Walk before run: simple treatments

amirm · Jul 15, 2010

So let's get this forum started with a simple question. If someone has bare walls and want to make the first step toward treating their room, what should they do? Assume modest investment.

If you were forced to only allow one piece of acoustical treatment, what would it be? I have heard it be a ceiling absorber to get rid of the first reflection bounce ahead of the side wall.

What would the priority after the first wall? Corner bass absorbers? Side wall first reflections points?

And how about front and back walls? Diffusion? If so, what type? And how to keep the budget under control there?

vinylphilemag · Jul 15, 2010

Great questions, and I think the answer partly depends on one's speakers: dipoles are likely to require more attention to the front wall, for example, and I imagine a multichannel system would have different needs to one that is just stereo.

That said, I'm planning to invest in some acoustic treatments sooner rather than later. I'll be putting bass traps in the front corners and middle of the front wall, some HF traps on the front wall, and some absorbtion on the side walls. (I have a nasty flutter echo I want to address!)

es347 · Jul 15, 2010

I would guess treating the first reflection points along the side walls. Ethan, jump in on this one my boy.

Ethan Winer · Jul 15, 2010

Yes, treating side-wall and ceiling reflections is probably first, though bass traps are close behind. It depends a lot on the size and orientation of the room. Bass response is best when the speakers fire the longer way down the room, but that puts the side walls closer to the speakers and your ears. So reflection absorbers are needed more than when the room width is 20 feet or wider. But early reflections are easily treated with absorption in those key places, versus bass problems that are far more difficult to deal with. So I generally prefer firing loudspeakers the long way to get the best bass response.

--Ethan

DonH50 · Jul 15, 2010

I'm certainly not going to question Ethan's response (I like it anyway). I will comment that, to my ears and measurement system, those relatively inexpensive foam panels do not work nearly as well as actual fiber panels, and those big tall foam stacks termed bass traps, are not. - Don

Ethan Winer · Jul 16, 2010

^^^ I won't defend foam other than to say all foam is not equal. There are some good reasons to prefer absorbers made from rigid fiberglass over foam! But some non-acoustic foam is sold fraudulently, using falsified specs. So that stuff is even worse.

--Ethan

KeithR · Jul 22, 2010

i found without a doubt ceiling treatments were most important---but that probably has to do with my lowish 8.5' ceilings.

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Walk before run: simple treatments

amirm

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vinylphilemag

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es347

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Ethan Winer

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DonH50

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Ethan Winer

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KeithR

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