suck out fixed. i think.

Mike Lavigne

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I'm thrilled for you, Mike! Anytime someone with a system at your level can experience a satisfying "leap" in performance, that's worth celebrating. That you did it yourself with your son just adds to the enjoyment.

Lee

thanks Lee.

it was really fun to do it with my son. that's life at it's finest.
 

Mike Lavigne

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Mike, great read and congratulations on the results. Your enthusiasm comes through in spades. I commend you for getting your hands dirty and trying to solve the problem yourself. Sometimes, it is the only way. And as a father of two, I am sure there was no small feeling of joy in doing this project with your son.

This story is consistent with what I have been discovering myself. Within one's budget, he reaches a point where improvements in sound may mean relatively large expenses in new components. But with sufficient curiosity, effort and motivation, additional gains can be had through fine tune and slight tweaks to the system and room. These gains can be dramatic and cost very little relative to the overall system cost. And they can be extremely rewarding and contribute to a significantly better emotional connection to the music. Member Al M. is experience a similar improvement as described on his system page.

These kinds of threads, and the "One Amigo" thread that Steve just posted, make this forum so enjoyable. Thanks Mike for sharing.

thanks Peter.

these last room tuning efforts have taken things to another place and as a byproduct have really amped me up for the enjoyment of the experience.

a collection of gear or pretty room are well and good but getting it to make music better is very satisfying.
 

MadFloyd

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Congrats, Mike - awesome to see that you can keep on improving what I'm sure is a wonderful room!

Btw, how far do you sit from your speakers? The photo makes it seem very far (but I'm sure that's an optical illusion).
 

jazdoc

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thanks Lee.

it was really fun to do it with my son. that's life at it's finest.

Did you measure the 'fun'? If not, how can we be sure it was actually 'fun'; let alone 'life at it's finest'. Please provide waterfall graphs; (preferably using the Harman fun scale). :D
 

Mike Lavigne

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Congrats, Mike - awesome to see that you can keep on improving what I'm sure is a wonderful room!

Btw, how far do you sit from your speakers? The photo makes it seem very far (but I'm sure that's an optical illusion).

thank you Ian. I also think your system and room are wonderful. nice job there and your passion is considerable and appreciated in pursuit of ultimate performance.

maybe that picture is a hard perspective as far as depth. the sweet spot chair looks farther to the rear than it is as it blends with the sofa. and the speakers, which are huge, make the room look much smaller than it is. when you see a person standing next to the 86 and 82 inch tall speaker towers then the scale is more evident.

my ears are 119" from the tweeters, and the tweeters are 119" apart. so the chair is at the head of an equilateral triangle. the woofer towers are also on that same radius so the wave launch gets optimal cohesion and precision.

here is a better perspective for depth.

left_front_view_0004.jpg
 

MadFloyd

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thank you Ian. I also think your system and room are wonderful. nice job there and your passion is considerable and appreciated in pursuit of ultimate performance.

maybe that picture is a hard perspective as far as depth. the sweet spot chair looks farther to the rear than it is as it blends with the sofa. and the speakers, which are huge, make the room look much smaller than it is. when you see a person standing next to the 86 and 82 inch tall speaker towers then the scale is more evident.

my ears are 119" from the tweeters, and the tweeters are 119" apart. so the chair is at the head of an equilateral triangle. the woofer towers are also on that same radius so the wave launch gets optimal cohesion and precision.

here is a better perspective for depth.

View attachment 21615

Thanks, Mike - I knew it was an illusion. Great photo - your room is to die for!
 

marty

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Mike,
Love, love, love the original post because it shows your obvious passion and your "leave no stone unturned" commitment to this hobby. That said, there are those that will encourage you to simply adjust your meds, but don't listen to them for one second! You've got it right, buddy. Stay the course and follow your bliss.
Marty
 

jfrech

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Mike,
Love, love, love the original post because it shows your obvious passion and your "leave no stone unturned" commitment to this hobby. That said, there are those that will encourage you to simply adjust your meds, but don't listen to them for one second! You've got it right, buddy. Stay the course and follow your bliss.
Marty

+1 nicely said. We're the lunatic fringe after all ;-)...lunacy is part of the deal...and the sound !
 

Mike Lavigne

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Mike,
Love, love, love the original post because it shows your obvious passion and your "leave no stone unturned" commitment to this hobby. That said, there are those that will encourage you to simply adjust your meds, but don't listen to them for one second! You've got it right, buddy. Stay the course and follow your bliss.
Marty

+1 nicely said. We're the lunatic fringe after all ;-)...lunacy is part of the deal...and the sound !

thank you Marty and John.

I think we all do qualify for that lunatic 'fully all-in' group.

thank you both for the kind words and Marty....no worries about the 'anti' crowd slowing me down from musical bliss on my own terms.;)
 

Mike Lavigne

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update; another step forward.

there are 4 different dials to adjust on each of the 4 separate bass adjustment panels (2 per side) on the bass towers. the OP describes what happened when I adjusted 2 of them for each section; the 'bass level' and the 'bass quality'. I set those to what the designer called 'flat' positions which were quite different (about 40-50% around the adjustment scale) than where they had been in the 'compensated' positions.

we had left the other 2 adjustments (bass filter and bass extension) in the 'compensated' position in case we found that the changes I made did not work, so we did not need to find those positions again.

yesterday I had left a message for the speaker designer asking him if I could also move the other 2 adjustments to the spots he had designated as 'flat' since we did know that we had a positive result from moving the other 2. early last night I had not yet heard back from him and decided 'what the heck' I want to know what that will do, so I did make those adjustments. in this case; both the 'bass filter', which is a variable crossover, and 'bass extension' the 'compensated' positions were much closer to the 'flat' positions. in one of the 4 was already in the 'flat' position.

WHOA! more meat on the bones, more heft in the bass, but it was the fire and sparkle of the mid range that took a significant improvement. vocals were quite a bit better. I had thought I was all the way there on perfect balance of voice and string tone but I was wrong. richer, more 'body' and dimensionality (is that a word?) to the images, more harmonic shading, more tube like breath of life.

every reference I have was improved in subtle ways. delicate little things in the soundstage are all more real and filled out and complete. magical.

these were tiny adjustments on 2 innocent dials on the back of some active bass towers that crossover at around 35hz with the main towers. how can this do that? don't know, but they did.:D
 
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advanced101

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Mike, given the choice, would you stick with your decision on the floor type/ layout? I’m considering the same thing with hardwood in the front of the room.
 
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Mike Lavigne

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Mike, given the choice, would you stick with your decision on the floor type/ layout? I’m considering the same thing with hardwood in the front of the room.

sorry for the delayed response, I saw this post Friday night and have been very busy and finally found the time to circle back and respond.

yes; I absolutely believe that ideally having a 'stage' (hardwood) under the speaker end to retain energy, and then the somewhat absorptive 'audience' (carpet) on the rear 60-66% is ideal. think concert hall where the walls are mostly diffusive to retain energy but eliminate direct reflections. I think this approach is appropriate in reasonably sized rooms. if the room is quite small then you need to be open to more absorption to control energy and allow for higher SPL's. but even then if you start out with hardwood there you can always add an area rug. I've tried area rugs at the speaker end a number of times and it was immediately obvious it is a bad idea. the sound just died.

good luck with your project.
 

advanced101

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Thank you for taking the time to respond.
 

spiritofmusic

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Jun 13, 2013
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Mike, you were the main reason why on carving the audio room, I went non-carpeted on the front 12’, and carpeted on the rear 26’-36’.

And it’s undoubtedly been the right choice.
 

spiritofmusic

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Mike, do send me that PM on diffusers as per our comms recently.
 

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