3db's Great Room (mainfloor townhouse open concept) setup (1 Viewer)

[3dbinCanada]

The fun started today. I've purchased a second identical PSB Subsonic6 used and cheap, have a miniDSP. This room is so irregular shaped with a gaping that I could not find a sweet spot for a single sub like I did for the basement.

No matter where I placed a single sub, I never got a smooth response like I was able to in the basement.


What a day. I'm exhausted moving sh?t around. I started today by placing the subs in the 1/4 and 3/4 position on the long wall and after calibrating the sub gains, I proceeded with the measurements. It turns out that the left LP response was horrendous. I pushed the sub to the corners of the long wall and took measurements, I had a dip in the center or main LP but it was better than the alternative. I went further with the subs in the corners r as I'm waiting for longer sub cables from Amazon to arrive and I still had to try and figure out the rest of the miniDSP REW process.

The first graph is what the individual sub responses looked like along with the combined L+R sub response;


The second graph is the combined sub responses across 3 listener positions.


The third graph shows both the raw and REW eq'd response at the main LP


The last graph is me playing with MiniDSP using input EQ to lessen that notch.



Did another sub placement exercise today. The right corner sub in yesterdays placement was moved to the other end of the couch, still behind it and firing back into the corner of its previous placement. The Left corner sub was moved to the right of the right speaker centered under the window. I will post measurements tomorrow.

This is where I ended up placing the two subs. Its even a smoother response than the one subs in the room corners.. There at opposite ends of the couch but give the best bass response where the white recliners are, I dont quite get it.


If you notice the media stand is under the TV. I used those 3M velcro strips and velcroed the miniDSP to the back of the stand.

 

[3dbinCanada]

Here are the plots. The first plot is of each sub by itself taken from the center LP and R+L subs from center listening position.


After the EQ. I chose the slope of the bass to be +10db higher between 20 and 30 Hz and be down at 10 db at a 100 Hz based on the Youtube video stating that the lower frequencies (20-30) need to be 10 db louder than at 80 Hz, aka house curve.


I've listened to music and some BluRays and I must say that I agree with the slope philosophy, The bass is no longer boomy but the floors are rattling because of the lower bass. I'm actually quite pleased with the results.

Now integrating this with YPAO was a process I had to think about and run a few measurements. What I ended up doing was disabling the two sub outs on the miniDSP and running YPAO. I also ran YPAO for the main or center LP as I did NOT like what its was doing when I ran it across the 3 LPs. I realise that this would set the mains to large so just for shits & giggles (my favourite English expression) I ran a measurement as shown below.


I enabled the sub outputs on the MiniDSP, went into the AVR config menu, set the bass to sub only, set mains to small, and set the cross over to 90 Hz..(I experimented with that and 90 gave me the best result) . I also played with the sub distance and found that 10.5' gave me the best response. I also took a measurement of YPAO set to through which means no YPAO EQ but bass management is still employed.

 

[3dbinCanada]

Here are some pics of my second system using the PSB 600 as mains.





These last two pics were taken sitting at the main LP.

 

[3dbinCanada]

I decided to swap in the PSB500 and swap out the PSB600. I found some stands for the 500s and the tweeters are now at ear level.


Here are the measured responses;

Subs Only measured across all 3 LP


Mains set to large subs turned off at CLP


YPAO set to flat across all 3 LP

YPAO Off, Mains Set to small across all 3 LP

 

[3dbinCanada]

I finally dialed in the 3rd sub into the Greatroom. The bass is much more even now when walking around. Still not perfect but I'm not going to invest into another sub. Here are the pics.. The last sub added is the sub on the left. The other two subs I had in their present location since March of this year. The 3rd sub is holding up the lamp

Here is the bass response.. each response at a different listening position, NON EQ verses EQ (miniDSP). The LLP is closet to the hallway and the RLP is closted to the backwall. The couch is not considered a listening position.


Here are the full frequency sweeps across the listener positions (LP). First graph is with YPAO set to flat, second graph is YPAO turned off but using bass management, and the third graph is Pure Direct

 

[3dbinCanada]

I have rearranged the great room. Im getting a new smaller sofa and chair for the great room and selling off the old set. I moved an Ikea book case into the basement which freed up more space for the 3rd subwoofer. I swapped out the PSB 600s for the PSB 400s onto new to me but used stands. Here are the pics..



I have a question about the measurements and generated house curve wondering if I have to redo the measurements again. I turned the crossover on the AVR to its highest value of 200 Hz and set the fronts to small. I went into the AVR sound menu and turned off all EQ. The sub distance was still at its old value of 14 feet. I took the REW measurements and generated a house curve based on the old 14' .

This curve is the house curve measured across the 3 LP.


The next curve is full frequency sweeps without any YPAO influence and with the AVR crossover set to 80 Hz.


These measurements were taken after playing with the sub distance to reduce the notch that was happening between 90 and a 150Hz. The new sub distance that yielded the best results pictured by these traces was at 25' but the house curve generation was based on 14' . I do not like the hump found in the CLP (green curve) between 67.5 and 90ish Hz . Do I need to remeasure the CLP based on the new sub distance and generate a new house curve in REW to improve upon the in room bass response?

 

[3dbinCanada]

I didnt like the measurements I was seeing and I thought I could tighten things up so I tried next day again playing with new sub positioning. Everyhing else stayed status quo.

Here are the measured results.
Subs 1-3 Raw response across all 3 LP

Post EQ response of Subs1-3 across only 2LP. Missing the Left LP

Full frequency with speaker set to small and YPAO PEQ results turned off

Full frequency with YPAO PEQ filters set to flat

 

[3dbinCanada]

I swapped out the KX-800 deck for a K720 auto reversing deck that I've had in storage. Plays really nice.

 

[3dbinCanada]

The new sofa and chair are in, waiting on a couple of ottomans to come in to complete the room. Did another sub placement/REW EQ exercise. Measurements to follow later but this what the room looks like now;

 

[3dbinCanada]

I redid the sub locations and will upload the pic. Basically the orientation of the left and middle sub has changed with the driver facing the closet corner or back to back. I took three full frequency sweeps with the sub distance of the AVR set to 16.5', 25', and 27' . Although none are ideal, which would be the best setting?

 

[JohnRice]

You have a massive problem in the crossover area. Probably some phase adjustment on the individual subs is in order.

 

[3dbinCanada]

You have a massive problem in the crossover area. Probably some phase adjustment on the individual subs is in order.

The 3 subs are all glued together by a MiniDSP which makes it act as a virtual sub. I have accounted for phase at the CLP as shown below. This is before I EQ'd through REW+MiniDSP and is all three subs on.

Here is the 3 subs response after the EQ curves were applied.

This room is a bitch to dial-in as its an open concept room in a town house. The left LP is open to the hall and stairwell.

 

[JohnRice]

The response of the subs alone is great, but if once you add in the speakers you get the massive drop in the crossover area I see, then you still have a serious problem. If all three subs are originating from a single output (before the MiniDSP) on the receiver, then adjusting the distance for the sub output should be able to fix the problem. Basically, you keep doing sweeps of the transition area (50-200Hz should do it), adjusting the distance setting for the sub output (in the receiver) 1ft. at a time until you get a much smoother transition area.

 

[3dbinCanada]

The response of the subs alone is great, but if once you add in the speakers you get the massive drop in the crossover area I see, then you still have a serious problem. If all three subs are originating from a single output (before the MiniDSP) on the receiver, then adjusting the distance for the sub output should be able to fix the problem. Basically, you keep doing sweeps of the transition area (50-200Hz should do it), adjusting the distance setting for the sub output (in the receiver) 1ft. at a time until you get a much smoother transition area.

Thats what I have been doing. There are distances where that the transistion disappears but Im left with two bass humps. If time permits, I will post them.

 

[3dbinCanada]

Well I gave it another go yesterday running sweep after sweep in 1ft increments from 1' to 16' . Not seeing anything outstanding happening, I jumped to 44' The RX-V1900 has setting all the way out to 80' . Anyway I started running sweeps above that and it got worse looking. I finally settled on something that was a little better than last time.

 

[3dbinCanada]

I have upgraded my AVR from a Yamaha RX-V1900 to an RX-A2060. Doing this required me to move the middle shelf up a couple of inches to be able to give the AVR at least 1" air gap on the top, moreroom on the sides. esterday while I was doing the spring cleaning gig in the kitchen, I was listening to the system. After listening to the double album set of Led Zep, I went over to the system and placed my hands over the AVR and noticed it was rather warm. I measured the air gap from the top of the AVR to the shelf and its only an inch. I'm worried that if I uses like this for an extended time (many months) that it will eventually break and malfunction, most likely the HDMI cards. I went on to Amazon and saw this listed for $169 Cdn . Did some quick measurements and I'm able to place the unit on top of the AVR if I remove the shelf. The unit exhausts to the front. The chassis is made of steel and can support an additional 30 pounds so I can safely put my deck and 4K player on it.

 

[3dbinCanada]

I've been a busy boy these last few days spending 1.5 days on my greatroom system with my PC, REW and mic after having swapped out the PSB 800 towers for a pair of PSB400 bookshelves.

I know you are all going to tell me to pull them away from the back wall but I get a real nasty bass suck out between 115 to 142 Hz at the listener position. It was such a bad response that even the subs couldn't pull up the response. I saw the mid bass suck out and I wonder if the height of the stand had anything to do with it. The tall stands sit at 23" tall while the short stands are 17" tall.

The first graph below shows the difference in response between tall and short stands when the speakers were placed adjacent to the front of the media console. You can see the deep notch centered around 132 Hz on the tall stands verses a much shallower notch at a 115Hz on the shorter stand.

The next graph shows the difference in response between tall and short stands when the speakers were placed near the back wall beside the media console. The response while on the tall stands is only 3db less compared to the adjacent placement from the above graph. You can also see a big reduction of the notch on the smaller stands at the back compared to the previous graph.

The last graph shows the difference in response between the adjacent placement and the backwall placement of the speakers on short stands. Now you understand why the bookshelves are pushed towards the backwall.

 

[JohnRice]

How far did you pull the speakers out? What about going further forward? Or, if you’re really ambitious, running sweeps at 4” increments.

 

[JohnRice]

Also, did you run sweeps without the subs, to check if the null was actually an interaction between the speakers and the subs?

 

[3dbinCanada]

After I got the speaker locations dialed in, I went to work on the subs. I left the sub locations alone but used the miniDSP2x4HD to introduce delays on sub 1 for a better response pre REQ EQ.

The first graph shows the individual responses of subs 1 thru 3 and the combined response of all three subs (green trace) before I EQ them with REW.

The next graph shows the difference in response between the combined sub responses and the combined sub responses but adding a 5ms delay on sub1 using the MiniDSP

The last graph shows the difference between Pre REW EQ and Post REW EQ

I may redo this again and play around with the delays on the individual subs to see if I can remove that notch around 120 Hz