To tell you what I heard last night. I debated whether or not to post about this for fear of it sounding like more audiophile rhetoric, but screw it, here it goes.
For the last couple of years I have been working on my very small room (10.5'x12.5') trying to create a decent sounding acoustic enviornment. I have installed bass traps, first reflection absorbtion, absorbtion behind the listening chair, a large polycylindrical diffuser on the front wall between my speakers, and triangular reflective diffusion at the ceiling/wall corner junctions. I have moved my speakers around searching for the best sounding locations and reduced the height of my equipment rack behind the speakers, what I haven't done (other than with a dB meter, spreadsheet, and test tone disc) is taken response measurement and made adjustments based on those findings.
After the installation of the polycylindrical diffuser I felt that I was experiencing good imaging and soundstage, I didn't know...
A few days ago I decided (after reading InfernoSTi's, John's, thread on using REW) to take the leap and try it for myself. I grabbed my son's creative USB DAC, my radioshack meter (only good to 3KHz according to Home Theater Shack) and a few cables. I calibrated the soundcard and used the calibration plug-in for the meter. After a bit of trial and error I figured out how to take some basic response measurements. I took a few measurements and contacted Danny to get his recommendation on how to start adjusting the settings of the V1 servo bass amps. Danny had me take various readings presented in different ways until he was confident he could make a couple of recommendations. I implemented his ideas and started taking more measurements. I continued to make adjustments until I ended up with a graph that was reasonably flat with the exception of a substantial bass bump 70Hz and down, this is what I settled on.
Last night I was able to sit down and listen, a WOW moment occured with regard to soundstage and imaging. This is what I told Danny:
"Hey Danny,
Just a note to send you a big thanks for your help with the graphs and adjusting the bass amps on Thursday. My system has literally taken a huge leap forward in soundstage and imaging, I think it probably was primarily due to getting the phasing right although that is proabably not the whole story. I got to sit down and listen to my system last night, it was a revelation for me. The walls of my small room melted away, the soundstage was as big as the recording made it, way outside my walls with obvious depth, I could locate every instrument in nearly every song I played. I listened to a bunch of Zepp, all the imaging was rock solid with each performer on the stage with the exception of Kashmir, Page was floating all over the stage on that one floating in the air, just everywhere. I have never heard a stereo system do this or sound as great as my system is sounding right now, I am almost afraid to change anything, total immersion in the soundstage. I am incredibly happy with it. Sorry for gushing, I was up until 4:30 this morning listening.
Next time I see these guys point newbys to headphones because they don't have a large space or the room isn't based on the golden ratio I will be calling BS on that, amazing sound in a very small room can be done!!
I didn't know a soundsystem could sound this great!
Best,
Ed"
Please, no comments on the gushing nature of the email
, I was up until 4:30
.
The moral of this story is don't put off taking measurments, small changes can make a huge difference!
Best,
Ed
System: Alix/MPD>Tranquility DAC>Bottlehead 2a3 (Stereomour)>GR Research V1s
