2. speakers
  3. 131947-97633

Speaker/ Room Measurement and DSP

If speakers and room are the two most important elements in your sound system, how many of you have gone beyond “checking by ear” to optimize speaker placement? A couple months ago, I downloaded the free REW software and bought a calibrated microphone to run some experiments. It was a fun exercise although in the end, I only moved my SF Auditor M speakers by 3-4 inches. The fact that I could objectively validate that there was nothing more to be gained by speaker placement was reassuring.

REW generates a wealth of data, most of which I don’t understand. I have a room reinforced bass bump in the 58Hz range and then another at 100Hz. See the graph I uploaded to my virtual system. However, there is no way the interior design committee (wife) approves the use of base traps or multiple subwoofers. I was considering a miniDSP Dirac Live but I’m not sure trimming those bass modes would significantly improve the sound. I’m also concerned about the amount of power required (10dB attenuation?) from my 150W amp. The cost is not trivial for me, especially if I don’t like it. To those that have DSP units, what have you found for sound improvement? What baseline did you start from?

mikexxyz

Showing 1 response by willemj

willemj
1,036 posts
 
I use even smaller Harbeth P3ESR speakers as desktop speakers in my study. Due to the proximity of the desktop surface, even with the speakers on small desktop stands, I suspected a bass hump. And indeed, measuring with REW, I found some peaks. I downloaded an equalization curve into the Equalizer APO/Peace software on the desktop computer that I use as a source, and this resulted in a meaningfully cleaner sound. So I do think it is worthwhile. If you do not use a computer as a source, a MiniDSP is a cheap way to implement REW equalization.
I don't know your room (or your wife), but your speakers do not extend very far down. Unless your room is very small, I would think that a pair of small subwoofers like the black gloss SVS SB1000 (or even smaller, the REL T zero) could be hidden in two corners of the room. They would extend the frequency response significantly (particularly the SB1000s), and combined with a DSpeaker Antimode 8033 room eq unit give a very smooth response.
More to discover