room treatment effectiveness


Before I spend money on room treatment, I would like to hear of positve/negative experiences and whether the results are objectively measurable or merely subjective.

My local dealer had a sound room (now a storage room) with a pronounced 100hz boom and he said they installed 16 inch tube traps from floor to ceiling in each corner and the measured difference was only .5db which isn't much. I don't want to go down this road.

I have looked at GIK acoustic and their products are reasonable priced. I have read some favorable comments on their products. I'm sure there is a limit on what can be done with add on products. Are they all good for a few tenths of a db or can one expect to correct for 5 or 6 db?
rhljazz

Showing 1 response by ckoffend

In my opinion it strongly depends on what you are trying to accomplish and the problems that exist before beginning. My expience for best results is in addressing a very lively room with excessive echo/reverberation. This can be done with both application specific sound treatments, but frequently can be performed just effectively with some careful and tasteful decorating.

You comment specifically on a pronounced boom at a very specific frequency and report that their single solution only affected the "boom" by 0.5 db. What was the measuring of the "boom" to begin with? What other approaches did they pursue - speaker placement, listening position, toe in, etc. . . To me, it is not the end of the world having a slight excess at certain frequencies as achieving a perfectly dead flat room across the frequency range is near impossible/difficult and liveable at the same time.