dbowker
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When you "know" too much
tmsorosk
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Hello d.b. .. Knot to be the one to cast stones , the squarishness of your room may explain the toe orientation . A few years back at an audiophile friends we experimented with toe ect in a room with similar measurements , and found we had to cross the speaker line of site in front , rather than just behind . After much deliberation and wine we concluded that in the previous position the speakers were interacting with the side walls .

BillB
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thanks. Are the speakers kind of close to side walls or is that not an issue?

dbowker
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Yeah- as I said, I'm, sure it's something in the room aspect that is the problem. I probably could use another 4 feet in either direction to get the most out of the speakers (and who couldn't?).

Currently they are about 22" off the back wall and 4' out from the side walls, give or take. I'm sure if they were 3-4' off the back wall things would be many times better all around. And if I were a few more feet into the room I'd get less back refections too. All are speculative though as the room's not getting bigger, and I'm not going anywhere. I'm just glad I get a room this size that is essentially mine for music only!

geoffkait
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I suspect everyone wishes his room were bigger, or less square, with higher ceilings and a cement slab floor, etc. Have you ever played around with Live End/Dead End room arrangements, or tried sound diffusers/absorbers, acoustic resonators, corner tunes, tube traps, room lenses, that sort of thing?

Think of it as four differential equations in four unknowns. :-)

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica
Advanced Audio Concepts

dbowker
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And the next thought is: my wife would object to each and every one on grounds of aesthetics and cost. Room treatments are almost always a non-starter to being married, (and probably getting married as well) and I wouldn't trade them for a second.

If I had the time and energy to really think it through, I could maybe build something that was less obtrusive than most of what's out there, but there always seems to be something higher on the list.

Anyway- the "room" as such is not a big deal now that I found the far simpler solution of the radical toe-in config!

tom collins
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room treatment does not have to be fugly. i have 2 nice handmade quilts hanging on the walls of either side of my room. no wife would object. i have two pictures where i bought 2 two by four inch canvasses and had my daughters each paint one then I filled the back with sound insulation. they are then mounted so they are not flush with the walls, but stand out about an inch so they catch waves. if you have leather furniture, see if you can get some afghans to to toss over them. lots of little things that don't sit bad with the wife.
best of luck.

tom

dbowker
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In that case, I DO have a few "treatments" up in the form of a double backed wall hanging, an extra thick wool rug on the floor, a cloth sofa to the side, and a few other subtle diffusers and absorbers covertly situated. I have a window behind the system that I covered with 1/4" plexi (which is much softer than glass) and that, and another window, have honey-comb paper/cloth blinds. All in all the room does sound pretty good, but at some point size can't be helped. The thing that is hardest to tame is a 65hz bass bloom you get in this particular room/speaker combo. 90% of recordings are don't show it much, but anything Allison Kraus (with a big bass guitar and drums) seem to really put the spotlight on this frequency zone.

What I'd really like is another 4' behind my listening chair. I think a great deal of room reflections are are happening in the rear reflection area, though I do have a pretty funky 1880's fireplace behind, which due to all it's curves and other decorations must do a little something to break up waves.

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