Headphones & speakers

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Wow such a long reply... took me a few days o read it

 

Anyway I have done any room treatment yet so far, just need a little more furniture in my room. So far my speakers still sound pretty alright I guess. Could hear the height, depth and width. Nice focused mids, could hear the singer standing in front of me, depending on recording. Last but not least, the speakers "disappear" as well when music is played through it.

 

On top of space, room treatment is another big headache as well!

 

While at it pulling my speakers from the wall/into the room, I had a chat with the guru, TS Lim. He advocates less "treatment", instead, just fill your room with ordinary stuff, bookshelves, CDs, LPs, desk, chair, etc...

 

The reasoning behind this is what some call "room re-enforcement" effect, ie the room reflects certain frequencies more, such that you get the 3D effect, the sense of performers in the room. When sound bounces off the walls, this gives out an echo/a secondary reflection, which the brain as being in space. If you take the extreme case, when you listen to a performance in an old church, the high ceiling and big space gives you a sense of the hall.

 

Coming back to our room, with the speakers away from the walls, sound is allowed to bounce off them and thus create a better sense of space. Lim describes the front plane of the speakers as a mirror - the further you bring the speakers away from the back wall, the deeper your soundstage. Of course each room differs and some treatment is usually necessary in corners, but his point makes perfect sense and flies in the face of commonly held notions of room treatment. I did not believe it at first and thus avoided doing it for years, but now after trying it and hearing the effect, I wouldn't go back.

 

In practice, with the room reflection - you do not need to turn up the volume as much to get the same relative loudness. Also each room will reflect certain frequencies more than others, so some experimentation is required to fine tune and get the right balance. I found that a slight toe-in from direct forward was necessary to get more treble energy to the listening position. Too much toe-in and the soundstage collapses and becomes 2D. With my room, I got more detail in the mids and the bass was re-enforced despite being further away from the wall. The instrumental separation was also much enhanced with voices being clearly distinguished where they appeared as a bunch before.

 

I would conclude by saying that together with (a) clean power supply and ( equipment isolation on footers, © speaker positioning away from walls - rank as the most important tweaks to maximise audio reproduction.