# Treating the New Audio Room



## craigandkim (Sep 22, 2008)

Hello to all,

I have recently moved into a new house and have the luxury of kitting out an entire room for the sole purpose of a listening room. The room's dimensions are a substantial 10.3m x 5.2m (35' x 17') with an "A" frame pitched roof with a variable ceiling height of 1.9m - 3.1m.

The room will be used for 2 & 5.1 music and eventually home theatre (aussie spelling!). There are a couple of things I would like to try and achieve:

_** Record an accurate acoustical analysis for this room (I understand this is difficult due to the "A" frame roof?) What would be the best way to record the rooms properties?*_,

** Apply sound treatment to correct any deficiencies, and*

** Ensure correct placement of speakers for both 2 and 6 channel listening to provide the best reproduction of the source*.

Here is the basic layout of the room's dimensions and placement of the mains (currently in 2 channel config only):

Any advice appreciated, thanks in advance,

Craig


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## tenzip (May 4, 2007)

The black boxes are your 2ch speakers, and the Lounge would be a sofa, the main listening position?

Which way, looking at the layout, does the roof slope? Or is this the middle of the house, and the peak is running down the middle of the room?

In case no-one else has said it, welcome to the Shack!


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## craigandkim (Sep 22, 2008)

Hey Chris,

yes, the peak of the ceiling runs straight down the middle of the room. And you are correct about the little black boxes- they are where the speakers are located at the moment until I purchase my next mains and center speakers.

Cheers


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

Lots of options in that room. Diffusion on the angled ceiling can do a nice job of keeping things spacious and open sounding while still minimizing some of the destructive reflections off of those surfaces. 

Bryan


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## craigandkim (Sep 22, 2008)

Starting to acquire 2nd hand acoustic treatments. Taken first measurements and plotted the 20-295hz region using an SPL meter. 
Not sure if this is a good or bad result (considering the lack of treatments) but I know I want to flatten out the peaks and troughs somewhat.
Going to build some bigger bass traps for the two front vertical corners and take care of the first reflection points as well.

Cheers

Craig


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

Well, it's not good, but it's pretty typical.

Before you do too much with treatment, take your time and take some detailed measurements with just the sub, just the mains, and both. Play with locations of each, phase of the sub, levels to smooth things. Also, make sure you get your seating in the best possible place. 

You'd be surprised how much you can improve the response with just careful placement. Without this, doesn't matter how many treatments you put in, you'll still have potential issues that treatments aren't necessarily going to solve.

Bryan


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