# Room Sounds Like a Stairwell



## yourgrandma (Oct 29, 2007)

My HT/Bedroom has sounded like **** since I moved in. I have signifigantly improved the sound in the past four years, but i still feel the need to sit way too close to my mains to get decent sound.

Room is 14'X16' with an 8' cieling, bad news, I know.

First and most troubling is the severe flutter echo. It was originally far worse than the stairway, but I've done the following to provide some relief:
1. Shag rug- Literally 1-1/2" deep shag in black an brownish green. That was helpful to an extent, but its looks are more noticeable.
2. Speaker placement.- Ive gotton it to where the speakers dont really echo, but the sound is still muddied. I have my mains three feet from the sides and 40" from the back wall. They are also angled in slightly, and tilted back on spikes.
3. Fake Acoustic Foam- I noticed this packaging material that has a very similar look and feel to real deadening foam. So i grabbed a bunch. I have it along the cieling in an alternatin pattern so that opposite each piece is an open space on the other wall. Thy're 16x28x3" and only did the back an side walls. Eight pieces total. Then i had some of the same stuff, but like 4.5" thick and made a primitave bass trap/howl reducer in the corner where my sub sits. All this effort actually yeilded pretty good results, but...

I still have a horrid lack of bass in my listening position, and lack detail in the midrange.

Any suggestions on what particular course of action I should take would be much appriciated. Keep in mind that I dont know how much longer my mommy and daddy will let me stay here, even paying rent, so cheap and easily removed are important descriptors.

I'll try to post up some diagrams as the place is way too messy to post pics, and my camera is busted anyway.

Thanks for any input!


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

Please post your speaker positions in relation to the room (length and width) and also your seating position. Likely, some of the bass issues can be helped with careful positioning.

Next thing is to ditch the 4" foam and get some real bass absorbers. Also likely, some good panels directly behind each speaker to deal with SBIR and also centered on the rear wall to kill the nulls off the back wall.

Bryan


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## yourgrandma (Oct 29, 2007)

I metioned in my OP that the fronts are about 3' fom the side walls and about 3.5 feet from the fron wall. The seating position is just about centered in the room, 8 feet from both ends and 7 feet from both sides. My RSW10 is pretty much stuck in the corner, but it seems to be the only place ive tried putting it where i can tell its even on. I'll try throwing up a quick diagram in a second.


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## yourgrandma (Oct 29, 2007)

Wow, I cant believe that worked the first try.

By no means should this be imagined to be to scaled in ant way, just a rough drawing to give an idea of how its all layed out.the two blobs up front are the towers, the blobs on the sides are my BiPolars, and the blobs in back are my rears.

Theres a window 84" wide on the back wall and a conveniant ledge under it. The big rectangle in back is my twin sized bed and the two boxes on top are my equipment tower on the left, and my tv,and center channel speakers. Im gonna try to get a scanner running to show you a much better hand drawn version, perfectly to scale and much more detailed. But first i have to figure out this infernal Harmony!


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## yourgrandma (Oct 29, 2007)

Just for the fun of it, here are some pictures of my setup and whatnot, the shag rug isn't in the pics, I was cleaning it at the time of the pics, ah well, its black and brown and is 4X6 feet.

This is the view from the door.









This is from the opposite corner.









My gear.









Right speaker and media.









Behind my sub.,









Not sure if that will help describe my problem, but i figured since I just uploaded a bunch of pictures to photo bucket, I'd share my setup. I think it works pretty well for the multipupose nature of the room, but I think some proper acoustic treatments would help immensely.

Thanks for any insight.


I just noticed the last couple are sideways, and in opposite directions no less, i feel bad for people with neck problems.


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

Can you post:

- the distance from the front of the speaker to the wall behind

- distance from L and R speaker centers to the wall beside them.

- distance from your seated ear position to the front wall.

If you can provide those accurate to the inch, that will help a lot in trying to determine where your issues lie.

Bryan


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## yourgrandma (Oct 29, 2007)

The centers of both front baffles are 24.5" from the side walls, and 29" from the wall behind. 

The position of my ear varies a lot but when I do my most critical listening, it would be 100" from the front wall.

If it's any help, I have a twin sized bed in the back right corner of the room, a window centered on the back wall that is 84"X55", and behind the front right speaker, I have all my CD's and DVD's as seen in the photos.

I would love to supply a nice technical drawing with accurate scale dimentions, but I can't get AutoCAD to work with Windows Vista. I fi figure something out, I'll post a scale drawing first thing. 

Again, to try to make things easier, I would say thit I prefer a somewhat live sound, but not overly bright. I'm not totally opposed to rearranging the room, but ther would have to be some serious gains in sound to convince me to do that. All that stuff is really heavy! I guess the most important thing is that I'm on the cheap and whatever I do has to be reasonably easy to reverse.

Thanks again for the help, I've been pretty disappointed in how my setup sounds for the last four years, hopefully you can point me in the right direction to get my system to perform the way it should.


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## yourgrandma (Oct 29, 2007)

Does anyone have any suggestions yet? I'm still trying to get AutoCad running so I can post a very detailed technical drawing. 
In the meantime, are there any threads I can look at to read up on home made basstraps and reflective treatments?

I'd like to have a fairly neutral sounding room, as in not too live, but I don't want it to sound like the inside of a whale, either.

Based on my crude sketch, where would I be best off focusing my attention first? I assume bass trapping would be the easiest, and the lack of bass is the first thing you notice. Even with the powered subs in the PT400s and the RSW10, it sounds like I have bookshelves. Should I do all the corners with traps, or just the front? It almost seems that symmetry is my enimy here, would it be best to only do the corner behind the sub?

I know this has to be an annoying post, but I really would like to get this room to sound like it's filled with decent gear, like I payed for.

I really appriciate any help, beyond the basics of speaker placement, I'm pretty much in the dark.

Thanks very much.


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## eugovector (Sep 4, 2006)

Ditch autocad and use roomarranger. Much easier.

I mentioned in your previous thread, that foam up by your ceiling is doing absolutely nothing for you. Move it to your First Reflection Points. Also, get some real fiberglass.


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## yourgrandma (Oct 29, 2007)

I took your advise and whipped up a quick roomarranger. I will continue to tweek and add detail to it, but for now, here is what I have.










Is there a better way to share this? Instead of as a picture, can I share it with you as a real roomarranger file, so you can see all the dimentions, or should I just update it with all the dims on the drawing?


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## eugovector (Sep 4, 2006)

yourgrandma said:


> I took your advise and whipped up a quick roomarranger. I will continue to tweek and add detail to it, but for now, here is what I have.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Just tell us what the grid equals, is it 12"?


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## yourgrandma (Oct 29, 2007)

Dont ask me why but the grid is 20". Im trying to figure out how to change it to 12" or maybe even 6" for more accuracy.


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

Basic room layout looks pretty good. You're sitting dangerously close to 1/2 of the length of the room. Also try shifting the whole setup about 6" off to one side including your seating position to get out of the midpoint null/peaks of the width dimension

After bass absorbers in the front corners, to knock things down a bit, you'll need some reflection absorbers on the side wall and potentially a thicker panel centered on the rear wall behind your seated head position.

Bryan


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## yourgrandma (Oct 29, 2007)

Is there a particular brand or style of absorber you would recommend? Same for bass trapping?

Theres a slight problem with a panel on the back wall. Theres a 7foot wide window across the back wall. Is there an alternative? Presently I have some pretty thick curtains, but not a lot else. 

Would you expect the same effect as moving the setup to one side if I move one main speaker towards the middle, and adjust my position accordingly? Theres not much room on the left side.

I'm going to look around at some of my options for trapping and absorbers.

:hail::thankyou:


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

The idea is to have the listening position centered with the speakers but not with the room center in the width dimension.

As for treatments, of course I'll recommend ours! 

Bryan


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## yourgrandma (Oct 29, 2007)

Can you set me straight on bass trapping? I'm seeing many different options and I'm not really sure which is most effective, rather for the price. I saw your corners, are they made with compressed fiberglass? Is that a specific type, or is it a readily available product? What is your view of commercial traps like the Auralex LENRD? From a budjet standpoint, I assume the home made fiberglass treatments are the way to go, but is there a disernable difference in performance?

How would I deal with any imaging problems arising from offsetting the speakers? Im really stuck on symmetry, and I love good imaging. With good recordings, I can walk right up to the center and it sounds like its running until i put my ear up to it, I love that about my speakers.

It's nice being able to hear from someone who knows what they're talking about, thaks for your help!


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