Welcome to the August 2004 newsletter from Sonic Spirits!
I – Sonic Spirits News
II – Manufacturers’ News
III – Feature – Room Acoustics
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I – Sonic Spirits News
The summer is usually a slow time in the world of high end audio dealers. A blessing in disguise, this allows us to spend more time learning about our equipment, tweaking our setups, and of course, listen to more music! We hope that you are all having a great summer and hope you come visit us soon!
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On June 19th, Sonic Spirits kicked off the summer by hosting the monthly gathering of the Audiocircle NY Audio Rave. We had nearly two dozen Audiocircle.com members participate and had a great time! The main topic of demonstration was modified CD/DVD players, where we compared units from Pioneer, Toshiba and Sony with mods by Audience, APL Hifi, ModWright, and a DIY from one of the participants. We also enjoyed plenty of food and drink!
For pictures and post-mortem discussion of the gathering, check out:
http://www.audiocircle.com/circles/viewtopic.php?t=11258
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More show reports from HE2004 have come out, and Sonic Spirits (and our partner companies) have received more coverage! Check them out here:
Rick Becker from Enjoythemusic.com (about one third down):
http://www.enjoythemusic.com/hifi2004/becker/
Key Kim from Stereotimes.com (near the bottom):
http://www.stereotimes.com/commHE2004KeyKim.shtm
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II – Manufacturers’ News
Audience
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-The Audience Au24 interconnects and speaker cables were reviewed in 6Moons.com:
http://www.6moons.com/audioreviews/audience2/au24.html
-The Audience Au24 digital SPDIF coaxial cable was reviewed in On Sound and Music:
http://www.onsoundandmusic.com/issues/0407/0407-Au24.html
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III – Feature – Room Acoustics
As many of you know, Sonic Spirits has changed locations twice over the last year (we’re finally settled down for years to come!). Aside from the normal logistical issues that arise from a move, one thing has really identified itself distinctly as our biggest challenge is the issue of Room Acoustics. While I am far from an authority on the subject, I thought I’d share some of my experiences and lessons learned. This is *not* meant to be a technical/scientific discussion of Room Acoustics, but more an anecdotal narrative on things to think about.
Years ago, I met an acoustic engineer from Hong Kong. His expertise was in acoustic design for music performance venues; concert halls, recording studios, etc. Surprisingly, he was unfamiliar with high end home audio systems. I demonstrated my system to him, and while he was impressed, he gave me the advice of “make your room as ‘dead’ as possible”. What does this mean? In any non-acoustic-treated room, sound will reflect off of walls and other objects in the room. The effects are two-fold; first, sound reflected off the walls will eventually reach the ears of a listener at a later time than a direct, non-reflected sound; second, the wall/object which is hit by the sound might also resonate (particularly surfaces like glass), causing additional sound to be generated. These two effects basically cause a listener to hear additional sound that was not directly generated by the source, meaning that the listener is not hearing sound that was purely generated by the source (eg. speakers). The audible results are also two-fold; first, a result of reflected sound can be “smearing”, where the time delay of the reflected sound smears the accuracy of a sound. A more extreme example of a time-delay is an echo. The second result is an imbalance of frequency response, where certain frequencies are emphasized/de-emphasized because of different frequencies being reflected more strongly than others. A room that is highly susceptible to reflection and resonance is generally known as a “live” room. A “dead” room is one that minimizes/eliminates these effects.
So is a perfectly dead room ideal? According to the acoustic engineer from Hong Kong, in the case of a live performance venue, the general goal of the acoustic engineer is to allow the audience to hear the performers and performance. The nuance of a plucked string, the resonance of a cello’s wood body, the inflection of a voice. A perfectly dead room would allow you to hear these things, because you would hear sound exactly from the source without any additional sound from the room to mask the details (note: a perfectly dead room is also known as an “anechoic chamber”). But any audiophile who has heard a system in a perfectly dead room will tell you that such a listening experience lacked some “sparkle” or “energy”. The fact is that most recording engineers will account for their intended audience when recording something, and for the most part, very few consumers in this world will ever do their listening in a perfectly dead room.
How does one go about treating a room? The answer lies in some combination of “absorption”, “diffusion”, and “reflection”. In the world of professional audio and “Ultra High End Audio”, it is a painstaking task of analyzing and identifying the characteristics of the room; “How live is it?” From there, the appropriate acoustic treatment products are installed to (a) absorb sound to prevent 1st and 2nd order reflection as well as to minimize bumps and dips of specific frequency ranges, (b) diffuse other frequencies to energize the sound, (c) reflect sound waves to minimize “standing waves”. Sometimes these products are things that you put into the room (eg. absorption panels), and others might be structural/architectural (eg. braces in the walls to keep a wall from resonating). The initial analysis gives an acoustic designer an indication of what frequencies need to be addressed and how to address them.
For many audiophiles, however, it is not practical to do such a thorough treatment of a listening room; aesthetic and budgetary concerns often limit what can be done. For these people, it is a matter of being creative and trying different alternatives. For example, in our current showroom, we have lined the backing/frames of artwork with sheets of acoustic foam to absorb mid/high frequencies at 1st order reflection points on the front and side walls. Also, we use thick rug-padding underneath our area rugs to minimize reflection and resonance from the hardwood floor.
As previously mentioned, it is possible to have a room that is too dead. This is usually the result of having too much absorbing material in a room. This material doesn’t need to be acoustic treatment; it can be the result of having too much furniture that is highly absorptive (eg. a large, sectional soft sofa and ottoman in a relatively small room). You might even notice that having a large number of people in your listening room will deaden the sound. When we were demonstrating our gear at the New York Home Entertainment Show, it was very obvious that when our room was full, our sound was over-dampened, encouraging us to remove some room treatment items when things became crowded.
In each of our locations, we’ve faced different challenges. In our first location in New York City, we were faced with a relatively large room with lots of glass windows and openings into the room. Despite the glass, we were fortunate not to have much problems with reflection, because the size of the room allowed for good distance between speakers and walls, minimizing reflection. However, this was also problematic because it was difficult to maintain good sound pressure in the room, leading to reduced dynamics and low “sparkle” (energy). To a critical ear, high frequencies were rolled off, and while bass was “accurate”, it certainly did not have the impact many audiophiles look for. We were also very limited in our ability to treat the room because of aesthetic issues. Our main “cure” was simply to play music at higher volumes.
In our second location, our issues were almost opposite. The room was smaller and closed in. As a result, we had good sound pressure and were able to achieve decent dynamics and energy. However, we faced more reflection issues, which caused smearing of sonic imaging; in addition, bass performance caused an amount of masking of detail. Low volumes were beneficial, and we were able to place some bass treatments in various corners to minimize the bass masking.
Our current location offers both good and bad acoustic characteristics. The size of the room is decent for good sound pressure, and because we place our system/speakers along the long wall of the room (with good distance from the side walls), we minimize first-order reflection from the side walls. However, with openings on the left-side wall and back-right wall, we have some issues in maintaining sound pressure in the room. To compensate, we have portable “barriers” which we can place in the openings to keep sound pressure in the room and avoid “suck-out”. The other unfortunate thing is that these openings lead to large atrium-like spaces; these spaces offer a slap-echo which is noticeable. The barriers have acoustic foam on the back to absorb some of that echo. We’ve treated the room with heavy-duty bass traps in the corners, along with acoustic foam (behind paintings/artwork frames) as well as thick-padded rugs. In addition, we’ve added some “Echo” cushions to the front and back wall/ceiling intersections to help control slap-echo in the room. For a picture of our current room, please check out the Gallery on our website:
http://www.sonicspirits.com/gallery.htm
So to summarize, Room Acoustics are a very important part of any high end audio system. How you treat it will depend on your budget, your aesthetic demands, and your taste; Every room has its unique challenges, and there is no doubting that it will play a critical role in getting what you want out of your equipment.
Here are some useful links to commercial articles about room acoustics (I particularly like the Rives Audio link, which provides a “Listening Room Simulator”. The Simulator provides information with regards to standing waves and nodes, which I mentioned but did not discuss above):
http://www.eighthnerve.com/methodology.html
http://www.rivesaudio.com/resources/listening_room/frame.html
http://www.echobusters.com/page9.html
http://www.rpginc.com/products/hometheater.htm
http://www.realtraps.com/facts.htm
http://www.silcom.com/~aludwig/Room_acoustics.html
A good source for acoustic foam:
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Sonic Spirits Inc.
info@sonicspirits.com
Authorized Dealer for:
Focus Audio - Blue Circle Audio - Resolution Audio - Dodson Audio
- Acoustic Zen - Audience - Eighth Nerve – Golden Sound
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