# Looking for suggestions to optimize sound



## jedispork (Jan 21, 2010)

Here are some pictures of my living room setup. Please forgive the clutter. I'm looking for any suggestions on how to optimize the sound in this room. I'm running beta 40's and a PB10-NSD. I've noticed that the clarity and detail of the sound is much better if I listen to my speakers from 3-4 feet away and is closer to what my headphones sound like. Sitting back in the chair things are still ok but not as crisp sounding. Is this to be expected or is there something in the room I can change or add? The large opening in the room has been very frustrating when trying to position stuff. thanks in advance.


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

Can we assume that flipping the room 180 degrees is not an option? While not optimal, it's certainly more symmetric than the current setup. 

Another option would be to reposition things in front of the fireplace since it looks like you don't use it. That would give you a lot more room beside the speakers and much better symmetry.

Nearfield listening helps to emphasize the actual response vs the room contributions, though they're not out of the picture totally. 

If you have to leave it oriented as is, I'd recommend moving the sub over to the right wall, shifting the cabinet to the right, and moving the left speaker to the other side of the opening, and treat the right short wall to help with boundary interactions.

Bryan


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## jedispork (Jan 21, 2010)

I'm going to give it a try in front of the fireplace. The black box on the floor is my pull up screen so that also limits my placement of the towers. The chair on the left is to keep the speaker from getting knocked into the screen. I have the sub placed on the right for the same reason. If I ever do away with the projector I will move the towers closer together. 

The couch is pretty much in the same place. I thought about using it for the main seat but I like the versatility of being able to move the chairs around. I can be happy with 2 chairs. The couch should be fine if we have extra people. I have foam insulation against the fireplace right now because we get a terrible draft through it. 

I still have to neaten things up a bit but are there anymore tweaks that would help the way it is now? Where would you put the sub and treatments? This way seems closer to being "right". I like it so far but afraid my girlfriend might flip when she gets home. I've been thinking about switching things up for a while but never pressed myself to go through with it until now.

thank you very much for the help


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

While maybe not perfect, it has to be a huge improvement over the way it was set up. 

After she gets over at the rearrangement, consider working with the sub position. Don't get hung up that it has to be between the speakers and the rack. I'd likely consider it just outside the left speaker to get a little bit of room gain without being in a corner.

Bryan


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

Came over here from your basement theater thread. I thought we had this one resolved? Is there something else you had a question about?


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## jedispork (Jan 21, 2010)

It is much better but was curious about adding treatments. The only corner I have is to the left of the display (setup between the windows). Would adding tri-traps there help? I also thought about adding some on the other side of the short wall and stairs where its kind of a corner but didn't know if it would still be beneficial to treat that. I read somewhere that if you have large openings into other areas often times treatments don't help. 

Acoustically which room would be better for me after treatments? I went with the stained floor in the basement to maximize moisture resistance but do have a 8x10 area rug. I hope to test our REW this weekend so I can do some experimenting for myself. 

Maybe I should get rid of the speakers and setup some kind of system to drive multiple headphones :bigsmile:

thanks for all the help. I'm still learning.


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

Tri Traps in that corner would certainly help.

In terms of bass control, the next thing would be some 244 panels hung as a long cloud straddling the peak of the ceiling though that may not pass the WAF test...

The downstairs room offers more options and better symmetry. This room is at least acceptable now and better than before where the downstairs room is not good and IMO would be a better place to work on.


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