Mudcat,
I believe that the screen would likely be in the 8' range or smaller.
I did some suggested reading on the Harman website regarding Floyd Toole's white papers on room acoustics, treatments, and modes. Good stuff, that. I also experimented a little with reflection control last night. I placed pillows and quilts strategically around my speakers and behind my listening couch. There was a marked tightening of images (Norah Jones was only 2 feet wide, not 5 feet wide as she always was before). I suppose I always considered "smoothing out the soundstage" sort of a good thing from speakers, being pleased with the illusion of "widening the sweet spot" in my naiveté. The newfound pinpoint sound sources last night were refreshing, although it will take some time to get used to the effect. Ahh, absorption! That's what it does! It is also clear from this experiment that even though it is angled down properly to the listening position, my center channel on top of my TV (the most convenient spot), being 6 feet above ear level, is killing my multichannel soundstage. I suppose exposing problems with speaker placement validates the "improvement" that absorption has caused in the room.
Although my current space is not ideal (shared living room with no wall into kitchen/dining room, shed cathedral ceiling, 5 oversized wood blind covered windows, etc.), I think I will start there by procuring recommended "Owens Corning Select Sound Black Acoustic Board" and some acoustically transparent black fabric. In this shared room, a set of moveable panels to place behind and beside the main speakers and one larger panel behind the couch might work well to deaden the reflections a bit. I could set them up when I want to listen or watch movies more "accurately" and they would not interfere aesthetically otherwise. I'm now thinking of copying the rounded grill shape of the B&Ws and framing the homemade panels in routed solid cherry to give them a more furniture-like and uniform audio appearance. I can do all that window-dressing after I prove the effectiveness of just the raw fiberboard in-situ. Although I am limited to only one subwoofer, the DD-15 has measurably and effectively, I believe, allowed me to position it ideally and tame the worst of my room modes.
So perhaps as a starter I'll just spend a few bucks on some improved seating (maybe eventually that projector) for now and manage the sound as best I can in the most convenient room available. That doesn't mean the dedicated room is dead, perhaps just postponed for additional experimentation.
An additional question regarding measurement, though. I bought the Rives Test CD 2 because it is weighted to work with the Radio Shack SPL meter. Toole indicates that 1/3-octave intervals are insufficient to truly equalize a room. He also suggests (in my interpretation) that there is little to be gained from equalizing mid and high frequencies, just control reflections and resonances with absorption. Is there an effective and relatively inexpensive way to measure a more complete audible spectrum? Should I get a series of 1/10-octave sine wave frequencies as MP3s off the 'net and methodically measure and graph the responses? Perhaps I should just be content to equalize below 200 Hz with the Velodyne's parametric EQ and not even bother measuring the higher frequencies?
I continue to be open to and thankful for your suggestions. Thank you again!
Paul
