Since I did some room node cut-outs with the EQ, one of the results was I could then clearly hear other anomolies with the speaker output.
The worst offender was an out of phase sound were I to just move my head a few inches left or right, and seemingly odd reflections that I couldn't track down. I moved my absorption panels everywhere, to try to isolate the anomoly and all evidence led me to conclude the problem originated on the front wall. So today I decided to address this. I used a test disc, "The Music Surround Spectacular", which has tracks for phase, imaging, pink noise and frequency sweeps.
I used all pertinent tracks and moved the speakers every which way to Sunday - near, far, close together, far apart, changed phase on the woofers, you name it. The best result came from having the speakers ~ 15' apart up against the front wall but the imaging was still all over the place on different frequencies. Not good enough.
The way I then had the speakers in the room were that the front wall was a parallel wall in relation to the ridge board of the cathedral ceiling. There was a "dining area" off to the left that I had blocked off with my homemade absorption panels. Since I had used every iteration of speaker position in regard to that orientation to no satisfaction, I decided to use the large wall 90 deg. to the current one, perpendicular to the ridge and with symmetrical left and right side walls.
That did the trick. The stereo centering track which runs a tone from 12khz down to 99hz stayed pretty much on center, wavering very slightly once or twice to one side, but not by much and nowhere near the far left, out the door, up the chimney, in the garage positions of the former orientation as frequency dropped. The imaging tracks were spot on, left- half left-center-half right-right, bingo! The entire sound stage has more depth than I could get formerly. I will be tweaking for stage width shortly.
But all is not ok, since doing this major relocation I have to re-read the room and rebalance the subs, as all my previous settings on the EQ are meaningless for this setup. It seems as though I lost some of the resolution too. Plus I have to figure out what to do with the rack, TV, and everything else in the room.
Still I'd rather have this new setup with corrected soundstage and apparent phase and work out the new problems than having to keep my head in a proverbial vice, all the time knowing something is wrong but not know what.
The worst offender was an out of phase sound were I to just move my head a few inches left or right, and seemingly odd reflections that I couldn't track down. I moved my absorption panels everywhere, to try to isolate the anomoly and all evidence led me to conclude the problem originated on the front wall. So today I decided to address this. I used a test disc, "The Music Surround Spectacular", which has tracks for phase, imaging, pink noise and frequency sweeps.
I used all pertinent tracks and moved the speakers every which way to Sunday - near, far, close together, far apart, changed phase on the woofers, you name it. The best result came from having the speakers ~ 15' apart up against the front wall but the imaging was still all over the place on different frequencies. Not good enough.
The way I then had the speakers in the room were that the front wall was a parallel wall in relation to the ridge board of the cathedral ceiling. There was a "dining area" off to the left that I had blocked off with my homemade absorption panels. Since I had used every iteration of speaker position in regard to that orientation to no satisfaction, I decided to use the large wall 90 deg. to the current one, perpendicular to the ridge and with symmetrical left and right side walls.
That did the trick. The stereo centering track which runs a tone from 12khz down to 99hz stayed pretty much on center, wavering very slightly once or twice to one side, but not by much and nowhere near the far left, out the door, up the chimney, in the garage positions of the former orientation as frequency dropped. The imaging tracks were spot on, left- half left-center-half right-right, bingo! The entire sound stage has more depth than I could get formerly. I will be tweaking for stage width shortly.
But all is not ok, since doing this major relocation I have to re-read the room and rebalance the subs, as all my previous settings on the EQ are meaningless for this setup. It seems as though I lost some of the resolution too. Plus I have to figure out what to do with the rack, TV, and everything else in the room.
Still I'd rather have this new setup with corrected soundstage and apparent phase and work out the new problems than having to keep my head in a proverbial vice, all the time knowing something is wrong but not know what.
