CARA - Room Acoustic Software


We're very much not into doing sales-pitch type posts, but after reading through several threads in this forum, we realized that questions regarding software for room acoustics were frequent enough that if we tried to answer every thread, we'd *really* feel obnoxious!

So... the lesser of two evils

CARA is a comprehensive room acoustic modelling package designed and developed by German physicist: Dr. Ulrich Thomanek. Dr. Thomanek worked with ELAC GmbH for many years and used computer models to bring their loudspeakers to be the number two in Germany.

He started ELAC Technische Software as a spinoff dedicated to his computer programs associated with loudspeaker modelling and room acoustics. CARA 2.0 is the product.

Rather than get into too many details here, I'll send you to www.cara.de where they have lots of information regarding CARA and a walkthrough. The site is in both English and German.

Early last year, Rhintek became the US representative for ETS and CARA. We have a strong background in software development, but are relatively new to the high-end audio industry. Our website is: www.rhintek.com

Thanks for your time, I'll probably be lurking around here on occasion as it looks like this forum is a good place for me to gain more understanding.

Kristin VanVranken,
Rhintek Incorporated
kristin3e25
Though not previously experienced with any CAD products, I was able to model everything in this room including a couple of odd corners and the two exposed beams on the ceiling. Not the most complete CAD package according to a buddy who would know, but definitely workable with some diligence.
BR>BTW, my system is set up along the 19.5' wall. A neat feature is the ability to do a 3-D walk through of the modeled space. Mine looks alarmingly like my room. Except my speakers aren't blue. ;-0 Which reminds me of a bugaboo in CARA. Be careful when defining the regions in which speakers or listeners can be moved during optimizations. If these overlay a 3-D object (sofa, rack, TV, etc.) the speaker or listener will be raised above that object. To avoid this I always do a 3-D walk through before running any calculations.

Ran the calculations once without realizing this had happened and got great reference numbers. Turns out the speakers and listener were suspended about six feet in the air! Haven't figured out how to make stuff float in the air quite yet...
That last sentence should have reas, "Haven't figured out how to make stuff float in the air in real life yet.... "
Dad gummit, "...should had READ,..." One of these days I'll learn how to prufreed.
Woudl I be correct if I assume that CARA can also be used to make hypothetical changes to a listening room such as a pair of tube traps or that small sink and wet bar that my wife seems to be thirsting for?

JD
The short answer is yes.

To expand on the subject, once a new object is placed in a model using the CAD tool there are three calculation options available, position optimization, sound field calculation and special calculation.

Position optimization would indicate if a new speaker/listener postition would be appropriate (or how well it would work). Sound field calculation could be used to visually compare set ups. These two sets of calculations can take awhile to complete; sometimes on the order of days. Special calculation runs through the basic calculations once and seems to be most useful for quick feedback. It's the "what if" feature in my opinion.

Each of these has a number of user defineable variables available (listed under the general categories of SPL Target Functions, Variational Ranges, Weightings and Parameters) that I won't go into detail on at this time. Hope that's helpful.