SQ FT vs Speaker Sizes

[tljraj]

Whatis the ideal room size (W x L) should I be looking at with La scalas speakers 2 mains, 2 centers and with 2 HereseyII for surround?

[jdm56]

Bigger is better, but more importantly, and especially if you are building or remodeling, you need to try not to have any two room dimensions that are identical, or that are multiples. This will spread out the room resonances, avoiding pile-ups at one particular frequency. The absolute worst room for music would be a small, square room.

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JDMcCall

[JohnA]

If I were you, I'd use the La Scalas for mains and surrounds (I do) and one H2 for center and the other H2 for the rear ES/EX. MOST KILLER!

For that system the room should be 18' x 20', or bigger, just to have room for the speakers and furniture and not be crowded.

John

[tljraj]

Thanks for the info I'll try using them as mains and surrounds and my H2 as a center.

[Malcolm]

In addition to what has already been suggested, wouldn't you want the longest dimension (diagonal across the room, top corner to bottom corner) to be at least equal to the wavelength of the cutoff frequency of your speakers?

[Malcolm]

BTW I would recommend getting a fifth LaScala, selling the Heresy IIs, and using the money for a good subwoofer, if you have room for all those LaScalas. I have 5 matched Heresys with a Decware WO32 subwoofer and am very satisfied. I would be even happier with 5 LaScalas if I had room.

But if you must use what you have, I would use 3 LaScalas in the front, use the Heresy IIs for the back, sell the extra LaScala, and put the money toward a good subwoofer. The front center channel is the most important speaker in a home theater system. Most of the sound will come through this speaker, most of the time--anything that is on-screen. It important that the timbre of the front speakers match as well as possible so that pans from either side through center to the other side are seamless. Heresy IIs have different tweeters and squawkers than LaScalas and will sound different. You would get better results with an original Heresy with K-77 tweeter and K-55-V squawker, but I think you would still hear the difference because of the diffence in crossover points to the woofer. Even with LaScalas, you will need a subwoofer for the low end in a home theater system.

Since you already have the speakers, give it a try both ways in whatever room you have now and see which sound you like the best.

[Ray Garrison]

Malcolm,

That sounds like a good idea, but think about it for a sec...

Sound travels at about 1,100 feet/second. If the speakers cut off at, say, 28 hz, the longest dimension should be, uh, 40 feet.

That's some big room.

The idea that the room needs to be bigger than the longest dimension of the soundwave of the lowest frequency you want to support is quite popular, but isn't really the whole story. What happens is that if the room is smaller than the largest wave by some significant amount, the speaker will "pressurise" the room, resulting in a RISING frequency response below that level. This is way speakers that show a gentle rollout below some frequency in the midbass can actually sound, and measure, flat to a much lower frequency in-room.

Think about a car stereo. If the interior of the car's occupant space (uh, cabin?) needed to be larger than the lowest supported frequency, it would be impossible to get any deep at all inside a car. Obviously, the opposit is true - you can get massive amount of low frequency energy inside a car, far more than you can in a typical room.

By the way, the awful sounding Boom Boom Boom you hear when someone with Bass Bazookas goes driving by isn't the result of some fundamental characteristic of car interiors, it's the way the system is engineered and setup. Really good, tight, tuneful articulate bass is achiveable inside a car with the proper equipment and setup.

Ray

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Music is art

Audio is engineering

[Malcolm]

Ray,

Interesting explanation, but I don't think even 500 watts is going to significantly pressurize my listening room, even with all the doors shut. Isn't the real reason that speakers generally show better bass response in a listening room because most speakers radiation patterns at low frequencies are nearly omnidirectional whereas at high frequencies they tend to be fairly directional toward the front, more so as the frequency goes up? The frequency response figures you see from the manufacturers are open field measurements directly in front of the speaker. When you place speakers in or near the corners of rooms, which most people do, the mid and high end measurements will remain reasonably close to the open field measurements, but the low end might be 6 dB higher because the sound that was radiated away from the meter in the open field is now reflected toward the meter in the room.

Of course, actually frequency response in a room is much more complex than this. The measured frequency response is going to vary from point to point in the room because of reflections. There will be peaks and there will be troughs, perhaps even nulls. And of course, what is good for one frequency is bad for another.

All of this causes people to treat wall, floor and ceiling surfaces to reduce reflections, and to use bass traps or other contraptions to minimize the peaks. Sometimes people have to use fancy equalizers to get rid of the peaks and troughs.

I would go along with what James D McCall and John Albright said on this. And I would also suggest just building a room that will be esthetically pleasing and comfortable with you equipment in it, then worry about figuring out how to make it sound the best from your preferred listening position.