I'm noticing a lot of light bleeding through the AT screen. I'm guessing this isnt very good for image contrast as the light bounces back through the screen. I know most people paint the entire area behind the AT false wall flat black. This isnt an option for me. Has anyone tried just masking the back of the screen frame, or mounting frame, with black speaker cloth?
I know Nick covered his entire front wall with black cloth, but I'm trying to save money where possible. I figured masking the back of the screen frame would have the same effect with little negative affect to the center channel.
I'm ordering fire retardant speaker cloth for the screen wall, so I would need to get this sorted first. Thoughts anyone?
Black bed sheet, or black fabric from a fabric store (suck up your pride and step in their doors) is actually pretty cheap. Heck, Amazon.ca has a 60" x 102" polyester black tablecloth for CDN$ 10.99 (Amazon Prime eligible too) and that was just the first search result. Just don't put it RIGHT behind the screen, but behind your speakers and work with the projector angle a little bit for placement of the cloth (black cloth may need to be higher or lower than the screen itself once looking at from your seating position) and you should be golden.
I'm the type of wierdo that likes going to the fabric store. Lol. I'm like Jamie and Adam of Mythbusters. If the mission calls for it, I'm in. fire retardant fabric is special order there.
Saving my next trip to the fabric store till my better half can attend (see: right mood to humour tedious theater details.) I'm thinking I will just over order fabric from parts express to put it directly behind the screen. A few threads over at AVS suggest doing this leads to better contrast and blocks light in one step. Was curious if anyone here had first hand experience with it.
The next trip to the fabric store will be for the sidewall panels material. Need to pick something in contrast to the rest of the sandy brown and pale yellow tones in the rest of the room. Might go red/gold. Might go copper tones. Need blinds too.
Sitting in the room listening to some old Moby. Wondering just how much better it can sound. Nervous my over analyzing details will implode in a sudden loss of spaciousness.... Trust my ears I have to remind myself. The machine can measure flatness and decay times, but cant grin. All the books suggest I'm just not there yet. Need to go over the checklist in the acoustical frontiers paper.
I think we can all agree that sound quality is the end goal of why we fuss over speakers and hang out in forums. Is it better to use correction, or tune with treatments, or both?
This video touches on a lot of issues with a playback system I've been considering in my HT setup. Changing the physical acoustic conditions of the room is one step, but is correcting the system to "perfection" removing the reason we pick out specific speakers altogether? Thought provoking I think.
Great video thanks for sharing it with us. I can say I really love my Dirac live , its not a swiss army knife of room correction but used with treatments it is damn good. I have only had Audyssey XT and not XT32 but Dirac is on a whole other level. For those who don't want to replace their receiver the Minidsp is a great way to get Dirac Live and honestly you only want it for movies so best imho is to use it between your BD player and receiver. Emotiva says Unison will be available on the XMC-1 when it is released so that's good news if you are considering buying an XMC-1, our dollar on the other hand is the bad news
DOG is GOD spelled backwards. What others think of me is none of my business. M80 V3 MY GLOSS Cherry
Very glad someone found use in it. One of the subjects covered in detail was the concept of the ratio between direct sound vs early and late reflections. I am strongly considering the value of impulse response correction.
If you own Axiom speakers, early reflections are more forgiving in your setups, as they have a very flat off axis response. This is not to say early reflections arent supposed to be controlled. In my case, where my speakers are more directional, early reflections are better absorbed.
Early reflections add a sense of intimacy or liveliness. They are considered detrimental to imaging and clarity. Late reflections do not harm imaging, and increase spaciousness. A music centric system has a stronger ratio of early reflections and direct sound. A multichannel audio HT system has a greater ratio of late reflections and direct sound. This decreases liveliness in favor of speech intelligibility and clarity.
Floyd Toole tested the effect of lateral reflections using a mono source and a speaker representing the reflection point of a wall. A direct radiating speaker and a speaker located at the theoretical wall reflection point were placed and listeners were able to adjust the level of the speaker representing the first reflection. Listeners prefered a first reflection as strong as the direct sound.
Lateral reflections should not be completely absorbed, but should be controlled based on their off axis response and intended use. At AVS someone mentioned the words of Mathias contradicted Floyde Toole, but in fact, they agree on many fundamental audio concerns.
Room treatments are always better than electronical trickery, however getting a room "perfect" is nearly impossible. But, some things can't ever be fixed by electronic room correction, or at least not without causing other problems... So a combination of the two is a great fix. If you can truly fix some of the big hitters in your particular room (echo is a big one for most), then you also tend to tame some of the room modes, which in turn make electronic correction much better and with fewer compromises.
I only have experience with 2 room corrections. MCACC from Pioneer, which honestly is a joke. I currently use Audyssey XT32 and it is really good, but I have heard that Dirac is amazing. (Then again, for $725 USD for the 8 channel software plus needing to buy a $100+ microphone for room measurements, it better sound good. They do have a 14 day trial if you have a microphone already to give it a shot.) With Atmos and DTS:X I am not sure how critical it is to have correction for all speakers in a 7.2.4 setup as they currently don't have that level, but I am sure that pretty soon they will.
Home Theater Geeks just posted a video about Dirac. It gets mixed "reviews" from the viewers, and I haven't watched it yet, but.... here is the link to the video
After watching a bunch of movies I can safely say the center channel is interacting with the AT screen audibly. I think the screen isn't an issue for db drop or frequency filtering so much, but creates a parallel surface to the front wall creating a very weak boxy sounding echo. I would describe the sound as someone talking to you then cupping their hands around their face (not just mouth) and talking. Subtle but noticeable. I might just be hearing the difference of its response at ear height, instead of below the screen as I was accustomed to. I might try to put something behind the center channel temporarily and see if the effect is negated.
fire retardant fabric is special order there.
Very glad someone found use in it. One of the subjects covered in detail was the concept of the ratio between direct sound vs early and late reflections. I am strongly considering the value of impulse response correction. 
