Yeah Kiwi I stayed up the other night reading your whole thread! Now i'm telling the girlfriend we have to get rid of all the absorption and get mostly diffusion. Thanks
But really, great read and I appreciate you sharing your experience with us.
Hi Guf, I really hope my thread doesn't give the impression that absorption is something that should be ditched. While it is true I have prefered diffusion in some positions in the room - I still find that striking a balance between absorption and diffusion is important. What that balance is will depend on many things, not least of which is individual preference. Too much absorption and the room is dead. Too much diffusion and the room can be too bright.
A friend of my mine recently made the following statement / observation - that I find quite interesting. He noted that
"diffusion keeps the sound sustained in the room longer, at a more evenly decay patten and lower amplitude ...
The human brain need about 30 msec (30/1000 Sec) to make sense of what our ear hear, so by using more diffusion to remain the sound in room at control manner longer , we are hearing more information in the recording.
But acoustic Diffuser have to use wisely, we need to have enough mid high absorber spreading in the room to prevent the too evenly spread mid high affect the tonal balance , making the room become too bright .."