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Which would you prefer for your system? (Explain why below)


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stevenswall

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Moved studio monitors from corners to ~30% the length of the side walls closer. They are near the sidewalls, per Genelec recommending keeping them closer, or if there is space making sure they are more than 1.1 meters from the wall. this follows the first rule for the side walls, and the second rule for the front wall.

No treatment yet, looking at putting up two or three layers of acoustic blankets on the back walls, and getting 6" absorbers at the first reflection points with scatter plates on one side. hopefully this helps. Very satisfied with the bass response crossing over lower and putting the subwoofer really close behind the seating area.

1620972857631.png


Prior setup had a deeper null on each speaker in the bass region around 80hz or so. That is gone now, but there are dips I'm worried about shown below, espeically around 5k and between 1k and 1.15k that are nearly 5dB down. The soundstage is much better though after moving them forward compared to having them angled in and back in the corners.
1620972867825.png
 

alex-z

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Correcting frequency response relatively simple, so pick the location with good imaging.

Acoustic aka moving blankets are not suitable for the rear wall. I tested a 72x80 7lb version and it only absorbed to around 1000Hz.

4" mineral wool panels by comparison can absorb well down to 200Hz. This should be your primary treatment choice, as most rooms have too little low frequency absorption, and too much high frequency absorption.

I would focus on the ceiling and rear wall first, as those late reflections are the most noticeable in terms of decay times impacting clarity. Side wall treatment should be done carefully. You want to keep some reflected energy, otherwise the speaker is too much of an obvious point source. Strike a nice balance between spaciousness and imaging.

Of course, eliminating SBIR is also a good thing which is why Genelec recommends either a short or long wall distance. If you place the speakers in the corners and surround them with absorption, that might be best.
 
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Hipper

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Correcting frequency response is not that simple!

I found it took positioning, room treatment and EQ to get a response I wanted, particularly in the most difficult to deal with region, bass (say 0-300Hz). None of these three things in isolation did the job. In addition, room treatment in particular adjusted the decay times which I found had a major impact on the sound. I also prevent side wall reflections using absorbers beside the outside of each speaker.

As a result of all this I do not get a big soundstage or impressive 3D image. Rather I get an image mostly stuck between the speakers with solid centre image and other instruments placed anywhere between the speakers. This mostly depends on the recording and as mine is mostly studio bound pop I don't often get the 'being there' impression. What I think I get is a good impression of what each instrument sounds like and good separation, for example in harmony singing.

The general guideline according to the likes of Floyd Toole is to get a smooth response, not necessarily a flat one. That is, no wide sharp dips or peaks. You have a useful tool in that you are using a sub. Moving that around the room will change the bass sound at your listening position allowing to concentrate on placing the Genelecs for mostly the higher frequencies. Two or more subs might be better still.

To sum up, use rules only as guidelines. Move your speakers and subs (and listening position) around your room as you can in order to get as near to your desired frequency response as you can. Add room treatment to further improve things (bass traps are important here to go as low as possible (these are usually big and intrusive so your domestic situation may be a factor of course). Then complete the task with DSP/EQ. Measure all the while to see how things are going. Don't be dogmatic about getting a ruler flat response. All target curves are to aim for only. In the end let your ears decide what is best.
 

Frank Dernie

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Correcting frequency response is not that simple!

I found it took positioning, room treatment and EQ to get a response I wanted, particularly in the most difficult to deal with region, bass (say 0-300Hz). None of these three things in isolation did the job. In addition, room treatment in particular adjusted the decay times which I found had a major impact on the sound. I also prevent side wall reflections using absorbers beside the outside of each speaker.

As a result of all this I do not get a big soundstage or impressive 3D image. Rather I get an image mostly stuck between the speakers with solid centre image and other instruments placed anywhere between the speakers. This mostly depends on the recording and as mine is mostly studio bound pop I don't often get the 'being there' impression. What I think I get is a good impression of what each instrument sounds like and good separation, for example in harmony singing.

The general guideline according to the likes of Floyd Toole is to get a smooth response, not necessarily a flat one. That is, no wide sharp dips or peaks. You have a useful tool in that you are using a sub. Moving that around the room will change the bass sound at your listening position allowing to concentrate on placing the Genelecs for mostly the higher frequencies. Two or more subs might be better still.

To sum up, use rules only as guidelines. Move your speakers and subs (and listening position) around your room as you can in order to get as near to your desired frequency response as you can. Add room treatment to further improve things (bass traps are important here to go as low as possible (these are usually big and intrusive so your domestic situation may be a factor of course). Then complete the task with DSP/EQ. Measure all the while to see how things are going. Don't be dogmatic about getting a ruler flat response. All target curves are to aim for only. In the end let your ears decide what is best.
My opinion too.
Room compensation is a blunt tool so it is much better to get an even in room response by speaker and listening positions first.
Compensation can't fill in nulls.
My system is already pretty even before applying a the room compensation.
 

fredstuhl

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I had a very similar experience with a pair of 8350. Placed near the front wall, I am getting a much flatter response, but placing them about 1.2m into the room seemed to improve imaging. Now, I didn‘t trust myself/ my hearing one bit in this test, because it took quite a while for me to position them back and forth and there is probably a very strong association with visably more space around the loudspeakers and the expectance to hear a wider/ deeper soundstage. Thought about how to test this properly blinded, but postponed it, because I figured it would need some serious preparation (i guess loudspeakers should be repositioned while the listener is not in the room and then when led to the listening position, the listener shouldn‘t get any cues that help him to locate it (step counts, directions, how the outside noise sounds at that spot...)).

While this could be a fun exercise that I am planning to actually do, is there any generalizable underlying principle that suggests that imaging usually improves when loudspeakers are not positioned directly at the front wall? Or is this always completely speaker/ room/ listening position dependent?
 

thewas

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Beware that our ears and brain doesn't perceive sound like a "stupid" omnidirectional mic does, especially above transition frequency where the direct sound dominates our impression, so those dips won't be perceived as strongly as they measure.

Personally precise and stable imaging is more important than measured dips and first one cannot be corrected while tonality issues partially can so my choice is obvious.
 

abdo123

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the majority of people don't have perfect equal hearing between their two ears, so it's very difficult to have very accurate phantom center anyway without a center channel.

while frequency response improvement is appreciated by everyone in the family.
 

FeddyLost

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Unless you mix/master with those monitors for living, perfect FR in LP is not mandatory.
Some irregularities in mid-hi frequencies in some single point is totally OK. You'd better measure set of points around your head position including some posture changes and average them.
Please keep in mind that if your wavelength at least comparable with microphone size, they might show wild changes if you move it. And wavelength for 5KHz is around 7 cm.
If you have some severe dips/peaks, you'd better first find out reasons for them. For example, if you measure 2 equal speakers with linear FR, you can get big dip when mids is off-phase. Measure separately L and R speakers, if some dips dissappear, just forget about them.
 

oversky

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PEACE can correct Left and Right channels separately.
Maybe you can make both channels fitting to the same target curve.
 
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stevenswall

stevenswall

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Acoustic aka moving blankets are not suitable for the rear wall. I tested a 72x80 7lb version and it only absorbed to around 1000Hz.

What I have aren't moving blankets. More absorbent, not reflective polyester, but they can absorb 80% of frequencies above 250hz if pleated, and the company, VocalBooth2Go, does provide third party measurements.

If I layer 2-3 of them on the back wall, I think it will help a lot with some slap echo and perceived quietness of the room.

I already have them from back when I was on a tighter budget, but do plan on getting some 6" thick absorbers for side walls, with diffusion plates that will help not absorb too much treble.

1621009098933.png
 

Frank Dernie

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Personally I accept that accurate location isn't possible without multi-channels.
I am interested in getting a convincing instrumental timbre which, since the timbre of an individual instrument is created by the balance of the mix of overtones, accurate frequency response and low harmonic distortion would seem to be the most likely parameters to be important for accurate timbre.
The amount of ambience on recordings varies a lot anyway.
 

audio2design

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Moved studio monitors from corners to ~30% the length of the side walls closer. They are near the sidewalls, per Genelec recommending keeping them closer, or if there is space making sure they are more than 1.1 meters from the wall. this follows the first rule for the side walls, and the second rule for the front wall.


Looking at what you did, you significantly widened the total included angle between the listener and the speakers. That will give you a wider sound-stage and make it better able to separate sounds across the sound stage, but as noted (did you detail?) you lose coherence of what is at the center.

Narrower listening angle causes less head induced comb filtering on mono signals (centered), while wider angle gives greater range until cross-talk kicks in. 2 channel sucks, but it is what we have unless we introduce cross-talk cancellation.
 
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stevenswall

stevenswall

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Looking at what you did, you significantly widened the total included angle between the listener and the speakers. That will give you a wider sound-stage and make it better able to separate sounds across the sound stage, but as noted (did you detail?) you lose coherence of what is at the center.

Narrower listening angle causes less head induced comb filtering on mono signals (centered), while wider angle gives greater range until cross-talk kicks in. 2 channel sucks, but it is what we have unless we introduce cross-talk cancellation.

Prior to this the center channel was very weak. Nothing really "centered" and it just sounded like a bit of a smear of sound from right to left relative to this.

Yeah, I wish I had a unit that could do processing for cross-talk cancellation, or maybe Polk will make a Legend speaker that is active and uses coaxial drivers.
 
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stevenswall

stevenswall

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Personally I accept that accurate location isn't possible without multi-channels.
I am interested in getting a convincing instrumental timbre which, since the timbre of an individual instrument is created by the balance of the mix of overtones, accurate frequency response and low harmonic distortion would seem to be the most likely parameters to be important for accurate timbre.
The amount of ambience on recordings varies a lot anyway.

I'd argue that room acoustics are going to affect instruments too, so the frequency response will be changed for them too. If a recording captures the ambiance of a room, this could be important not to double up with room issues, but if it's a close mic recording, perhaps it matters much less than we think it does.
 

Frank Dernie

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I'd argue that room acoustics are going to affect instruments too, so the frequency response will be changed for them too. If a recording captures the ambiance of a room, this could be important not to double up with room issues, but if it's a close mic recording, perhaps it matters much less than we think it does.
Yes IME room acoustics has a big influence, one of the biggest of the whole system.
It is one of the things I have played around with a lot over the last 50 odd years and learned what I "like" and what I find sounds most realistic, not always the same.
 

mononoaware

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Hi there, the following will not be very scientific so it may be technically incorrect.

I like probably many consumer's go through the process of buying speakers, then adjusting the positioning and placement of speakers in said room, until I achieve the most (subjective) pleasant result.

I have read many comments saying that the ideal placement in a room is long-ways as you diagram suggests.
But the speaker placement I have arrived at and find most pleasant is the opposite.

I have the speaker's placed far apart on the "long wall" of the room facing directly forward (no angling towards listener), and my listening position is closer to the centre of the room.

I just thought to suggest this and maybe you can try it to see how you perceive the sound.
(please take notes on your current speaker position's incase you decide to revert back to that positioning)

Just a suggestion, I mean it is always interesting to try new things. . .

(also worth mentioning the room I mention is small, and I do not use a subwoofer)
 
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stevenswall

stevenswall

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^I think that would be useful for speakers that have peaks that go away off axis. You lose a little detail with most off axis due to treble roll off. I've tried these long ways with a little toe in, but wider than an equilateral triangle. Maybe I should try that, though with the doors in the room this is really the only feasible wall to have them on.
 

direstraitsfan98

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Your ears will adjust to the dips, so overall I'd imagine the wider soundstage would be more appealing in the long run. You can always have a slight mix between the two by adjusting the toe in a little more or less. Also try moving your listening seat forward or back that could help if you're sitting in a null or a peak.
 

Andysu

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You can move them in closer and place panels on the sides and move the panels in close near to the speakers, just saying you can do whichever.
 

Pennyless Audiophile

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Soundstage is always way more important than tonal balance in my opinion. Tonal balance in 99% of the music that is effectively published is butchered in the mixing and mastering stage, and the 1% that isn't, it is usually not very interesting.
The right tonal balance is very elusive; I had a friend that constantly kept the bass knob at the max position and the treble knob at the min and he was happy this way...

I happened to hear room/equipment combinations that gave you the impression of perceiving the body of the singer in the room, as if it was a sculpture, fabulous!

I also would love if pop/rock music mix engineers stopped making blobs in the middle, or at least made available a "for audiophiles" version of their mixes. For the music I like I would be happy to pay double for it.
 
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