Not just the position. Everything changes in the other room. Further, the entire science of it changes if the room is sufficiently big such as a concert hall. We will then get a diffused soundfield and the bass becomes far better as we get a dense set of modes. The problems we are talking about here are perils of small room acoustics which unfortunately make our life difficult. But yes, if you are talking about a small room, same science will apply. I will not only hear variations due to where I sit, I also hear variations in the identical spot because the room rooms are guaranteed to have different frequency responses due to so many variable contributing to that from speakers to room. For this reason, we need to divorce ourselves from thinking we can ever replicate what the talent heard. Unless both presentations are in anechoic chamber with identical speakers, we are out of luck there.
Ok.
I'm not either at this point!Which is exactly what I said and repeated above. Not sure why you quoted me and reply as if I disagreed.
I would think (perhaps with too high expectations) that seasoned audiophiles, those who have been around for awhile and have had a lot of time and opportunity to educate themselves and their ears, would not prefer the artificial enhancement of listening room reflections. Instead, realizing that the source is the recording and it should be able to stand on its own if well done and played on an objective and neutral system/room. I wasn't considering neophyte audiophiles.No, they don't degrade the *experience.* How do we know that? We test people. We test them with or without that reflection and with the exception of recording engineers, the rest of the world tends to like side reflections better than not having them. Not all reflections. But strong side reflections. Yes, the sound is "distorted." I cover this in my other thread/article: http://www.whatsbestforum.com/showthread.php?8226-Psychoacoustics-of-Room-Reflections.
I can cite research paper and listening test after listening tests to demonstrate the above. For brevity and an interesting data point from someone who should think like you say, here is George Augspurger (designer of PRO listening rooms) in his AES paper, LOUDSPEAKERS IN CONTROL ROOMS AND LIVING ROOMS:
”Third, I did a lot of listening with various amounts of absorptive treatment in the comers behind the speakers. When first-order reflections were largely absorbed I noted that locations of individual sound sources were more precise, that the timbre of individual instruments was more natural, and that the overall stereo picture was more tightly focused. These observations agree well with other reported listening tests. Nonetheless, after extensive listening to classical and pop recordings I went back to the hard, untreated wall surfaces. To my ears the more spacious stereo image more than offset the negative side effects. Other listeners, including many recording engineers, would have preferred the flatter, more tightly focused sound picture.”
Actually, the (my) goal isn't a pretty graph. It's a fairly critical environment with which you are able to hear what is recorded without significant augmentation. Only then can you appreciate the difference between well recorded and average.So if the goal is to have a pretty graph, you are absolutely right. We should create an anechoic chamber and get rid of all reflections. But if the goal is to *enjoy* music, listening tests and research into how we hear, which includes why we don't hear distortions that show up on graphs, tells us that some reflections are beneficial. Others are not. Floor reflections for example bring no benefit since both ears hear it equally. So you would want to absorb them. Likewise front and back walls do not have benefits so while they are not damaging per-se, they can be attenuated if you need absorption. On that point, mid to late reflections can be a negative so all rooms need to have fair amount of absorption in them. The surfaces I just listed make good candidates.
I have also been referring entirely to the low frequencies below the room transition point. Above that point (major room reflections aside) you are mostly correcting speaker and crossover behavior, which IMO should be done only with convolution applications which can control level, phase and timing.I have explained "why tolerate" them above. I also want to be clear as to which part of the room acoustics we are talking about. In this thread we are all about the bass frequencies/sub. In this region, psychoacoustics does not play a role and the soundwaves act differently. It is important to not mix topics and say that I am talking about EQing everything. Not even close. I am talking about bringing down resonant peaks in bass frequencies. I am not telling you to go and apply EQ to 8 Khz and expect to necessarily do good. You could be making the sound worse if you don't know the cause of that. As to doing things acoustically, let's see the low frequency of a room without EQ. Show me how none of the variations in its frequency response matter.
True enough, though significant peaks and valleys remaining would usually indicate insufficient or improper trapping.We always start with minimizing the problem. That solution calls for optimal placement of subs to cancel some of the modes, and use of more than one to cancel some of the others. Once you do this you still have some peaks. Those peaks are then brought down to give us near flat response. I will never have flat response as I mentioned to Terry. It simply is not possible to get lab type results. And you don't get there with acoustic products either. You will absolutely still have peaks and valleys and those sure will have a character.
I look for more of a studio control room/mastering room presentation of playback. I don't want to hear how the room modifies it because you lose your accurate point of reference when listening. I guess many listeners don't care that much for that aspect and just want warm and fuzzy when they play something. The problem with that is that 'warm and fuzzy' isn't the same in a different environment. And worse, especially with reviewers that include the room in their listening formula, reviews can often be skewed by the ability of the system (and the reviewed item) to integrate well with their room. Or not.The foundation of this forum is have a mix of solid science and open discussion of audio. All opinions are respected though there is no obligation to accept . What I am describing here is backed by decades of acoustic research. You are hearing 10% of it. Over time, I will post more. The science is all targeted toward bettering the sound in the room. So the goal is the same as what we have here. When Bradley researchers speech intelligibility and finds that room reflections contribute up to 9 db there, we want to know about that even though it goes against one's guts that reflections hurt rather than help. The science tells you that if you take out reflections you take out energy from the room and that has its negative effects. So yes, get ready to hear the best that the acoustic science has to present us. That is what this forum is about. Again, no obligation to accept any of it.
It won't sound worse, but it still won't be correct.Well, you should repeat my exercise. Put a single sub in a corner and measure. Take out the first massive peak and tell me if made your room sound less natural. I assure you it will not. There is reason most high-end subs come with built-in DSP filters and software that programs them. Why would they do that if it makes the sound worse?
Agreed on that. I see listening rooms with hardwood floors and just shudder at the thought.Reading your posts makes me think that you are thinking that it is being said that EQ should be used as the only tool to fix anything that is wrong in the room. That is not remotely what I am saying. Again, we are talking about narrow but important area in small room acoustics which is bass resonances. We know these will be there. You are right that you can't take out floor reflections using EQ. You better have a thick carpet there. Likewise if your room is too live, no EQ will save it although getting rid of bass resonances is an improvement.
Yes, I'm referring to the LF resonances caused by the room. And yes, I did get the impression from your initial posts in this thread that you would be perfectly fine with EQ only resolution of LF problems because it 'was good enough'.
Ok, I agree with all this, except the method of optimizing bass frequencies. IMO to do it right you need many traps, and then if you must, further it with EQ. Me, I never use inline EQ to the monitoring, unless it can be integrated into an active, already existing path with convolution.I plan to write a simple tutorial on the top level picture as I think that is most of our problems. Here is a quick version of it. To get good sound, you need to do the following:
1. Start with good speakers. This is what makes sound in the room. I am amazed that entire texts are written on room acoustics but ignore speakers. What makes a good speaker is a subject of another thread .
2. Make sure you have sufficient absorption for mid to late reflections. Too much here causes intelligibility problems and makes for bad sound in general. Too little of it and the room becomes uncomfortable (think anechoic chamber).
3. Deal with problematic reflections (e.g. floor).
4. Optimize your bass frequencies. This is what I am talking about in this thread. Studies show that we contribute 30% of sound fidelity to how good the bass is. So if we fix this, we are one third of the way there.
And let's not forget that it's not just the speakers and the room controlling how things sound, but is inclusive of power amps, preamps, and cabling (etc). The electronics can make a profound difference to the interpretation of music by the listener and can have an significant effect on how problematic acoustic areas are perceived in the room.
--Bill