Room Acoustics
Your Room
This is one of those areas that requires a little background to understand and some time and experimentation to obtain the best performance from your system.
Your room is actually a component and an important part of your system. This component is a very large variable and can dramatically add to, or subtract from, a great musical experience, depending on how well you attend to it.
All sound is composed of waves. Each note has its own wave size, with the lower bass notes literally encompass- ing from 10' to as much as 40'! Your room participates in this wave experi- ence like a 3 dimensional pool with waves reflecting and becoming enhanced depending on the size of the room and the types of surfaces in the room.
Remember, your audio system can literally generate all of the information required to recreate a musical event in time, space, and tonal balance. The purpose of your room, ideally, is to not contribute to that information. However, every room does contribute to the sound and the better speaker manufac- turers have designed their systems to accommodate this phenomenon.
Let’s talk about a few important terms before we begin.
Terminology
Standing Waves. The parallel walls in your room will reinforce certain notes to the point that they will sound louder than the rest of the audio spectrum and cause “one note bass”, “boomy bass”, or “tubby bass”. For instance, 100Hz represents a 10' wavelength. Your room will reinforce that specific frequency if one of the dominant dimensions is 10'. Large objects in the room such as cabinetry or furniture can help to minimize this potential problem. Some serious “audiophiles” will literally build a special room with no parallel walls just to get away from this phenomenon.
Reflective Surfaces. The hard surfaces of your room, particularly if close to your speaker system, will reflect those waves back into the room over and over again, confusing the clarity and imaging of your system. The smaller sound waves are mostly affected here and occur in the mid and high frequencies. This is where voice and frequencies as high as the cymbals can occur.
Near Field Reflections. Those reflective surfaces of the room that are the closest to your speaker system, particularly if they are hard surfaces, can reflect the musical energy back into the room, confusing the imaging and tonal balance of your system. Excessive brightness can result from this condition and diffuse, ill defined imaging can easily occur if too many surfaces near your speakers are hard and sharp in their relative angle to your system.
Resonant Surfaces and Objects. All of the surfaces and objects in your room are subject to the frequencies generated by your system. Much like an instrument, they will vibrate and “carry on” in syncopation with the music and contribute in a negative way to the music. Ringing, boominess, and even brightness can occur simply because they are “singing along” with your music.
Resonant Cavities. Small alcoves or closet type areas in your room can be chambers that create their own “standing waves” and can drum their own “one note” sounds.
Clap your hands. Can you hear an instant echo respond back ? You’ve got
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