Ideal Listening room

Did you put your speaks on the long or short wall? My attic space will be finished at 11 feet by 18 feet. If I build equipment racks into the knee walls then the speakers will be facing the shorter room dimension. I am not sure this will work with such a narrow room?

Suggestion: put built in cabinets in one of the knee walls for your equipment. I have a room of similiar shape, but a little larger, which I turned into a home theater. I second the recommendation to contact Rives audio. I consulted with them on my room and it was worth every penny. Send me your email and I'll send you some digipics.

Good luck,

Your space could become an excellent listening room.

For professional help, I'd contact Rives Audio (rivesaudio.com). He has several layers of service available and from reputation you'll get the most bang for you buck this way, unless your willing to take a crash course in acoustic design. If you want try this on your own, you might consult the Jeff Hedback @ auralex.com they will provide materials and advice too.

The slopping walls could be an advantage-less parallel surfaces. I wouldn't worry about them.

Since this is part of your house, and you might not want to disturb others ask Rives about constucting isolated walls with resilient channel. You can play your system long into the night and not disturb anyone. Rooms constructed this way tend to sound excellent too. Go to the Acoustic Sience Corporation website and look at their Iso-Wall system.

My friend has a room with similar dimensions and his system sounds great with speakers on the short wall. He gets an incredibly wide soundstage listening nearfield. However Rives can really help with this too and probably guide you on speaker selection somewhat if you haven't made a purchase.

The low ceiling and narrow sidewalls can be easily fixed by using diffusion products. These products have the ability to make your room sound cathedral like.

Rives will also be able to compensate for any resonance issues with bass absorption.

From my experience, you haven't heard your system until you have a well built listening room. In fact, I would consider this the ultimate "front end" and spend whatever needed to get this right. Only then will you truly hear what your components are capable of.

Good listening,
Sgr