Small room reality, or can I do better?

[snackiac]

Hello all,

I've been trying to optimize my new KH750 with my KH80s, and I'm wondering if this is just about the best I can do in my room. I've moved stuff around as much as I can, but it's a little hard with the main cables coming from the sub. I've gotten the best response so far with everything close to the wall. Moving them out seems to cause the dips to widen, but not really reduce in depth. It's a small room so I can't pull them out super far. It does sound pretty good to me (a little boomy still), just wondering if I should keep trying, or if there's not much else I can do other than room treatment.

Thanks for any feedback!

 

[fpitas]

May be some ideas here:

Early Reflections Are Not Beneficial

ethanwiner.com

I know putting up ceiling absorbers helped my small room a lot.

 

[kacos]

Try the subzone app - it will show you the best places to put your sub in the room:

room looks like this btw

Here's the best I got so far (blue line is the Harman curve):

 

[Elkerton]

I'd say you've done remarkably well.

 

[Willem]

However, small rooms are a challenge because the room modes extend to higher frequencies. @snackiac are you using the dsp room eq options of your sub?

 

[kacos]

Are you using the dsp room eq options of your sub?

that helps too after you figure out the position of the sub (forgot to add this):

 

[snackiac]

However, small rooms are a challenge because the room modes extend to higher frequencies. @snackiac are you using the dsp room eq options of your sub?

Yes, I should have added that this is post MA1 calibration with some tweaking to my taste.

It seems like the MA1 expected and the actual averaged responses are pretty close to me (using psychoacoustic)? Not sure, this is pretty new to me

 

[snackiac]

May be some ideas here:

Early Reflections Are Not Beneficial

ethanwiner.com

I know putting up ceiling absorbers helped my small room a lot.

I'm not opposed to putting up some treatment, but I don't understand what I'm doing enough to have confidence it would help. I keep messing around with the absorption values in REW, but I haven't found anything fairly simple to try.

I thought some tuned absorbers in the 70 to 100hz range could help, but I'm not sure, and I'd want to try to build them myself considering how expensive those things are. I know those bass frequencies are pretty tough to absorb.

 

[fpitas]

I'm not opposed to putting up some treatment, but I don't understand what I'm doing enough to have confidence it would help. I keep messing around with the absorption values in REW, but I haven't found anything fairly simple to try.

I thought some tuned absorbers in the 70 to 100hz range could help, but I'm not sure, and I'd want to try to build them myself considering how expensive those things are. I know those bass frequencies are pretty tough to absorb.

I used broadband absorbers for the ceiling. If you go to Winer's website he may offer pointers.

 

[kacos]

I'm not opposed to putting up some treatment, but I don't understand what I'm doing enough to have confidence it would help. I keep messing around with the absorption values in REW, but I haven't found anything fairly simple to try.

I thought some tuned absorbers in the 70 to 100hz range could help, but I'm not sure, and I'd want to try to build them myself considering how expensive those things are. I know those bass frequencies are pretty tough to absorb.

here's a test with your room dimensions, and guesswork on the type of room construction (the 1 is estimated ear position):

with your sub as set in your 1st screenshot:

and with the sub in the proposed position:

 

[snackiac]

here's a test with your room dimensions, and guesswork on the type of room construction (the 1 is estimated ear position):

with your sub as set in your 1st screenshot:
View attachment 320732

and with the sub in the proposed position:

View attachment 320733

That definitely looks worth trying! Ugh, going to need to order some longer cables.

 

[kacos]

Ugh, going to need to order some longer cables

lol, don't remind me - I had to get a 10 meter one

 

[DJBonoBobo]

That definitely looks worth trying! Ugh, going to need to order some longer cables.

Make sure to make not only measurement but also listening test. One sub far to one side can sound worse than one in the middle, even if it measures better (stereo balance).

 

[kacos]

Make sure to make not only measurement but also listening test. One sub far to one side can sound worse than one in the middle, even if it measures better (stereo balance).

the app doesn't show it, but it positions the sub pointing to the listening position.
I had to try it both ways to figure it out .. and if you level match it to the speakers you won't/shouldn't be able to even tell if it works

 

[snackiac]

Make sure to make not only measurement but also listening test. One sub far to one side can sound worse than one in the middle, even if it measures better (stereo balance).

Yeah, definitely will. I had it off the side next to R at first, and I could tell it was there just through floor vibrations and such. It sounded better to me centered even though the measurements weren't much different. It might be ok with it even further away off to the side, but I didn't have the cables to try it there.

Interestingly REW showed it might improve just rotating the sub 180 degrees, and to my ears it does sound better (might be placebo). Need to bust out the mic again...

 

[snackiac]

I guess my main is question is about the smoothing. I was under the impression that I should pay more attention to var smoothing for the bass region. Is that only for EQ'ing though? As in psychoacoustic is too smoothed to accurately know what to EQ, but it's still fairly representative, even for bass, of what we actually hear?

 

[ozzy9832001]

I guess my main is question is about the smoothing. I was under the impression that I should pay more attention to var smoothing for the bass region. Is that only for EQ'ing though? As in psychoacoustic is too smoothed to accurately know what to EQ, but it's still fairly representative, even for bass, of what we actually hear?

It's going to come down to your preference once the EQ filters are generated. For me, I find 1/6 smoothing is about where I want it to be when generating EQs. Otherwise, the bass ends up way too bloated and sounds very unnatural.

However, when positioning subwoofer and/or speakers, you want to try and get the best response with VAR smoothing that you can, even if you may have a narrow dip or 2.

Looking over your graphs of the corrected vs uncorrected, and my personal preference would say that it would probably sound quite boomy. When software tries to boost out of cancellations caused by SBIR it never sounds right.

 

[snackiac]

It's going to come down to your preference once the EQ filters are generated. For me, I find 1/6 smoothing is about where I want it to be when generating EQs. Otherwise, the bass ends up way too bloated and sounds very unnatural.

However, when positioning subwoofer and/or speakers, you want to try and get the best response with VAR smoothing that you can, even if you may have a narrow dip or 2.

Looking over your graphs of the corrected vs uncorrected, and my personal preference would say that it would probably sound quite boomy. When software tries to boost out of cancellations caused by SBIR it never sounds right.

Thanks, that makes sense.

I've tried like 20 more positions, and I mostly just end up moving problems around, so I think I'm going try to be happy with this (it does sound good to me), and try some treatments eventually. I do like the sub better between the mains too. It's still really boomy outside the listening position, but that's ok for me

Thanks for the feedback everyone!