Where do I start with this silly room?

Posted by: Mike Hanson on 12 June 2001

Ok, I'm slowly getting settled in my room, and I'm starting to realize that speaker positioning is going to be a royal PITA. With my big bay window, equipment closet taking a good chunk of space, big metal door on one wall, (always open) French doors behind, it's going to be a challenge. Here's a drawing of my room, with a couple of possible speaker positions:

I would prefer to use some derivation of the first configuration, since the speakers will be pointing out the double doors (and into the rest of the house), and I can lean back in my chair without bumping into the wall. Also, the second configuration is pretty much plagued with corner positioning for the speakers, while the first has a fair bit of flexibility for moving the speakers away from the walls.

Ignoring the bay window, the closet, and the always open French doors, the basic dimensions are 12'L x 8.5'W x 8'H. I may have room resonance problems with the 8' width being so close to the 8.5' height, but I'm hoping not. If I treat the ceiling, it will make the difference between dimensions more pronounced, so this may not be a problem.

The main problems with the first approach are the bay windows behind the speakers, which can produce a number of interesting effects from a phaser to a honk. I'll add some curtains, but I like looking out the window too. Also, the position of the chair is rather close to the closet door, which makes it a little difficult to change CDs and such.

There's also the issue of room reflections, standing waves, flutter echo, etc. I've got some software from ETF Acoustics that does real-time measurements of a room's acoustic properties, but it doesn't give any hints of good starting positions. You just keep trying different spots until you find the best measurements. Also, it's designed for a symmetrical room, and mine isn't. (You're supposed to measure just one speaker, and set up the other as a mirror image.) Therefore, I may be forced to test both speakers at the same time or separately, in an attempt to get the best positions. All the other software that I've seen also assumes that your room is a perfect rectangle.

Then there's the concept of the listener being in an equilateral triangle with the speakers. Right now I have them about 18" off each side wall, which puts the centres approximately 5' apart. If I sit with my head 5' from the speakers, this seems rather confined (only slightly bigger than my office system, which is around 4').

As far as room treatments go, I mentioned earlier that I'm going to put curtains on the windows. I may even install an additional roll-down tapestry to completely block the bay window for those intense listening sessions at night, when there's nothing to see out the window. I will also lay an area rug of some type. I'm not sure whether it should run the length of the room, just down at one end, across the front of the speakers, or what.

I appreciate any help or suggestions that you can throw my way. With all of the fiddling with Mana, etc., my wife is getting sick of me tweaking my stereo. (At least when I'm listening to music I can interact with her, but when I'm doing set up stuff, I'm indisposed.) I also don't enjoy fiddling, as listening to music is much more fun. Thanks guys.

-=> Mike Hanson <=-

Posted on: 19 June 2001 by Mike Hanson

I'm willing to remove the closet wall, but I would like to try all my other options first. If I leave the gear the in the closet, then it's protected from the cats. Elsewhere, there's no hope for it.

I was speaking with Vuk yesterday, and he suspects that my speakers are energizing the floor. (He had this problem with his Neat Elites, until he added the Sound Bases under them.) To enable me to move the speakers easily about the room, I had stuck them well into a couple of MDF slabs, which float along the floor without any further physical isolation. Consequently, there's a strong coupling between the speakers and floor.

Just for a quick test (I didn't have much time this morning), I set the system to Mono, panned far to one channel, and played something with lots of bass. I stood beside the speaker as the bass lit up the room, and I lifted it off its stand. Much (not all) of the "problem" bass dissipated. This gives me great hope, and my next step will be to find a better isolation method that allows repositioning without marring the beautiful hardwood floor. Once I find the perfect spot, I don't have a problem with spike marks. I just don't want it looking like a pincushion.

-=> Mike Hanson <=-

Posted on: 19 June 2001 by Mike Hanson

A friend who lives not too far from me was using cement paving slabs with felt underneath. He still had the bass problem. When he changed to Mana Sound Stages, the problem went away. I'm probably going to try some cones under the MDF, or something similar. Alternatively, I may try some Vuk-style ball footers in place of the spikes in my speaker stands, then place them directly on the floor. However, this may not give me sufficient isolation.

I'm getting entirely tired of all this tweaking. I wish I could just sit in front of my system and have it sound good. Oh well... I guess it will come with time.

-=> Mike Hanson <=-

Posted on: 19 June 2001 by Mike Hanson

quote:
Clearly feel free to dismiss the large weight of opinion here that led me to try this, and then Mana. Obviously the friend of a mate who someone once met on holiday provides the absolute answer in this case. No other truth is possible.

He's not quite that far removed from me. In fact, I've heard his system a bunch of times, without the slabs, with the slabs, and with Sound Stages. The slabs helped, but took it only half way there. I think that's further than my MDF solution is right now, which is why I'm still considering them. However, I would like to get it closer to the final support before fine tuning the position with the ETF Acoustic software.

-=> Mike Hanson <=-

Posted on: 24 June 2001 by Mike Hanson

I've been trying for the past week now to get configuration #2 to work. Although, the mids and highs were fine, the entire bass frequency spectrum was excessively exaggerated. If this was a room resonance (i.e. a standing wave) problem, then it should only happen at few frequencies, but this was happening at all lower frequencies.

The speakers were well-spiked into MDF platforms, which were sitting directly on the floor. Since they might have been transferring bass energy into the floor, I decided to isolate them better. First I put the MDF on cones, then I repositioned the speakers so that they were not pressed hard into the MDF. This seemed to tighten the sound, but didn't solve the bass problem.

However, it did manage to eliminate enough of the problem to make the remaining issue much more obvious: wall proximity. The room was simply too small for option #2. I had the speakers about 18" off the back and side walls. If I sat my chair close to the opposite wall, then it was very boomy. However, if I leaned forward about 12", then it was almost perfect. I played with positions a little more, and there's just no way to make this work, without being forced to sit four feet from the speakers.

So now I'm back to option #1. I'm using the cones under the platforms, which deals with most of the bass problem I originally had in this configuration. There are still a couple of bass frequencies that seem mildly accentuated, but overall the sound is very good. I probably won't mind the chair there either, as I can can almost change CDs without getting up.

So it's going to stay this way for now. I'll probably replace the MDF platforms with Mana at some point, but the current solution is working pretty well for now. Now I have to get an area rug and some curtains, to see how that attentuates the sound.

Thanks again for all of your help and suggestions. It seems that I'm getting it licked, little by little.

-=> Mike Hanson <=-

[This message was edited by Mike Hanson on MONDAY 25 June 2001 at 03:54.]