Room correction - what device works best?

"Many audiophiles are "purists" at heart, and as such are closed-minded to anything that does not fit their purist mindset. In the case of room acoustics and EQ keep in mind that most of the people giving advise have little or no experience working with electronic EQ. Even if they have tried electronic room equalization, there is a learning curve and they may have given up before they fully understood how to use their device effectively. That said, it's not exactly rocket science."

I would probably be classified as a purist. At least by your standards. I think you mean purist to be someone doesn't have the same opinion as you.

Lets say that you removed your stereo system from your listening room and put a piano in its place. Like most rooms, its not perfect, so for this example, lets say the room excites a range of frequencies in the upper mids. Those notes sound a little louder than the others due to room acoustics. How would you fix the problem? One way would be to open up the piano and modify it by putting more felt on the hammers to the keys in the problem frequencies. Now all of the notes have the same volume if you hit them with the exact same amount of force. A flat frequency response. Another option would be to just leave everything as is and just live with the problem if its not too bad. And finally, you can fool with the room and not the piano. As a purist, I would go with one of the two latter options. Given the components the OP has, I believe you would do more damage to the systems sound using processing, digital or analog, than choosing another option.

Some may argue that this is just my opinion. That's correct, it is. But I do base my opinion on actual experience, and not just guessing. I have a Behringer 24/96 digital EQ that destroys the sound of my Wadia CD player. I also have a dbx analog EQ that ruins the sound of whatever preamp it gets used with. So, in my opinion, the OP's Ayon CD player is just to nice a player to be run through processing.

One option to consider is if you live near a Guitar Center, they stock the processors I mention, and many more. They have a great return policy so if you try something and it doesn't work out, just return it.

I grew interested in acoustics and having a technical background and DIY inclinations, studied quite a bit, got a measurement mic, mic amp, REW software, and built a number of tube traps, Helmholtz resomators, etc. also worked a fair bit on layout. The benefit was very apparent, although my wife wasn't as happy with the ugly stuff in the living room. But proved room treatments are worth the effort.

My only source these days is a very optimized PC with hardware and software optimizations, feeding an Audiophilleo and Metrum Octave DAC, a Lamm LL2 pre, a McIntosh Mc275 amp, 3-way speakers and a pair of subs.

Recently I incorporated Acourate software. Along the lines of Dirac, but less automatic and more powerful. So far I have been using it for room correction only and it works wonderfully. Miles' Tutu playing now, sounding as real as ever before in my system. Imaging has improved a lot.

I guess purist is in the eye of the beholder. My purist plan is to go fully active 4-ways and enable Acourate ability to run digital crossovers, driver linearization, and time-alignment. An amp driving directly a speaker driver is as purist as it gets in my view.

A couple of good articles for those who might be interested in learning more, at computeraudiophile.com, by Mitchco:
Introduction to Acourate: explains the basics for a 2-channel system. What I'm doing.
Advanced Acourate: explains how he implemented his 3-way active system, linearized drivers, time-aligned.

As far as I can tell, I have used all of the devices so far mentioned (as well as some others) and, honestly, they all work. The variables are:
1. Bass only or full range.
2. Analog only, analog in/out DSP or digital in/out DSP
3. Automatic implementation of filters from measurements or independent measurement and implementation (more hands on).
4. Single measurement point or multiple measurement points.
5. Single pass listening area measurement/correction or separate near-field correction followed by room correction.
6. Fixed or variable target curves.
7. Stereo or multichannel.
8. Hardware or software.

What device works best? Depends on your choices and your room acoustics.

I completely agree with Plato and RW is correct. Audio is technology and must be corrected them with electronic engineering. The last thing I want is to tweak and install Pads on my wall because it just telling people that my system needs help.

RW, nevermind the research... have you actually used the product in your own system and if so what was your experience? If not, well, maybe you shouldn't be touting it...

I did my research and I was willing to invest the time and money. I went with DEQX. No regrets.

Everything I read indicates that the Dirac system is the way to go. Do some research and see if you agree...

-RW-

I understand that not everyone's significant other is cool with having a lot of tube traps and acoustic wall panels in their living room--and I count my wife among them. That's why I use Lyngdorf's RoomPerfect room correction system and it's simple to set up and use, plus the results are gratifying.

I have also used a fairly basic dbx 31-band stereo graphic equalizer with very good results... but usually you need a way of measuring the resulting response curve and it is done manually, band by band whereas the Lyngdorf does it automatically using measurements you take around your room with the included microphone.

From what I understand the DSpeaker EQ only adjusts frequencies from 500Hz and lower, and the Rives unit, while it is reputed to be fairly transparent, is also limited to what it can do, and I believe it only works in the bass. The Lyngdorf works full-range and reduces room reflections which can improve the fine detailing and imaging quite a bit. There is a lot of flexibility as to the adjustments you can make to the sound via remote control from your listening position, and that's another reason why I like it. It also has a bypass button so you can instantly compare the direct input signal to the EQ settings. For me this makes it a no-brainer.

While the Lyngdorf is not inexpensive, neither are acoustic panels, diffusers, helmholz resonators or tube traps... and none of those devices may work at the specific frequencies that your particular room needs corrected.

Many audiophiles are "purists" at heart, and as such are closed-minded to anything that does not fit their purist mindset. In the case of room acoustics and EQ keep in mind that most of the people giving advise have little or no experience working with electronic EQ. Even if they have tried electronic room equalization, there is a learning curve and they may have given up before they fully understood how to use their device effectively. That said, it's not exactly rocket science.

Does the Ayon have a digital out or better yet a digital tape loop? If not your system with a room correction device will have an A/D conversion step and you won't be using the D/A converter in the Ayon, but the one in the room correction component.

If your primary goal is to eliminate peaks resulting from bass room nodes than an alternative approach is to use an analog parametric equalizer. A used Rives is a good choice.

As others have stated you should do some physical room correction first.
This is advice based on my experiences;
Treat first reflections, front/back wall, corners and wall ceiling junction.
You will need a measurement device, highly recommend the Omni Mic system.
Bass issues are the most difficult to tame, especially if you have a smaller space that you can't move things around in to get out of the modes.
Bass traps were a no go for me, just not enough space.
I tried the DSpeaker Dual Core in the digital and analog domain, it would correct but I was never satisfied with the end sound.
Any device that worked in the digital domain that I tried always seemed to mess with the sound adversely.
I ended up inserting a Rives Parc just before my mono blocks, pure analog correction.
It is extremely transparent and did the bass correction that I needed without mucking up everything else.
You do not need the Rives software to set the Parc up, just a good measurement tool and enough patience to work through the learning curve, its really not that involved.
It is a shame that they are out of business.
There is a seller with two for sale on Audiogon, I feel that his asking price is too high, but he is taking offers.
Do not be fooled into thinking that you can not correct enough with only 3 bands of parametric correction per channel.
It works extremely well!

Just curious why you're considering room correction? Is there a specific room issue you're trying to overcome (let's face it, they all have'em)? Have you heard a system with room correction? I get that you don't want to turn your family room into what looks like an adult daycare center, but I'd still try to do some of the basics like treating first reflections, corners, etc. if at all possible.

I'll just share my experience FWIW. I heard two different corrected systems, one in a hotel room and one in a big buck home system in a well-treated room. In both instances the differences were huge, as in as big or perhaps bigger than a significant speaker upgrade but definitely at that level. Put it this way, after hearing the corrected signal I didn't even want to listen to the un corrected system anymore. I'm with Byfwynne in not wanting to insert anything into my analog signal, but the improvements in these cases were so overwhelming that if it was degrading the signal to any degree it was swamped by all the other benefits.

Anyway, if it's me I'd try the DSpeaker just because it seems to work well and is relatively easy to use -- I'm not into endless fiddling with this stuff either. And it has a built-in display that may even allow you to use it without using a laptop. All that said, every room and system is different and you may or may not get the level of improvement I heard. Maybe you can find a way to demo one? Cable Company sells it so maybe you could return it with a relatively modest restocking fee? Hope this helps somewhat, and best of luck.

I have found adding reflection absorbing panels and bass traps have made a tremendous improvement. Mostly DIY. A good site for advice is real traps.com.

Also be careful not to use too much room correction...

I agree with Zd542 ... if possible. In my case, it was not possible to "correct" my room. As you may already know, I opted for the DEQX PreMATE. It tamed my speakers and room. BUT ... I am not thrilled that it required adding an artifact between my preamp and amp.

As one respected dealer once told me, "sometimes you have to take 2 steps backward to be able to take 5 steps forward."

Ce la vie.

I think you would be better off not using a correction component. Tune your room instead.