Much less bass performance in this room than that room.

[bcycle]

Hi Gang,

I used to have my midsize, old A/D/S towers on my second floor in a 9x12 rectangular room. The speakers were on the short wall and the sound was very very good.

I have since moved them to my 3rd floor which has a pitched ceiling (the roof line). This room is about 18x10.

The speakers are now about 2 feet from the back (masonry) wall and a foot or so from the side walls. (See sloppy sketch and messy room photo here: https://share.icloud.com/photos/0LvPzRF59TuYM_qpdWINm37zQ)

In this space, I have lost a lot of mid bass compared to the other space, and I’m looking for suggestion’s on possible solutions. I’ve tried moving them close to the wall which overemphasizes the low bass. They’re more balanced where they are but I think the corner locations are creating some interference or standing waves.

What is your experience with things like tube traps? What might you suggest that might allow these speakers to shine a little more. Tube traps maybe? Panels? Placement ideas? I cannot relocate so I need tips for this space.

Thanks so much,
Greg

 

[TLS Guy]

In a situation like that, you have to get measurements. Otherwise any advice we give will be wrong, you can be certain of that.

 

[ski2xblack]

TLS is correct. If you want to apply some sort of corrective action, you need to assess what's going on so your efforts aren't a shot in the dark.

But that doesn't mean you're on the wrong track with the empirical method you have been doing. Using placement changes to try and get improvements is free, after all.

Also, while the new room will never sound exactly like the smaller room, being larger will have some potentially positive effects. Rooms with larger dimensions and non parallel surfaces tend to have fewer bass respnse issues than smaller rectangular rooms. It could be that your new room performs better than your old one, and it's just a matter of you becoming acclimated to it.

 

[ski2xblack]

As for bass traps, they have to be huge to have an appreciable effect. Running multiple subs can produce better results while taking up less real estate.

 

[ski2xblack]

Had a peek at your room layout. Looks like both speakers will be in close proximity to walls/ corners, so not only will the bass/midbass be sensitive to small changes in position, but early first refections at higher frequencies will also likely come into play. That gives you a couple distinct things to play with to passively tune things. Use blankets as improvised treatments on the half wall on the left and corresponding wall on the right and give it a listen.

 

[Kvn_Walker]

Your room size, and your listening position are both relevant to how you will perceive bass. You can use the following site to see your room's acoustic properties. Red and blue modes mean the same thing; the colors are just different to make the 3D model easier to see.

amroc - THE Room Mode Calculator

HTML5 room mode calculator. Read and hear the tune of axial, tangential and oblique modes. Scientific sources included.

amcoustics.com

 

[ryanosaur]

Trying to treat blind is an absolute folly! Short of measurements, experimenting with incremental placement changes would help... but take a loy of time. You would need to log avery change you make from front wall, side wall, toe-in angle, etc.

If you have Audyssey XT32 and their App, you get, at least, a good representation of the "Before" sweep. I was able to use this to fix a -20dB Suck-Out from a +10dB Peak! (Yes, a-30dB change, all because the Front Left Speaker was right at a cancellation point for a certain frequency at the 1/2-wave. I moved it 1.5" amd changed toe-in slightly... boom, it bacame a room artifact with at -10dB.

Measurements are key to understanding what is happening in your room!

 

[Trell]

Trying to treat blind is an absolute folly! Short of measurements, experimenting with incremental placement changes would help... but take a loy of time. You would need to log avery change you make from front wall, side wall, toe-in angle, etc.

If you have Audyssey XT32 and their App, you get, at least, a good representation of the "Before" sweep. I was able to use this to fix a -20dB Suck-Out from a +10dB Peak! (Yes, a-30dB change, all because the Front Left Speaker was right at a cancellation point for a certain frequency at the 1/2-wave. I moved it 1.5" amd changed toe-in slightly... boom, it bacame a room artifact with at -10dB.

Measurements are key to understanding what is happening in your room!

Really?

 

[ryanosaur]

Really?

Really, what?
Yes, I was able to fix a -20dB suck out by moving my left tower about 1.5" and re-angling it slightly. It was exactly at 1/2 the wavelength from woofer to back wall. Coming back at the woofer created the cancellation.
If you need further proof, I can provide some photos... I can show current placement in an asymmetric arrangement... I'll even tape it so you can see the lines!
Ain't foolin', here.
I might be able to recover earlier XT32 measurements with photos of the tape marks on the floor from when I was solving this problem... PM'ing with @Russdawg1 at the time, IIRC.

 

[Pogre]

Really?

I unleashed my inner Ryan last weekend. Taped off each position and labeled each sweep until I found a spot that both gained me back about 4 dB of a nasty null and works within room constraints. Unintuitively it put my right speaker about 6 inches closer to a room boundary. Go figure. Anyway, the small 4 dB gain turned into a bigger gain after I ran Audyssey again.

That's what I got after running Audyssey. No tweaking with the app or my mini. Just running standard setup. Blew me away. Smoothing that out was quick and easy. Audyssey has always made an improvement, but the dips at 45 and 75 hz were way worse before. I always have issues in that range, but finding a slightly better spot made a big difference for me. Those few dB were all Audyssey needed to do a much better job. It was tedious and I had tape all over the floor when I was done but I'm happier with it now!