When the only TV in the house resides in the GIK-treated living/dining room and husband would rather listen than watch what wife has selected with the Comcast remote, the bedroom audio system is his only viable option. But the bedroom is a 13'x11'x8' sardine can stuffed with the furniture that makes a bedroom what it is and asymmetrically configured with chest-high windows on one side, a louvered-door closet on the other, and no usable right-front corner because a door opens there. To add insult to sonic injury, the stand-mounted speakers have virtually no breathing room with a low-boy dresser sandwiched between them. Then there are the framed prints, jewel boxes, and assorted knick-knacks that, in the name of domestic peace and tranquility,
shall not be moved. And of course to top it all off, there's the question of what would happen to my marriage if I started moving what my wife calls '2001 monoliths' into our bedroom.
One of the benefits of having already treated the main audio system is that I could cannibalize its 2'x4' full-range and scatter-plated 244s along with its 1'x4' Monsters to see what effect they would have on what I would hear from my Paradigm Studio 20s while plopped out on the bed. Not all at once, of course. If I was going to get away with this, mission creep had to be my M.O. So I started with the front wall (two full-range 244s and a Monster). Having received no adverse reaction, I did the rear wall (two scatter-plated 244s and a Monster). Same non-reaction, maybe because I figured out how to move the prints around so all could remain on that wall after I positioned the traps. Feeling safe, I started ordering traps from Christina Stone in stages. An already too-long story short, I proceeded to the first reflection points, then the second, and, finally, after a very helpful consultation with Bryan Pape--and in what I thought would be an esthetic and functional deal breaker--2'x2' 244s to cover the dresser front to reduce its SBIR.
As it turned out, my wife liked what she heard from the additions, so everything stays...like so:
Not an interior decorator's dream design. But, no pun intended (and apologies to Cole Porter), the difference in the bedroom-system listening experience pre- and post-treatment is night and day. My thanks again to Bryan for his sage advice and Christina for her patience in dealing with the staging of my orders to enable me to put what I "borrowed" from the main system back where it belongs. And, of course, thanks to my wife for her forbearance.
--Jim