November 2006 has seen the start of building a dedicated 2-channel listening room (a.k.a. "the man cave"). For the interest and benefit of others wishing to do likewise, I will try and relay details of the event that is expected to take 4-6weeks to complete.
* DESIGN
It all starts with a piece of paper and creative thinking of an audio designer which I found locally. Measurements were taken, consideration was given to room layout and planned speaker firing position. In my case I had two concrete block support pillars in the basement room and a lowish hanging support bean that sits atop the pillars. A structural engineer was called in to see about moving the posts and yes anything is possible with enough money . . . but the beams would stay put but be replaced by smaller footprint jack posts.
* ACOUSTICS:
The soundproofing would consist of Roxul acoustic and thermal insulation in the ceiling followed by Sonopan and 5/8" drywall to contain the sound. Special isolation clips for wall decoupling are used to isolate and 'float' the walls while rubber gasgets go between the concrete floor and wooden 2"*4" framing. J-molding, accoustic taping, 1/4" gasket for the ceiling/wall connection, air duct dampening material, insulated flex duct, external door with weather stripping were all used too.
* ELECTRICAL:
Four dedicated circuits will be installed: (i)a planned subwoofer on a 20 amp, 12 gauge Romex wired circuit, (ii) analog will also have a 20 amp, 12 gauge wire (in the event that my current 6watt/ch. amp gets replaced with a behemoth amp, (iii)digital will be a 15 amp, 14 gauge wired circuit, and (iv) a misc circuit for lights etc will also be 15 amp, 14 gauge. Isolated grounds will be created in the breaker box and plastic not metal recepticle boxes will be used to ensure only 1 end of the circuit is grounded (grounding both ends will cause the wire to act like an antenna!).
Planned future purchases include:
* Apple Mac Mini with silent hard drive and external RAID 1 disc storage for musical files
* Metric Halo LIO-8 Pro DAC
* Parametric EQ within the Metric Halo to tame the lowest bass mode peaks
I hired a small firm to design a dedicated music room in my unfinished basement which was no small feat. A contractor was hired to build it to spec and it was finished in January 2007.
Hemi-Cylindrical Diffuser / Bass Trap for Front Wall
A DIY hemi-cylindrical (poly) diffuser that doubles as a bass trap having OC701 fiberglass within its cavity. It's a 160degree arc from a 48" diameter Sonotube with red oak veneer on the exterior. The hard exterior diffuses mid/high frequencies in about a 110degree arc. With a total thickness of 30 inches, the hemi will absorb down to about 65Hz [1130/((30*7)/12)=64.6]
Front Wall Corner Bass Traps
A pair of DIY hemi-cylindrical (poly) diffuers that double as bass traps are in each corner. Eash is a 100 degree arc from a 48" diameter Sonotube with OC701 fiberglass in its cavity. They're covered with black speaker cloth to visually dissapear into the black coloured front wall. The total depth is 39" (27" radius + 12" air space) which absorbs down to about 49Hz. All hemi-diffusers can be pulled away from the wall to whatever depth is needed so as to tailor the low-end absorption.
Side Wall Reflecting Panels DIY
I built 3 reflecting baffles for each side wall. They are 3/4inches thick and run about 12feet long. Each baffle can be opened to any angle between 0 - 90 degrees. Right now the bottom baffle is open 30 degrees so that ear-level reflections are sent upwards to the ceiling diffusers, whereas the middle and top baffles are both open 20 degrees. The bottom baffle has a pair of GIK D1 QRD-like diffusers at each side wall's first two reflection points to help widen the apparent sound source width.
Skyline Diffuser for Rear Side Wall Treatment
A DIY Skyline diffuser for the rear right side wall. Uses 8 different cell depths in 1.5" increments with a maximum cell depth of 10.5". Being conservative, 10.5" is 50% of a 645Hz frequency which it will very effectively diffuse down to and likey another 0.5-1 octave lower. * Prime Number used = 547 * Primitive Root = 2 * 26 Columns * 21 Rows * 501 individual blocks of wood!
Hemi-Cylindrical Diffuser/Bass Trap for Rear Wall
Another two DIY Hemi-Cylindrical (poly) diffusers - one per back wall corner - to diffuse mid/high frequencies and absorb low frequencies as its interior is stuffed with OC701 fiberglass. Dynamat Xtreme (for car doors) was put on the hemi's inside to help reduce resonances and add stiffness. It's a 130 degree arc from a 48" diameter Sonotube.
GIK D1 QRD-like Diffusers for rear wall
6 are placed on the back wall (3 columns of 2) in front of 3 GIK Monster bass staps.
GIK Acoustics Monster Bass Traps for rear wall
3 total: Used on the back wall.
RPG Skyline (HP) Diffusers for Ceiling Treatment
9 Total: from speaker plane forward to listening chair.
RPG Skyline (LP) Diffusers for Ceiling Treatment
3 in Total: used on the dropped part of the ceiling between the front of the left speaker and the listening chair.
George Stantscheff Lightspeed Passive Attenuator
Passive attenuator that uses the special LDR (light dependant resistor) which has the ability to change it's resistance according to how much light LED (light emitting diode) is shone on it, hence it can control the volume without any mechanical contacts needed in the signal path. www.lightspeedattenuator.com
Art Audio PX-25
Fantastic sounding and very powerful despite being a 6 watt/ch. SET amp. With the KR Audio PX25 tubes and Sophia Electric 274B tubes and NOS input tubes.
FAB Audio Model 1
A 2.5 way with 1" tweeter and twin 10" drivers. High efficiency speakers (97dB).
Rythmik Audio F15
Two servo controlled subs each with a 15" driver and 370watts Class A/B each sub. Wonderfully musical.
Foundation Research LC-1
This is a bi-directional line conditioner filter and Cardas power cord all in one for the Audio Aero CD player.
TG Audio Lab HSR high purity silver interconnect
1.5 meter shielded
TG Audio Lab Speaker wire - silver
8 foot with spade ends
Audience PowerChord (4 foot)
4 foot power cord for Art Audio PX25 amp.
Dayton Audio OmniMic
Precision audio measurement system.
Sennheiser HD-600
headphones
StudioTech Component Cabinet U-22T
A rosewood cabinet with ventilation slots on the side, six shelves, cool looking doors and great WAF.
Wattgate 381 Ag AC Duplex Outlet
Audiophile grade AC repectacle. I bought two Wattgate 381's to be used on dedicated digital and analog circuits.
Hey thanks Skushino. Acoustical treatments are not easy to integrate gracefully into the listening room, especially when they are thick, deep, long, and high in order to really be effective down to the transition zone.
I like your most interesting setup. Have you room treatments?
Hi Chuck, Thanks for your comments / questions above.
My RPG Skylines are held up on the ceiling using none other than good old velcro. I used roofing tacks to hold the velcro onto the ceiling drywall and a tack on the velcro attached to the Skyline. Been up for several years now and never had one fall . . . yet. ;)
Regarding the Skylines, you need to sit about 30" away from them so keep that in mind as you try them up above your head or in front of your chair on the ceiling. I wouldn't try just a single Skyline on the wall behind your chair - try at least 2 units wide * 2 units high and be sure to sit ~30" from them. They should attenuate (via diffusion) from about 970Hz and upwards thereby allowing you to hear more of the direct sounds and more details when placed behind you. The above Hz and sitting distance is for the longer version (i.e. 7" cell depth) not the shorter version.
Alternatively, try placing them on the side walls for the 1st reflection of the farthest speaker (e.g. place Skyline on left wall for right speaker's 1st reflection).
Lastly, try making your absorbing panels a minimum of 6" thick with an air space so that they don't act as a low-pass filter essentially eq'ing out just the high frequencies and deadening the sound.
Hi Agear, Thanks for stopping by my thread and for your kind comments. Other than isolation as you pointed out as likely being the main purpose of 'floating' the walls/ceiling, I would have to think (althought I haven't tested it per se) that the fact that the walls can move back and forth, that that fact alone would add some element of low freq abosorption. I don't know what the resonate frequency of drywall is, or how the freq may change when double layered (I'd have to guess that the added mass would lower the resonant frequency).
My goal in using the isolation clips to float the walls was to prevent sound from leaving the room and traveling up through the rest of the house; I'm not sure that it works equally well in the reverse - preventing sounds from entering the room, but it may. Admittedly, sound isolation isn't something I've studied much.
I would advise you to try and make your room as symetrical around the length axis as possible to allow you the max flexibility of speaker/chair positioning. I've tried several speaker positional setups and the less-than-perfect symetry of my room (i.e. bulkhead on one side of the ceiling and two support posts) is a limitiing factor.
Lastly, be prepared for a God awful sounding room with 5 bare surfaces despite good gear, so acoustical treatments are a must-have, in my opinion. Good luck. Please post your system so I/we can see how you're making out with the construction etc.
Hi Bmwmcab - thanks for the kind words. The room really is 50% of the sound (or there abouts) so I have spent as much time learning and testing as others do by swapping equipment in and out of their systems on a regular basis.
The speakers were built in Toronto by a now defunct small company, but they are very good and tonaly neutral.
Hope to an update to your system components and room pictures soon.
Hi Zephyr34069, Thanks kindly for your compliments. While no expert, I'd be pleased to share my experiences with you and it's likely better done over on your system thread. It seems that Audiogon has removed the ability for members to email each other, perhaps as a way of promoting thread and blog contributions as a way of increasing their website stickiness . . . Let's 'chat' on your system thread.
Lapaierre - thanks for the heads up on the Yellowjacker's "Blue Hats." My twins (i.e.subs) know many Brian Bromberg CDs - I'm a big fan, and other bassists too (Jaco Pastorius, Marcus Miller, Alain Caron, John Clayton, John Patitucci, Ray Brown, Charlie Haden, Dean Peer, Christian McBride, and others).
Acoustical Measurement Tools: check out FuzzMeasure http://www.supermegaultragroovy.com/products/FuzzMeasure/
Back Wall: glad to hear that you don't have to sit right against the back wall. Once you have your Mac-based acoustical measurement tool you'll have to experiment with speaker and seating positional changes.
Answer: my listening distance from seat to each speaker is 90" which is the same distance between each speaker, so an equilateral triangle.
Hi Lapierre, You a Yellowjackets fan? I have their "Greenhouse" CD on GRP Digital Master; nice stuff! Try Brian Bromberg . . .
Your Back Wall: * I think GIK and I were saying the same thing which was to put the Monster trap on a stand in front of the bifold doors. You could try putting a Monster trap inside the closet and listening with and without the bifold doors open. * why can't you put a Monster trap on the back of the door - no way to affix it? Try a movable stand. * Ideally you don't want to sit right against the back wall as bass is too pronounced - even with traps. Can you sit 33%-38% of the room's length away from the back wall and put your speakers at 33%-38% out from the front wall? Does that give you enough distance between speakers and listening chair, even if it's 'near field' listening?
Acoustical Measurements: * OmniMic is a Window's based program. Not been ported to Mac OS as far as I know. * search Google for Mac OS tools.
Your wrote "The new listening position could potentially be 10'. What is the distance from speakers to listening chair?" Sorry but I'm not following you . . . Do you mean you're now sitting 10ft out from the back wall? What's the room length again?
Subwoofers: * my system pic is a bit outdated as I've moved the subs for smoother bass and upwards tilting freq response as freq diminishes (e.g. house curve) to align with equal-loudness curves. * my left sub is on the side wall just slightly behind my listening place. I've used a keybourd stand to elevate it 4ft off the floor and it significantly reduces a hight based null. I'm using a 80Hz 24dB low pass filter setting. * my right sub in on the right side wall across the room from the left sub and uses a 120Hz 12dB low pass filter with a lower volume setting than the left sub.
Hi Rugyboogie - thanks for the kind words. It's been a fun and educational experience. I still get out the Dayton OmniMic and play around with things - more tinkering than anything else.
I love your room and equipement too! I see you own a grand piano - are you the pianist? I take it you're an Oscar Peterson fan as one of your pictures in your Totem system has a caption with his name in it. When I was a young lad my parents took me to the Burlington Public Library (west of Toronto) to see Oscar Peterson play in the basement which was a free gig. He was INCREDIBLE. He demonstrated to us different jazz styles of playing. He had the audience yell out the names of a few notes which he then used to improvise a song on - UNBELIEVABLE! I think Keith Jarrett is a great improviser but Peterson is just as great or better, in my opinion.
Hi Lapierre - Let me address your questions in reverse order. (1) I use the Dayton Audio OmniMic acoustical measurement tool. (2)Regarding subs, if you have only one listening position for a single listener then theoretically one sub properly placed should suffice. Given that your room has the same width & length dimensions you might need a second sub and/or parametric EQ to attenuate the bass peak(s). Adding a second sub isn't about getting louder sound but rather more even bass reproduction. My left sub has been raised 4ft off the ground to greatly reduce a ceiling induced null at the listener position whereas my right sub sits right on the floor and has slightly different frequency and volume settings than the left sub so as to optimize the bass at the listening chair. (3) Are you planning on hanging a bass traps on the backside of your door? Alternatively the best bass trap is to leave the door open!! Regarding the bifold doors and closet, can you put traps inside the closet or build a stand with wheels to put bass traps on in order to swing it into place when you listen? I've found that mobility of acoustical treatmenets is critical as there is much positional adjustments required.
Hi Lapierre - thanks for your comments. I'm using two Rythmik F15 subwoofers, one on each side wall just slightly behind the listening chair for best bass response. The PX25 amp is wonderful and even though it only has 6watts output it's a good match for the 97dB efficient full-range speakers. And of course the gear - any gear for that matter - sounds best when the room is taken out of the equation via acoustical treatments.
Hi Devilboy, Like the new system you're rebuilding, I currently own the Lightspeed passive preamp, tube amp and high efficiency speakers and quite like to sound of it, especially the PX25 tube. To answer your question I've not had other passive preamps to compare the Lightspeed to.
System edited: just added some updated pictures, including the GIK D1 diffusers on the side walls and the reflective baffles behind them. It may not be anyone else's cup of tea but I love the colour of the baffles against the black walls . . .
System edited: Just finished building and installing reflective side wall panels that are adjustable from 0-90degrees to eliminate flutter echos, reduce comb filtering, and reflect upwards sound to the ceiling RPG Skylines to raise the soundstage height. In short, the side wall oak panels create a reflection free zone and preserve the MF/HF liveliness without the use of absorption panels. Added new photos.
Shadorne - many thanks for dropping by and for your compliments. I return to view your room from time to time too as its a great looking (and sounding I'm sure) room.
Musicfile (Pat) - Sure, I'd love to see and hear the changes you've made. Are they equipment related or room layout related? I don't know if I know my room issues stuff any better than anyone else here, but a 2nd set of ears provides another data point for you to consider. Send me an email and we'll arrange something. I want to finish off v2 of my room before you come over, ok?
Version 2 of the room has a few changes: -> Front Wall: the 3 Hemi's (centre, and in each corner) remain unchanged. I've added one GIK Monser on the front wall on either side of the centre Hemi to absorb the rear reflecting 1st reflections from the speakers. It deepens the soundstage.
-> Side Walls: 3/5" planks of Oak wood are running horizontally for most of the length of the room. The top plank is 12" wide, and the centre and bottom are 24" wide. The tops of each board are affixed to a 2"*4" using piano hinges which means the bottom edge of the boards are free to be pulled away from the wall as much or as little as desired. I'm using doweling to provide infinately adjustable angles for the boards to be 'open' or 'closed.' Using trigonometry I have the top and middle board at a 20degree angle and the bottom board at a 30degree angle. Still more listening tests and other angles will need to tried and contrasted. The angled boards eliminate slap/flutter echos, maintain the mid/high frequency energy within the room, and allow the apparent sound source width (image broadening) to be tailor-made depending on the angle.
->Back Wall: the two side wall hemi's have been moved to the back wall corners and a new Skyline diffuser will be made to fit the new wall size and will likely have 21.8" deep cells, which is 50% of a 311Hz wavelength. Should sound even better . . . I hope.h
01-16-11: Bigby Great looking system and acoustic treatments. Id love to hear the impact of the skyline diffusers. If I ever get to Canada, Ill give you a shout....
Thanks for the kind words Bigby. Your room doesn't look too shabby either ;)
The Skylines raise the ratio of direct-to-indirect sound being heard so you hear more details etc. I'm currently redoing my room - Version 2.0 - and will be moving the side wall hemi-cylindrical diffusers to the back wall corners and building a new Skyline for the back wall that will have much deeper cell depths to allow low frequency diffusion. The beauty of DIY allows custom stuff to fit your room and its limitations (e.g. seating distance to diffuers in my case).
System edited: Just bought, and am eagerly awaiting, the receipt of a Lightspeed (passive) Attenuator by Georgehifi in Australia. It'll connect directly to the Art Audio PX25 amp. Hope it sounds good . . .
System edited: Added descriptions of the front wall centre hemi-cylindrical diffuser (that doubles as a bass trap) and the pair of front wall corner bass traps that also double as a diffuser.
System edited: Added new pictures to reflect the work on building 3 more hemi-cylindrical diffusers for the front wall, They all double as bass traps due to their interiors holding OC 701 fiberglass. The front wall corners are 100 degree arcs while the red oak mid-wall is a 160 degree arc. They all got their start as Sonotubes (for concrete pouring) but had to be cut down to length and right arc degree size to fill the appropriate space. Also wrapped OC 701 fiberglass in plastic and stuffed the interior with it to act as add'l bass trapping. With the addition of the hemi's to the front wall, I took down the 8 GIK D1s and painted them the wall colour and hung them on the front part of the side walls. The immediate sonic impact was a deepening and widening of the sound stage. Lastly, I put some bass trapping on the floor by the mid-wall point of the back wall. It consists of 2 GIK Monsters and 4 GIK 242's all pushed together. They have an 13.5" air space between it and the wall and extends into the room 27" so it catches the 1/4 wavelength of 250Hz to 125Hz. The room and sound have seen a dramatic improvement over the bare walls before hand. I welcome your comments.I
System edited: Added new pictures. Made note of the new hemi-cylindrical diffusers I made for the side walls and the bass traps that are the 'boxes' they sit on.
Shadorne - thanks for your kind words. Like your "fireplace RPG-like diffuser" I too have taken an active interest in how the room affects the sound which I've been studying for a year or so now. Due to a noticable slap echo between the side walls between the speakers and listening chair I will embark on yet another pair of DIY Skylines that will be 14" max cell depth!! You can't buy that from RPG!
Soundgasm - thanks for your thoughtful comments too. A DIY Skyline can be tedious but the finished product really does look like a piece art. If you wish to try your hand at it email me and I'll send you a write up that documents each step of the way that I put together. And yes, each 4ft square panel on the back wall likely was 150lbs and took two of us to position onto a temporary shelf in order to fasten the 3" decking screws.
Hi Spencer - nice to hear from you again in nearly 2yrs. Yes, the room is coming along, albiet slowly. The GIK gear really kick-started the acoustical treatment process and it's evolved into a series of DIY Skyline diffusion projects for key areas of the room. With the addition of more diffusers the sound gets better and better by reducing the room interactions that interfere with the direct sound. I was amazed at how much mid-high frequencies were absorbed with a low pile carpet. Combine this with the fact that the bass traps don't stop working at 500Hz so cummulatively they also contribute to upper frequency absorption and it's easy to get to a "dead sounding" room quickly. This is why I've opted to use so much diffusion on front, back and side walls and ceiling. The Skylines look very cool and are labours of love, plus I have so much control over the frequency range I want it to operate on and I can use whatever prime number that most closely aligns with the desired dimension of coverage needed.
It's been an interesting journey trying to sort out the conflicting advice offered by manufacturers (RealTraps/GIK) vs audio designers (Rives) vs acoustical scientists (Toole/Oliver).
System edited: Adjusted the low frequency limits that my DIY Skyline diffusers work to. The original theory of Schroeder diffusers (written by Schroeder himself) gave the "design wavelength" of such a diffuser as just under 1/2 the depth of the deepest well. So my 10.5" deep diffuser has a design wavelength of just under 21 inches, which corresponds to a frequency of about 646 Hz [1130/((10.5*2)/12)]. Schroeder also noted that diffusion started (to some degree) at about 1/2 octave below the design frequency.
System edited: Just finished building another DIY Skyline 2-D diffusor for the rear part of the right side wall beneath a small window. Used a prime number of 547, primitive root=2, 26 columns by 21 rows and works between 622-4500Hz.
System edited: decided to add the 2 dimensional Sklyine diffusion to the list of acoustic treatments. If anyone wants to know how to build a DIY Skyline diffuser, email me and I'd be glad to share.
Hi Pat - sorry no pics yet as I'm waiting until the finished product is available before posting. As far as 'before' pics are concerned, just picture 4 bare walls and a white short-pile carpet on the floor and that was the starting point . . . I'll invite you over after the side walls are done, if you're interested in making the schlep out to the 'Shwa east of TO.
System edited: After doing some research on small room acoustics and speaking with small room acoustic expert Dr Earl Geddes, I've rearranged some of the treatments I have. In general, there can't be enough bass absorption behind the speakers (front wall and front of the side walls) so I moved a GIK Monster bass trap from each side wall right by each speaker for SBIR duty to the centre of the front wall for the floor/lower wall corner. This improved on the 80Hz peak I have. I also put the four 242's on the front wall covering a 8'*4' space which deepened the soundstage. Toeing in the speakers quite a bit helps reduce the first angle side wall problem but with bare side walls slap echo is still a problem. SO, I will be venturing to build a DIY 2-D Skyline diffusers for the side walls, about 12 linear feet on each side wall - yikes that's a whole lot of little wooden studs. With 10'*4' of 1-D diffusion on the back wall and planned 2-D diffusion for the side walls, the HF energy will remain in tack and not be a 'dead' sounding room thus making the musicians appear in the room. I tried absorption on the side wall reflections points using the 4 GIK 242's and while it killed the refections it also killed the HF energy so I was always wanting to turn up the volume to compensate - clearly something's wrong. HF absorption and too much of it makes the room sound like headphones - I have a pair of headphones so I don't need a dedicated room to duplicate that sensation thank you. So in summary, if you want to hear all the musical details use headphones, but if you want that live feeling that comes from the sensation of the musicians being in the room then keep it as live as possible by minimizing HF absorption using diffusion. Depending on your mood, you now have a choice . . . Hope this insight helps others with their acoustic room treatment plans. kevin
Musicfile - I agree, Bryan at GIK is very customer focused and generous with his time. I have a big 80Hz peak and he's taken time to suggest numerous locations of bass traps to try out, measure, move, and measure again . . . The treatments are a labour of love but worth it. I guess I'm about 50%-67% of the way finished with acoustic treatments - just have to do the ceiling, front wall and more diffusers on the back part of the side walls.
I would be up for a visit/listen to each others system in the new year. Lets stay in touch. cheers, kevin
Hi Musicfile, Nice to hear from you again. I see we both are GIK customers. Did you event end up getting cables from an upstart company in the US when I purchased your Audience power cord?
Your rig and room looks very good too I might add. cheers, kevin
System edited: Added more acoustic room treatments consisting of (i)5 Monster bass traps, (ii)8 D1 diffusers, (iii)4 242 mid/high frequency absorbers. It really is great how the sound of the room can be tranformed with treatments.
Elberoth2 and Glenfihi -- thanks for your notes and compliments. The up-front planning is indeed crucial. I had to deal with the limitation of a 7' ceiling height in my basement and two cement brick support posts that could either be replaced with slimmer steel jack posts (which I opted for) or for $2,000 - $3,000 I could move the posts farther apart. In the end the post positions within the room combined with the bulkhead around the support beam dictated speaker firing position across the short wall of the room and everything else spun off from there. It's a very quiet room even when the furnace turns on and blows hot air into the room. Thanks again.
System edited: Sold my First Sound Presence Deluxe MKII preamp as it was redundant with the preamp functionality within the Audio Aero Capitole CD player.
Sbank (Spencer), Thanks for the compliment on the room. I plan on updating the pictures shortly. I was playing around with speaker positioning and measuring SPL levels with my Radio Shack meter and based on the uneveness I'd say the next move will be accoustic room treatments. While the system has come a long way, it feels like there is still a ways to go including better speaker cables, possible bi-amplification and adding a sub...
THE ROOM CONSTRUCTION IS FINISHED: The constructions has finished, the workers have left and the dust has settled. The equipment has been moved in and set up, at least temporarilly as future accoustic treatments may mean some minor positional changes.
Bottom Line: The system has never sounded better - no background noise to interfere with the musical details, dynamics and fun of the listening session. Let's just say that my wife is now an audio-widdow as I spend several hours after dinner in the music room.
The soundproofing works well and isolation of the walls from the ceiling and flooring means that my Radio Shack SPL meter measures about 30dB less on the kitchen floor directly above the room and even more attenuation upstairs in the bedrooms. The duct work treatment works really well as does the cold air return sound muffler. All this means that people can sleep or watch TV upstairs without being bothered by music.
Accoustic Treatments: As I have the speakers firing across the width of the room (13' 8" wide), first reflections aren't a problem as each speaker is about 7ft from a side wall and out about 50" from the front wall. The listening chair is about 2.5' from the back wall so reflections from the backwall are noticable especially when the volume is turned up and/or when the music is very busy with lots going on. Quadradic diffusion is planned for the backwall and should greatly reduce this affect.
Thanks Rugyboogie - I suspect that the glitz and glamour of equipment upstages the importance of the room itself for most people, at least it did me until I found a new house that would accommodate a dedicated music room.
The floor will be covered with underpad and low pile carpet and the ceiling will have somme treatments to it near the listening position. The front wall will have a "Polyfuser" made from wood while the back wall behind the listening chair will have a 12ft wide by 4ft high wooden quadradic diffusion. Side walls may have some first angle sound absorbing material. All in all I'm looking for a room that is neither too damped nor too alive.
System edited: Added audio room construction pictures. (1) Bulkhead has two layers of Sonopan and Roxul Safe & Sound insulation and will be finished in 5/8" drywall. It is important to prevent sound from making its way into the duct work and traveling throughout the house . . . (2) Bulkhead picture #2 shows the Roxul layered around the duct work to muffle sounds. (3) Extra sound absorption on AC outlets and light switch boxes. (4) New duct work to 4 rooms had to be constructed so as to push it up into the space between the first floor joists. The one heating duct for the audio room has (i) a few bends in it and (ii) is a special sound absorbing flexible duct to prevent sound from traveling back into the duct work and through the house. A special cold air return duct has been built like a muffler that requires several bends and is packed with Sonopan and special sound absorbing material. Construction To Do Items: finish drywalling, build out window ledges, install two exterior doors and seals, finish installation of electrical outlets and lighting, painting and carpet installation - most of which ought to be done by Christmas or early January 2007.
System edited: Today I replaced my Audio Aero Prima CD player with the Capitole MKII SE CD player. I also bought two Wattgate 381 Ag AC outlets to be used on dedicated circuits for digital and analog.
Music Room Update: * PLUMBING is finished - had to move hot water heater into another room and misc pipes had to run paralel to the bulkhead containing the supporting beams. * DUCT WORK has been finished by pushing them up into the ceiling caveties between the floor joists. A cold air return "sound muffler" is being built to absorb sound but let air pass. It's a series of staggered horizontal pieces of 2*4 that force the sound/air to travel in a series of 'S' turns with Sonopan sound absorption on all sides. Hot air return is with a special insulated flex duct and also has Roxul Safe & Sound and Sonopan insulation around it. * ELECTRICAL has been roughed in - need to wait for drywall to be in place before it can be finished. * FRAMING from wooden 2*4s is in place and to ensure the walls 'float' they reside on something looking like rubber underpad but made from recycled tires and are held vertically using a special clip that like a car motor mount uses rubber to prevent room vibrations from transfering to the walls.
This week insulation and drywall work will commence.
System edited: Changed the description of the system to reflect the fact that a dedicated 2-channel listening room is currently being constructed in my basement which will be 22'L*14'W*7'H.
Hi Mre2007, No I haven't pulled the trigger on a headphone amp (of any kind) as I've moved into a new/old home and will be finishing part of the basement as a 'music' room which'll be soundproof (or pretty darn near) which means the need for a headphone amp goes away. Orignally, I was going to get the headphone amp for late night listening so as not to awken the wife/kids but now the basement music room beckons . . . Do you own a SinglePower headphone amp?
Artg - stereo systems in non-dedicated rooms are a spousal trade-off no matter how you slice it! We get to buy and keep the gear but it must conform to the spouse's room layout plans . . . ahhgg!
Art you may notice the addition of an Art Audio PX25 amp in my lineup which is amazingly wonderful. But hey, I really like your "new and improved" rig which is also quite stunning to look at.
Gliderguider - Ahhmen brother, yes indeed there is magic in that there PX25 tube . . . wonder what a pair of the amps in biamped config would sound like . . .!!! You are invited to listen whenever you're in town next . . .
System edited: After a 3 week in-home trial evaluating the Art Audio PX-25 amp, I have decided that it isn't going back to the factory . . . it's just too darn great and what synergy with my high efficient speakers. I never dreamed that 6 watts could sound so powerful. May the honeymoon period continue . . .
Perfectionist - thanks for your comment. Alas, I can have the toys as long as they "blend in" according to my wife's taste and vision as to how the living room ought to look like. It was a bit of a battle just to have the FAB Audio speakers in there as you might well imagine - they don't exactly recede into the background, now do they!?! The nice thing is that the cabinet in rosewood is really very good looking so we all win . . .
Art Audio PX25 arrived today and was worth the wait!!! Loving my time with it thus far. . . still in the honeymoon stage no less. :)
It seems to compliment the other components and my FAB Audio speakers so well - it's taken clarity and detail to a higher level and that "presence" factor that I was looking for is here.
Any thoughts on the next upgrade? My feeling is the speaker cable - ditch the Ultralink and get me a pair of Audience AU24 cables. Add a subwoofer. Then back around again to improve the CD source and upgrade to the next level or two of First Sound preamp to Deluxe 4.0 MKII with Paramount Upgrades. . . .
Bluemike -- I like the Audience powerChord and AU24 interconnects quite a lot. The powerChord is solidly built, not so thick that bending it is still easy, and is competitvely priced with things just as good but costing more. In my situation I had an electrician run dedicated circuits for audio back to the breaker box so my power is a bit cleaner this way thereby reducing some of the sonic benefits had my power been less clean. For example, I did some A-B-A listening test using my preamp and the pretty good std powercord it comes with vs the Audience powerChord and there was very little difference, to my ears at least. This is probably because of the dedicated power line and the fact that the First Sound preamp has more microfarads of capacitance than most power amps which also helps reduce line noise. Perhaps not a good test . . . In any event I have the powerChord on the pre and amp with the CD using the Foundation Research LC-1 passive line conditioner+Cardas powercord all in one while my Equi-Tech uses the 20amp cord it came with. Does this answer your question?
Thanks Art/Kirk/Paul for your compliments on the rig.
Art -- thanks for the Joes Tube Lore - good stuff! Paul -- it would appear that I am inching my way towards your system - remember that copying is the highest form of system praise :) By the way don't you like Audience AU24 interconnects - care to suggest something better? And I won't want to wait for 1 year for TG Audio cables in case that was what you were going to recommend ;) Paul, do you think a low powered SET amp (say 6-10 watts) will be sufficient power and umph for my room (40'*15'*8') not that it needs to be rock concert levels . . .?
System edited: Just bought the FAB Audio Model 1 speakers, Equi=Tech 2Q line conditioner, and a great looking equipment cabinet. Now just eagerly awaiting their arrival . . .
System edited: Just added the First Sound Presence Deluxe MKII preamp today which is joined by the Audio Aero CDP and VTL amp and wow what a difference over my old antiquated Sherwood receiver!!! No surprise here (hear)!
System edited: System Update - added a set of Sennheiser headphones which are really quite good! Great for late night or private listening. Now, I'll need to get a really good headphone amp . . .
