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In Reply to: What would be the perfect size and shape of room for audio? posted by fortysomething on February 22, 2007 at 21:06:12:
.....of my acoustical designer; provided the space (37' x 25' with as much height as needed) and agreed to build exactly what he designed. i had no preconcieved restrictions other than i wanted a couple of small windows.i built exactly what was designed. the above is almost exactly the final shape and plan. the only difference in shape is that the wall the windows is on slants toward the rear of the room from the center of the room to intercect with the other fabric wall about 18" from the inner corner.
Chris Huston of Rives Audio specified an 'ovaled' generally rectangular room 29' long, 21' wide and 11' high. the rear walls angle forward from center to side, the rear side walls step out toward the side center, the front corners are 90 degrees but there is a fabric covered fibreglass wall that cuts the corner to enclose large bass traps. the ceiling is chambered enclosing built-in bass traps.
there are no parallel walls; every surface is either absorbtive or diffusive, with the vast majority diffusive. the room focus is a large semi-circle resonator between and behind the speakers.
perfect is an overused inappropriate term. i would say the room is the physical expression of one acoustical designer's vision at that particular moment without restriction.
this designer spent 40 years in the music business, first as a musician, then as a recording engineer, then as a producer, and the last 20 years designing all kinds of recording and mastering studios as well as teaching acoustics. the last 5 years he has designed many 2-channel rooms.
i am 'perfectly' happy with the sonic performance of the room and can't imagine a better room.
mikel
Follow Ups:
How far from the front wall are the speakers?How far are Speakers from side walls?
How far from the front wall is the main chair?
Are speaker and chair placement based on Cardas Golden ratio formulas? (e.g., Speakers = .276 from side wall; .442 from front wall; etc.)
If I read you post correctly, you provided a 37 x 25 foot space and Rives designed you a 29 x 21 x 11 foot room, is that correct??
Was your audio goal to simulate a Large Orchestra -or- an Intimate 3 Piece Jazz band and/or Small string Quartet -or- both?
first; the current pictures on my system page are out of date; i have different speakers and they are in different spots.the new speakers (above) are the Evolution Acoustics MM3's. in the picture above they are 9'6" off the wall behind the speakers. the picture also shows them 14'6" apart (center of tweeter to center of tweeter).
since i took that picture i moved them (1 foot closer in on each side)to 12'6" apart but still 9'6" to the wall behind the speakers.
doing the math using a 21' width; at 12'6" apart the center of the tweeter is 4'3" from the sidewall.
i set up my listening position at the top of an equalateral triangle. so my ears are also 12'6" from each tweeter. i have not figured the exact distance from my ears to the front wall.
as a starting point i aim the speakers at a point halfway between the outside of my shoulders and my ears. which is how they are aimed now.
i do not use the Cardas formulas per se.....although some of my setups might be there by accident. my acoustician thinks that ratios are not a valid way to properly set things up as different frequncies act differently at different lengths. any ratio likely works at some sizes and not at others.
i'm no expert at room design; however my designer is considerably more experienced than Mr. Cardas. i am not invalidating Cardas ratios; just saying that the issues are not that simple. Cardas is a good place to start for the DIY'r.
yes; i provided the 37' x 25' in my barn with any height that we needed. Rives (Chris Huston) came up with 29" x 21' x 11' as ideal.
my goal was to be able to recreate all types of music; the toughest of which is large scale orchestral. once in the room i discovered that to harness the potential of the room i would need speakers with much more dynamic capabilities than my Kharma Exquisites.
doing intimate music correctly requires lots of immediacy and microdynamics; which was initially a challenge. my previous small room excelled at intimate music since i was listening in such a near-field environment.
once fully optimized (which point i now feel i am approaching) a properly designed large room can really deliver the whole performance envelope of anything from the most dynamic and complicated to the most delicate and simple.
my opinion is that the room is equally capable for all types of music. OTOH so few systems/rooms can do justic to full scale orchestral music that some might see that as it's strength.
did you compare the regular GPA's to the SE's? Any difference?
asdf
under what heading?
......'R' next to my moniker in my post.there are construction pictures in my 'picture gallery' too.
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