Pros and Cons of a Listening Room Being a Sealed Box

[bonzo75]

Marty's room is huge plus a pair of G213 v2 Gotham subs

Yes but there is control, and when the volume rises it does not get overloaded. There is something about the mix of the Helmholtz, the size ratio, and the other treatments. I think the ratio might be more important than the size

 

[Steve Williams]

are you sure Marty has Helmhotz resonators. I think not

 

[bonzo75]

are you sure Marty has Helmhotz resonators. I think not

Yes, in the ceiling. I think you do too

 

[Al M.]

Is a completely closed room good because it allows a stereo system to "pressurize" the space?

Apart from the advantages of a closed room already mentioned, this is important. With a closed room you can more easily get "room fill", literally filling the room with sound. Rather than just 'looking' at a soundstage you can get the sounds emanating from it and enveloping you. It may provide a more involving experience.

This holds for the total sound. As far as specifically bass goes, yes, it is easier to "pressurize" a closed room with bass, so that it makes more impact in general and you can even feel it in your gut when appropriate. You can more easily get unfortunate room modes with a closed room, but with proper acoustic treatment, as you already practice, this should be less of an issue. At the listening position my bass is excellent, but for icing on the cake I am thinking about buying ASC Isothermal traps for the back wall behind the listening seat to get rid of the low-frequency "rear wall bounce":

http://www.acousticsciences.com/products/isothermal-tubetrap

So yes, closed room all the way, as far as I am concerned.

 

[Steve Williams]

Yes, in the ceiling. I think you do too

I do. I didn't think that he did

 

[DaveyF]

ron , closed box for sure for symmetry an ease of treatment , but more importantly it will be a quiet room with no extraneous noise pollution and will also keep the music in..ie you can play at the level you like without disturbing the rest of the house.
Easy to control the liveliness of the room vs an open plan space .. no real aesthetic consideration or WAF to contend with with your own closed room

+1


In my old room, which was substantially larger than my current room, I had an opening to my kitchen. After very little time, I was really aware of the fact that this set-up was sub par. The kitchen is just that- a 'kitchen' and it brought with it all kinds of distractions and issues. While it was initially a lot easier to set up my system in the much larger space, the lack of 'intimacy' ultimately required a move. Today, although my room is far smaller, the sound is way better ( after treatment etc.,) and I don't look back.

 

[Al M.]

You can also look at it this way:
Think about music that you have heard outdoors. Except at extreme volume levels through a stadium PA, has the sound ever enveloped you in the same way as music listened to in a closed venue did, be it a club or a concert hall? Or did your ears rather 'look at' the sound source from a distance, as it were, with the sound staying at the source?

With an open-room layout you may get the outdoors effect to some degree, even if ever so slightly.

 

[NorthStar]

What about a fireplace? It has an opening to the outside...a funnel.

Gary's earlier question was a good question ? http://www.whatsbestforum.com/showt...g-a-Sealed-Box&p=392259&viewfull=1#post392259

Also, in my room there is a door that is always open to another room, but I can close it...should I?
Plus, there are two more doors that are always close...to the outside (outdoors).
Plus, there are three large windows that I can open and close...in the winter they are close...in the summer they are open.

Music sounds different between winter and summer. :b
Unfortunately I don't have two EQ presets...one for winter and the other for summer; only one...for winter.
My next pre/pro needs to have few EQ presets, to match the seasons.

* It's interesting, about our rooms and music listening in them confined space that can vary depending of the level of close-in and openings...
It's a bit like some people prefer sealed box enclosure speakers (acoustic suspension), and others vented designs...various type of them.
And the same with subwoofers. And some vented ones with two ports you can leave them open or block one of them or both.

The ideal music listening room; is it one completely sealed, or one vented?

 

[andromedaaudio]

You want special effects north star , speaker ...fireplace ??

 

[NorthStar]

You want special effects north star , speaker ...fireplace ??

No special effects, I watch movies for that. :b

But many music listening rooms do have a fireplace in them; and you can close the 'trap' door...except when you have a fire going on.
Ron started a thread about a sealed room, without openings to outside parts of the home...the pros and cons.
It's a great subject in our hobby, and it has impacts on our music listening. It's worth exploring in depth...fireplace included. :b

Lol, I am (we are) no experts; but this is the place to become ones.
We all know that the room is the most important component in a hi-fi stereo sound system; so it is very normal/natural/important that we spend more time on this.

Look, how many here are listening sometimes with a door (or a window) open, and other times close?
We don't need a degree in space aerodynamics to notice the level of difference in sound.
Tuning our room should be priority number one...to us serious music audiophiles.
Instead we tune our setups with different cables and power conditioning (sounds like a shampoo conditioner for our hair).

What about Doctor Floyd E. Toole on the subject of sealed rooms versus vented ones (with an opening to adjacent rooms of the house)?
Anything on this; the pros and cons of each version?
_________

I am searching right now, on this very subject; and I thought I was good in using key words when googling.
It took five pages before they even start scratching the surface; and it's not much, surely not enough...so I'll try different key words...

• http://www.agbell.org/Document.aspx?id=185
• http://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?t=117734

The two links above won't simply do it; but that's all what I found so far. I don't give up...still searching ....
* The first link is interesting.

 

[NorthStar]

? Here's one link that some of you might find educative and scientifically sound/useful: ? https://www.wengercorp.com/Construct/docs/Acoustic Problems-Solutions.pdf

It's loaded with goodies, and full of relevance.

 

[KeithR]

i think most "sealed rooms" have a tendency to sound dead and unnatural. I would be very careful on how much treatment to use if you go that direction.

then again, i'm also not really in the "man cave" gang. my favorite dedicated room actually had sofas in it.

 

[NorthStar]

... my favorite dedicated room actually had sofas in it.

Does it open to adjacent rooms...with door opening(s)...Keith?

 

[Al M.]

i think most "sealed rooms" have a tendency to sound dead and unnatural. I would be very careful on how much treatment to use if you go that direction.

That depends on far too many factors to be able to generalize.

 

[PeterA]

Two very good rooms that I have been in are the main listening room at Goodwin's High End in Boston, and Transparent Audio's main listening/research room. Both seem to sound better when the doors are shut, sealing them. They are both large rooms and heavily treated. Magico's main room appears to be also sealed, though I am not certain.

Al M. and I both have fairly symmetrical rooms and we listen with the doors shut. Our systems are similar in the sense that they are based around mini monitor speakers. Both systems exhibit what Al just referred to as room filling sound which envelopes the listener. We are surrounded by sound rather then observing it in front of us at the plan of the speakers. Jim Smith refers to this as the system "playing the room." When all is set up properly, the sound locks in and one sits and is a part of, rather then separate from, the sound - and the music. For me, there is more emotional connection to the music when this occurs.

I have never experienced this same effect in open spaces, though it may be possible, I don't know. I do have a fireplace. The damper is at the top of the chimney. When I paid attention to this, it seemed to sound better when it was closed. I open it in the Summer to vent the warm air from my amps when not listening. The sense of Presence seems to diminish when I listen with the door or windows open in my room.

 

[GaryProtein]

The room at Goodwin's High End is superb (see photo below). It has a mixture of diffusion and absorption and when I was there last years ago also had a large area rug. At the time I was listening to the Martin Logan Statement e2 and Wilson X-2 with XS at opposite ends of the room. All I had to do was spin the chair around in the middle of the room. The M-L Statement e2 was wonderful.

Like it says in my sig, my fireplace has been boarded up for over twenty years. It's the wall directly behind my speakers. I don't miss it one bit. We have better fetishes than making love in front of a roaring fire.

 

[Al M.]

Al M. and I both have fairly symmetrical rooms and we listen with the doors shut. Our systems are similar in the sense that they are based around mini monitor speakers. Both systems exhibit what Al just referred to as room filling sound which envelopes the listener. We are surrounded by sound rather then observing it in front of us at the plan of the speakers. Jim Smith refers to this as the system "playing the room." When all is set up properly, the sound locks in and one sits and is a part of, rather then separate from, the sound - and the music. For me, there is more emotional connection to the music when this occurs.

I agree, Peter. Let me just add a clarification. The sound source still is localized at/behind the speakers, and very precise imaging is still heard, but just like in a concert hall, while the sound is heard as emanating from the source, it fills the acoustic (hall/room).

As you once put it youself, Peter (please correct me if wrong):

Think of a soprano on a stage: the soprano as sound source is rather small compared to the hall, and you hear the dimensions as such, but the sound coming from the soprano voice is large and fills the hall.

 

[DaveC]

Two very good rooms that I have been in are the main listening room at Goodwin's High End in Boston, and Transparent Audio's main listening/research room. Both seem to sound better when the doors are shut, sealing them. They are both large rooms and heavily treated. Magico's main room appears to be also sealed, though I am not certain.

Al M. and I both have fairly symmetrical rooms and we listen with the doors shut. Our systems are similar in the sense that they are based around mini monitor speakers. Both systems exhibit what Al just referred to as room filling sound which envelopes the listener. We are surrounded by sound rather then observing it in front of us at the plan of the speakers. Jim Smith refers to this as the system "playing the room." When all is set up properly, the sound locks in and one sits and is a part of, rather then separate from, the sound - and the music. For me, there is more emotional connection to the music when this occurs.

I have never experienced this same effect in open spaces, though it may be possible, I don't know. I do have a fireplace. The damper is at the top of the chimney. When I paid attention to this, it seemed to sound better when it was closed. I open it in the Summer to vent the warm air from my amps when not listening. The sense of Presence seems to diminish when I listen with the door or windows open in my room.

It's possible with speakers that have a controlled dispersion pattern. With conventional speakers it takes a lot of work on the room to get it right, speakers with a tighter dispersion pattern take the room out of the equation to a much larger degree and provide that 3D immersive soundstage with relatively little effort and do it to a degree conventional speakers can't really match even if set up perfectly. One of the main design goals of my speaker is to provide this experience in a typical living room.

 

[PeterA]

I agree, Peter. Let me just add a clarification. The sound source still is localized at/behind the speakers, and very precise imaging is still heard, but just like in a concert hall, while the sound is heard as emanating from the source, it fills the acoustic (hall/room).

As you once put it youself, Peter (please correct me if wrong):

Think of a soprano on a stage: the soprano as sound source is rather small compared to the hall, and you hear the dimensions as such, but the sound coming from the soprano voice is large and fills the hall.

Yes, Al. I think I did say that, and still find it to be true. This has been a subject of interest to me for some time, but it is not often discussed. The difference between the sound being made at the source - voice, cello, orchestra, etc - and the sound spreading into the space. At the origin, we think of imaging, palpable presence, soundstage, etc. This is distinct and separate from the sound as it fills the room and spreads around the listener. Few systems, in my experience, can demonstrate this distinction. Those that can, tend to be more convincing. It is certainly the case with live acoustic music.

 

[Al M.]

Yes, Al. I think I did say that, and still find it to be true. This has been a subject of interest to me for some time, but it is not often discussed. The difference between the sound being made at the source - voice, cello, orchestra, etc - and the sound spreading into the space. At the origin, we think of imaging, palpable presence, soundstage, etc. This is distinct and separate from the sound as it fills the room and spreads around the listener. Few systems, in my experience, can demonstrate this distinction. Those that can, tend to be more convincing. It is certainly the case with live acoustic music.

Peter, I never thought about things that way until you pointed it out some time ago, but I think you are correct in your observations.

You also talk about the sound energizing the room/hall, something perhaps very much related to the sound filling the room.