Placement options – Impacts of location, orientation and treatments

Source of Acoustic treatments in the UK

For our freinds across the pond in the UK and Europe, there is this company that sells various acoustic treatments that you could contact for options:

http://www.customaudiodesigns.co.uk/index.htm

They also have a nice assortment of articles on Acoustics.

Although Ethan does ship international, it's nice to have options.

bigtickets said:

Do you guys think that proud owners of bose speakers have discussions as in depth as this thread is? Another reason why I love these speakers. Cheers Cheers Cheers!!!

Eric

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LOL :haha1:

Nah, they're too busy 'bose'ting about how cool their tiny little speakers are

Real audiophiles measure their radiating surfaces by the square foot :devil:

When you put the HF Mondo trap behind the ML's, which is giving absorbtion, do you keep the wall behind listening position diffussive to in keeping with one wall live, one wall absorbtive?

I see in the current Stereophile a real trap advertisment with an ML owner saying how the real trap diffusors improved upon his imaging when placed behind the listening position.. There is a picture of it in the ad on page 51. Would it be safe to assume with the HM mondo behind the speakers that the real teap diffusors would be the perfect mate on the opposite wall behind the listener?

MOON said:

Would it be safe to assume with the HM mondo behind the speakers that the real teap diffusors would be the perfect mate on the opposite wall behind the listener?

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I can't give you a definitive answer on this, but I believe it to be true. I know JonFo has a skyline diffuser on his rear wall and it seems to do a great job. Perhaps he can jump in here and give you his thoughts on that.

The real traps diffusers are great and I think will work very well to keep the rear of the room live and diffusive, which is helpful for both movies and music, I think. Obviously every room is different and perspectives vary, so it will depend somewhat on your room and personal tastes. I have some RPG omnifusers I plan to mount on my rear wall but I just haven't got around to it yet.

MOON said:

When you put the HF Mondo trap behind the ML's, which is giving absorbtion, do you keep the wall behind listening position diffussive to in keeping with one wall live, one wall absorbtive?

I see in the current Stereophile a real trap advertisment with an ML owner saying how the real trap diffusors improved upon his imaging when placed behind the listening position.. There is a picture of it in the ad on page 51. Would it be safe to assume with the HM mondo behind the speakers that the real teap diffusors would be the perfect mate on the opposite wall behind the listener?

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Hi MOON,

Use of diffusion on the rear wall needs to be chosen carefully, as it depends on how close the listener will be to the rear wall whether absorptive or diffusive is recommended.

If the listener is right up against the wall (head within a foot from wall) then it must be absorptive. A MiniTrap HF is the only thing I'd put right behind the listener in that case.

If the seats are all >5' away from the rear wall, then diffusion can indeed be a nice thing to have, as Rich notes above, it gives a more 'spacious' sense.

The RealTrap diffuser trap is a great product for the rear wall, as it both provides diffusion in the mid and high frequencies and also absorbs bass to improve on common room modes.

I chose a 3D diffuser (the RPG Skyline) because it really enhances the overall 'enveloping' effect, as some of the sound is reflecting from the ceiling as well.

But I do also use the RealTraps diffusers behind my rear speakers, as I find 2D diffusion (and the low-freq absorption) is helpful for managing the dipole rear wave on rear channel sound. One reason this is helpful is that rear speakers are typically a lot closer to listeners than fronts, and therefore broadening the soundfield in the rear is a good thing.

tilt

I know this thread deals mostly with room treatment, but very early on someone mentioned experimenting with speaker tilt and its effects. Did this ever happen? I am doing some room tweaking and was just curious.
Thanks.

Haven't found any reviews, nor U.S. dealers featuring the XTZ product yet. However, Kal Rubinson (of Stereophile) posted in the AVSforum that he will be getting one shortly. In that thread, I asked Chris (of Audyssey) why THEY don't develop something like that, and was VERY pleased to see this response (hope it's OK to cross-post)...

Quote:
<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=7 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD class=alt2 style="BORDER-RIGHT: 1px inset; BORDER-TOP: 1px inset; BORDER-LEFT: 1px inset; BORDER-BOTTOM: 1px inset">Originally Posted by sleepysurf
Chris, has Audyssey given any thought to offering a standalone speaker/room acoustics measurement product, similar to the XTZ one...
http://www.xtz.se/produkt.php?allman...kt=41&eng=true

Lots of folks cobble together the hardware and software for room response measurements, but it's not easy. The XTZ idea is intriguing, but not widely available (at least in the U.S.) I'm sure a LOT of folks using Audyssey (in whatever fashion), would REALLY like to measure their actual room response effect without hiring a Pro installer. Of course, a well-written instruction manual would be necessary to ensure the measurements are accurate and meaningful, but if anybody can pull this off, I would think Audyssey would be the one!

</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
Stay tuned--I've already said too much.

Chris

Very interesting news Alan. We sure could use something simpler than what I have to go through.

But it’s not just the software, it’s how to hook it up.

To measure all six channels in a modern surround system using an external sound generator hooked to a PC, you really need to feed six inputs, or be able to switch one around into each of the six.

I used to plug an unplug the signal cable, but that required powering down amps, move the plug, then power up, rinse and repeat for each channel. What a bear.

So I got a switcher to help me out. One with IR control no less.
Not many one to six switchers out there, but hey, audio signals don’t care which direction they flow in, so I got a cheap AV switcher with six outputs and IR control, then connect the measurement rig output to the Left ‘output’ of the switcher, the six signals go to each ‘left’ of the six ‘inputs’ on the switcher. Presto, I can now measure all six channels without powering down amps, and bounce back and forth between sub and center (or any other speaker) all day long without getting out of my chair (lazy, I know).

So much better.

But even with that, the cabling is pretty intense. I’ll do a diagram tomorrow.

I also have some ideas I’ll post in new thread on measuring. About time for one of those as well ;-)

We also went off on treatment options in this other thread. Starting with a members premise that stuffing the back of the speaker would work to deal with the back-wave. So, pics, measurements and discussion on that variation (and contrasts to bare walls and MiniTraps) over here:
http://www.martinloganowners.com/fo...way-for-absorbing-back-wave&p=68278#post68278

mbergs9 said:

I know this thread deals mostly with room treatment, but very early on someone mentioned experimenting with speaker tilt and its effects. Did this ever happen? I am doing some room tweaking and was just curious.
Thanks.

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Eventually will get to this, but I've been busy with other stuff.

In general, this one will be trickier to cover, as tilt is very, very room dependent in it's effects.