Component Advice for Small Room with Lively Surfaces
millercarbon, thanks very much for your recommendation on the Raven. Had no idea they are made in Texas, which is where I live. I will be sure to check them out. Really do appreciate your in-depth explanation and observations. erik_squires, thank you for your thoughts. You are correct in that there is not a lot of surface area in the room that can be treated. I don't think the stone wall is treatable either as it has stainless steel built in cabinets for components and albums and 4 stainless steel niches for guitar displays. Will definitely check out your suggested acoustic and EQ treatments. Are there any particular controlled dispersion speakers that would be worth considering? Thanks to you both. |
I had a challenging room though not as bad as you describe yours. I ended up using ARC room correction. I used Dirac as well but I liked Anthems line of products better. Either one should help with reflections and bass integration, I found the latter more important to me as I am not a fan of boomy bass that vibrates your insides. Another thing that would help is rugs on the floor and upholstered furniture. Edit: I didn't notice you mentioned spinning vinyl. ARC or Dirac used would be doing analog to digital conversions which is something you might not want. |
Vanquish wrote: "This makes a lot of sense Duke and I am wondering if there are any
particular dipoles and horns that you would recommend?" In my opinion SoundLab fullrange electrostats do an excellent job in a wide range of rooms, assuming they can be positioned five feet in front of the wall. Less than that and they can still work well, but we will need to diffuse the backwave or, as a last resort, absorb it. SoundLabs have an exceptionally uniform radiation pattern across either 45 degrees or 90 degrees front and back, depending on whether you go with the new (45 degree) panels or the old (90 degree) panels. I prefer the new 45 degree panels UNLESS a rather wide sweet spot is needed. I make low-coloration horn speakers with room interaction very much in mind, which includes something that I don't think anyone else is doing: I include user-adjustable additional upwards-and-backwards firing drivers to fine-tune the reverberant field. The fairly directional output of these additional drivers bounces off the wall behind the speakers and then off the ceiling before arriving at the listening area, so it arrives after a sufficiently long time delay without requiring much distance from the wall. My website is under revision but you can see my current models at James Romeyn Music and Audio. Jim is my partner. You mentioned Texas... I'm located about an hour from Dallas. Duke |
I have a very similar room my wife’s 12x12 sunroom with windows on 3 sides a tile floor and cathedral ceiling. Also limited options for placement within. It’s an acoustic nightmare. Lucky it’s not my main listening room. Having tried many speakers in there larger and smaller over the years in this case smaller was best. Currently using tiny Vanatoo Transparent One Encore actives in there (angled up slightly on short isolation stands) and am happiest I have been with the sound in there. Smaller may be best in very lively rooms Photo:https://photos.app.goo.gl/npCgHZEPXT3wmfww5 Also have used these 8” Ohm Walsh speakers there to good effect but was overkill for me in there: https://photos.app.goo.gl/aqqRqhkHGpjBqnk28 |
