# Home studio advice please



## Harry M (Jun 3, 2012)

I would like some feedback regarding my attempts at room treatment. Specific questions are at the end of this post.

I am just getting started in home recording (not theater) and joined this forum for information and feedback on room acoustics.

I have a 10' x 16' home office with 8-foot high ceilings that doubles as didgeridoo recording and mixing studio. I record in the middle of the room and mix at the desk/computer. Here is my office layout:










I am recording the didgeridoo. My first attempts at recording produced very poor results (comb filtering?) despite using decent recording electronics and mics. After a lot of research I focused on using REW and room treatment to solve the problems.

I build the following panels:

2 x Roxul Rockboard 80 bass traps (4" x 48" x 24") in the corners

2 x Roxul Rockboard 80 bass traps (4" x 24" x 24") in the corners

6 x Roxul Acoustic Fire Batts absorption panels (2" x 48" x 24")

I spent a lot of time with REW and the RTA function to determine the effect of various positions of the bass traps and panels, including first reflection points and ceiling reflection points. For REW I used both my subwoofer and studio speakers for the measurement sweeps.

Here is a photo of my mixing station with the bass traps and absorption panels in place, showing the subwoofer and the two studio speakers in relation to the mixing station/computer:










Here are some REW plots of the mixing station BEFORE and AFTER the bass traps and absorption panels were in place. The first plot is a full-spectrum SPL plot (15-25kHz) and the second plot is a subwoofer waterfall plot (15-200Hz) using a subwoofer and monitors.

Before









After









Before









After









There is a deep cut at about 105Hz that is probably from a standing wave from my subwoofer - I can't make it go away unless I sit directly in front of the subwoofer. 

Here is a photo of my didgeridoo recording station with the bass traps and absorption panels in place:










Questions:

1. I've tried moving the subwoofer around, pointing it in different directions, moved bass traps all over the room, and even surrounded the subwoofer with bass traps just to see what happens on RTA. But that big cut at about 105 Hz won't go away. Am I just screwed?

2. All of my panels seemed to have helped in the 15 to 2,000 Hz range, but nothing makes one bit of difference in the comb filtering above 2,000 Hz. What do I need to do next? Diffusion instead of absorption?


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

The higher frequencies I wouldn't be as concerned about honestly. Modes are very close together and you're not going to avoid them. On the bright side, the 'notes' are pretty far apart as you get up that high and the likelihood of a problem being on a note get very slim as you get up higher.

The null at 105 appears to have gotten worse after the treatments. I would find which ones are causing that which will also give us a clue as to how to what/where the problem is.

Bryan


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