How tall do you like your images?

@mikelavigne 

Having the proper balance of direct and indirect arrivals is critical, and one reason why I feel most audiophiles don't use diffusion behind and to the sides of speakers enough.  Too many still focus on dampening alone and that creates a headphone effect devoid of depth.

@erik_squires

Having the proper balance of direct and indirect arrivals is critical, and one reason why I feel most audiophiles don’t use diffusion behind and to the sides of speakers enough. Too many still focus on dampening alone and that creates a headphone effect devoid of depth.

i agree. to attain that ’proper balance’ is of course, the trick. and it requires that you start out with more energy than you end up needing, so as you do the fine tuning for balance you can reach that perfect balance. in 2015, after i’d been in my dedicated room for 11 years, i took 6 months of messing around to find that perfect balance, and have not touched it since. you can reach that right place and stop. of course, since then i have improved my sources, but my system bones and room has not changed at all since then.

here are some notes i wrote at that time describing my fine tuning process. i’ve posted these before but i think it’s very relevant to this subject. i get deep into the weeds for those interested. and note that all this system tuning had almost a zero cost, just huge amounts of sweat equity and time. 

https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/almost-free-and-4-inches-the-final-1.17389/

https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/almost-free-and-4-inches-the-final-1.17389/page-3#post-314941

https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/suck-out-fixed-i-think.18116/

https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/suck-out-fixed-i-think.18116/page-2#post-329496

This discussion has been very interesting in terms of provoking thought around what I feel, acoustic treatment wise, is the remaining weak link of my room.

My listening room is my living room, so it has double duty of TV and music. I would love to add diffusion between the speakers, but it would have to be removable which eliminates a solid number of wood options given the weight. Would anyone have recommendations of what could be used? 

@christianb5s4  Unfortunately TV's are a difficult item to overcome.  If you can put it behind a movable curtain, that is ideal, otherwise compensate by making sure the rest of your room is treated well.  Treat the ceiling, diffuse behind the listener and to the sides of the speakers.

@erik_squires Out of those, I haven't done ceiling but I did treat the others mentioned. Thankfully I have vaulted ceilings which helps but my WAF of existing treatment is definitely near or at the limits!