Ok yesterday I got my first set of panels for ATS Acoustics. They came shipped from Fed EX, I had ordered a non standard size to fit in my room, normal size is 2'x4' but I was looking for a 3x5 panel... With the help of my sales guy over the phone, that size was going to be quite expensive (shipping wise),The price of 2 panels or 4 was hardly a difference at all. So we decided to break up each of those panels in 2. I ended up with 4 panels - each being 18" x 5'. Not only did this make a nicer looking layout, it also saved me about $80. in shipping, from the really pain in the A$$ (non-standard) larger size.
When I got the panels, because of the odd size they were all boxed up kinda hap-hazardly (2 seperate boxes joined in the middle with tape) and the tape didn't hold. At any rate, the panels were perfect.
Ok, So I get them inside and unbox and unwrap them, and I was pleased... Construction was top notch, corners square, they used luan for backing and the edges all the way around the front were beveled at a 45 degree angle, very classy looking.
I went with the designer fabric selection, with the circles.
PATTERNS or
COFFEE I thought the color of the fabric was more of a brown background, which turned out to be more on the black side. From the pics on the web I just thought it looked different. I was a touch concerned... I was really shooting for brown. But when one of my Girlfriends came over for dinner and drinks, she instantly fell in love with the color and pattern. wheeeew.. "Those are awesome, they really make the area pop with the subtle colors and patterns!!" With the lights dimmed, they look even more spectacular. I was really worried about just putting up some ugly panels, I wanted some flare for this room, and I think I got it...
Now I know how the room sounded before, and I didn't want to waste time just setting them on the floor and comparing sound, I just wanted to commit, and get them hung, so I went to it.. measuring and setting everything up was just time consuming. They give you directions which are easy to understand and make short work of the job. Within 2-3 hours of working on them amidst the countless interruptions, they were hung, and I was done tweaking, being a bit anal my eye really adds more work to stuff that is relatively close… hehhehe
After cleaning things up and pouring a celebratory cocktail, I sat down and picked out and ran through some reference / evaluation tunes. I wasn’t sure what happened, as over a couple of months I must have started to get used to the echo and reverb that I experienced, and a few changes here and there were making subtle differences for the better. But I didn’t realize how much of a problem I had behind my corner layout system setup. I was getting so much sound bouncing around behind my plasma that it would break up the front stage sound and start to become quite muddled. I kept playing those few tracks that I was so used to over-analyzing and it came to me pretty quick. This wasn’t just a minor improvement, this was night and day!! My sound stage and dispersion nearly doubled in size, OK maybe an exaggeration, but it was drastically better, without the bouncing sound waves colliding off the back walls and being re-introduced with a delay at your ears, confusing one with the echo. 2 channel audio was much more precise, smoother and much more balanced. Thank GOD !! I moved on to a couple of movies and found that the LCR staging was so much cleaner….
I guess in the end, I really wasn’t as sure that I would notice that much of a difference, but Im extremely happy with the results. Now that I feel like I have just vomited all over your computer screen with my diarrhea of the mouth, Ill shut up... Im looking forward to my next set of panels to make some more drastic changes in sound to this nightmare of a room…
Here are a few updated pictures to see what they look like, and the color changes I have made in my room, and finally hanging my surrounds, although I have to run the wires in the walls.
Slowly its coming together…
Warp
Too bad the flash makes my room so much lighter then it really is... its so much more cozy in person...
Link to the
Web Album, just click Slideshow at the top
