Room acoustics

Coefficient Chart. Room Acoustics. ---- Theory ---- The best rooms ---- The listening room ---- Whatever happened ---- A - Introduction B - Loudspeaker directivity and room response C - Room reverberation time T60 C1 - Sound waves between two walls C2 - Sound waves in a rectangular, rigid room C3 - Reverberation distance C4 - Rooms for multi-channel sound C5 - Amplifier power to obtain Reference Level C6 - Room response time D - Loudspeaker and listener placement WATSON - Stereo Enhancement Loudspeakers as a merging of room acoustics and auditory perception A - Introduction Much has been written in the popular and professional audio press about the acoustic treatment of rooms.

To understand this claim let's look at the typical acoustic behavior of domestic size listening rooms, which have linear dimensions that are small compared to the 17 m wavelength of a 20 Hz bass tone, but are acoustically large when compared to a 200 Hz or 1.7 m wavelength midrange tone (G1 on the piano keyboard). Top. Acoustic Treatment and Design for Recording Studios and Listening Rooms. Acoustic Treatment and Design for Recording Studios and Listening Rooms by Ethan Winer Ethan Winer is co-owner of RealTraps, a leading manufacturer of acoustic treatment products.

Ethan has at various times earned a living as a professional musician, computer programmer, circuit designer, recording engineer, composer/arranger, technical writer, acoustician, and college instructor. Ethan has more than 150 feature articles published in various computer and audio magazines. He’s produced dozens of educational and music videos, and composed three pieces for full orchestra, all of which have been performed. If you have questions about anything in this article, or anything else related to audio, you're welcome to ask in my Audio Expert Forum. This page was last updated on May 9, 2016. French readers, see THIS version that is being translated by Christian Parent.Hungarian readers, see THIS version that was kindly translated by Tamás Bánfi. This text will surely expand as I learn more.

Acoustics Crash Course 1 - Modes. A crash course in acoustics in Modes.

This is by no means complete, but it should serve as a good starting point for someone looking to learn about acoustics. Great for someone building a home or professional studio, or looking to correct problems for their home theater system. The Fun House Metaphor Imagine a room whose surfaces reflected light to varying degrees.

These surfaces don't reflect light perfectly, but they all reflect light. Light travels much too swiftly for us to see it go by. This metaphor, while not totally accurate, can help you learn about the problems affecting rooms. Standing Waves, Room Modes, and Eigentones All of those phrases mean more or less the same thing. In audio these are known as Standing Waves - a wave of sound that bounces between two or more surfaces emphasizing one frequency over others. Light waves are tiny. Treble waves are small and fast like those created by a rock dropping into a pond.

You can calculate the length of a sound wave fairly easily. Room Acoustics. We generally think of the speakers in our stereo or home theater systems as the final link in the audio chain — and the one that makes the biggest difference to our ears.

But there's much more to the sound we hear than just where you place your speakers in a stereo or home theater setup, and what comes out of them. You might not even realize it, but your room plays a rather large part in the sound that you hear from your system. And as with any other component, there are steps you can take to improve your room's performance. Why your room matters The sound that you hear in any room is a combination of the direct sound that travels straight from your speakers to your ears, and the indirect reflected sound — the sound from your speakers that bounces off the walls, floor, ceiling, and furniture before it reaches your ears. Reflected sounds can be both good and bad. Acoustics/Basic Room Acoustic Treatments. Introduction[edit] Many people use one or two rooms in their living space as "theatrical" rooms where theater or music room activities commence.

It is a common misconception that adding speakers to the room will enhance the quality of the room acoustics. There are other simple things that can be done to increase the room's acoustics to produce sound that is similar to "theater" sound. [audio physic] - no loss of fine detail. Step-by-step instructions to set up the speakers After so much theory we are pleased to give you a practical example.

These are the basic rules to create perfect listening conditions. Even your friends and family can share the acoustic pleasure, and they will feel like they are sitting in the 20th row of the concert hall instead of sitting in the 10th row, which is usually preferred by opera directors and music critics. Once you have homed in on the right place, you should start to fine-tune the position of the loudspeakers.

If you angle the speakers, you will roughly influence the balance of high frequencies (due to the directivity characteristic) and the spatial bass performance at the outer edges of the soundstage (due to the influence of inevitable reflections at the cabinet corner of the speaker). We have just finished our step-by-step instructions. Acoustical perception.