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Obsessed with room acoustics

I've been involved in audio for perhaps twenty five years now, could be described as an audiophool for the last ten. In all these years I have never had an issue that has consumed me more than the room acoustics in my present dedicated listening room.
Specifically, a number of years ago I became aware of a channel inbalance, essentially more air and spaciousness in one channel vs. the other. I determined this channel inbalance was due to room asymetry after both trying different equipment and reversing channels.
Over the years I tried to adjust for this asymetry through endless experimentation with acoustic treatments (RPG, Echobusters), both diffusion and absorption. While there was definite improvement, I only became more frustrated and obsessed with the remaining inbalance, at least part of every listening session involved readjusting acoustic treatments.
Finally, the frustration drove me over the edge, I determined the only way to rid myself of the inbalance was to treat the source, in other words, redesign the room. I recently tore out all the walls that created the room aysmetry, I even went to the extreme of perfectly balancing out room furnishings. Of course, the acoustic treatments are perfectly balanced as well!
Finally, I have nearly perfectly balanced soundstaging and imaging. Nearly perfect I say, there still remains some asymetry on the rear wall :-)
I guess the point I'm trying to make is how amazed I am by this obession, no other parameter of sound (perhaps bass boom) has managed to obsess me so. I guess I'm jealous of those who can listen contendly in environments much less conducive to the perfect soundstaging and imaging I now require.
I too, listened contendly for years in much lesser rooms, it seems the psycholgical needs of a perfectionist audiophool displaced normal listening behavior. While I am now content with my listening, perhaps another issue may arise, any audiophile doctors in the house?
Now that I think of it, has anyone ever heard of psychologists that treat audiophilia :-)
sns
athipaul
40 posts
 
Reminds of someone I know who kept blaming all his problems on the room and its acoustics. Were you very very sure that it was/is the room thats the source of your woes?
I wish I could do what you have done, rebuild the room but that's not an option. I can't even get rid of some of furniture (bookshelves) as the little woman would throw me out rather than her collection of books. There are things you have to learn to live with and sometimes you need to bend a little and not be so picky and just enjoy the music. I could ask if you are so concerned with the rooms acoustics why you did not try Room EQ. I am sure it would probably get you a lot closer to what you want at the expense of some purity.
snofun3
601 posts
 
Seeing some of the beautiful systems in the dreadful rooms always reminds me that this is an equipment and not a music hobby to many here.

Best bang for buck tweek you'll ever find is to send diagram of your room to Auralex (auralex.com), and have them make some suggestions. They have everything from standard panels to WAF friendly pieces, and you can do a quick-and-dirty experiment on the cheap by picking up panels at Guitar Center for $20 for a 2 x 4 sheet.
imin2u
392 posts
 
You say it like it's a bad thing. :)
shadorne's avatar
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shadorne
7,477 posts
 
After assembling a modest system - room acoustics probably has the biggest impact on sound quality.

I agree with those that say careful selection of furnishings can really help.

I drew the line at a custom designed soffit mounted main speaker and equipment cabinetry with 2 1/2" thick mdf and 3" acoustic fibreglass around mains, four corner bass traps, a custom massive log pile fire place (esthetic rear wall bass trap) a sub (even though main speakers have 12" woofers) and a PEQ to control extreme LF. I count myself fortunate not to be obsessive!
acoustat6
357 posts
 
Hello, take a look at my room, I am obsessed also. You should be! This was the biggest improvement I have done to my system. If you are really serious about good sound and hearing your components this it the final frontier. I would say though that if I had to do it over again I would have done the room first, before buying any equipment! I was never on the component merry-go-round which is perhaps even more telling. I have owned Acoustats for over twenty years and have heard them in my various houses and rooms with different equipment. I know what they sound like with and without room treatment and in different sounding rooms and different equipment. While the overall sonic signature of the speakers is a constant, the vast majority of improvement was from room treatment. It improved the bass reproduction, imaging, clarity and including high freq response. All of these improvement and others, are simply not obtainable through equipment changes. Bob
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