cement to wood flooring

[bismarck]

I have my whole setup downstairs on cement flooring w/ carpet. I want to listen to it upstairs to see how the difference from wood to cement effects it. My reciever is in a position where is would not be fun to take and set upstairs. I am satisfied with everything except i want to feel the sub and I can't. Maybe someone could just tell me how big of a difference it would be, rock solid concrete to the 2nd level wood floor of the house.

[Colin]

better bass in basement with concrete floors...

[Scp53]

concrete will also have a less tactile feeling... unless a riser of some sort is built for the furniture to de couple it from the floor.

[DrWho]

How big is this room and where is the sub located? Sounds to me like

you have the typical rectangular room acoustical issues. And for what

it's worth, what kind of sub are you running?

[Scp53]

he has the klipsch sub12.

[DrWho]

Also, how is the basement furnished? A bunch of bare concrete is going

to make things sound very harsh - which could be described as lacking

bass.

[bismarck]

Well, hopefully these pictures show up. This should give you an idea of

the room, and hopefully you guys can help me out, and hopefully I don't

have to do anything to radical. Don't laugh to much at the tv and

whatnot, i care much more about the sound and I move off to college in

a year so then i will get a good HD, widescreen tv.

here is one picture

[bismarck]

The room was definately not designed for a HT, so i assume i am loosing alot of sound to the open side of the room but if i move the subwoofer to the other side of the tv then it just shakes the glass really bad. I resized the pictures so you don't have to scroll for a few mintues to see the whole thing

[Scp53]

bismarck, looks like reflections shouldnt be a big problem in that room. nice setup. btw, check you private messages.

[Speedball]

I would guess you will feel the bass even more on a wood floor if the rooms are somewhat the same size.

On the wood floor my sub shakes the furniture and everything. De-coupled from the floor with a concrete slab and squash balls, I hardly feel anything and the gain can be cranked way up without problems.

[bismarck]

So, the bass sounds better on cement than wood. The only disadvantage is that on cement you can't feel it.

right?

[Speedball]

"on cement you can't feel it."

Right, all I have is a wood floor and I can add or remove a concrete pad with squash balls underneath. It is so different with each but for now the sub is directly spiked to the wood floor so I can feel everything.

Just try experimenting and see what works best for you, everybodys place is different. Heck, that's the fun part....trying different thing's to see what does and what does not work so well.

[Joe Shmoe]

I always read that putting your sub in a corner maximizes the output. Or you can put the sub in your seat & walk around the room to see where it sounds the best & stick it there. I have mine in a corner, in the basement on carpet covered cement, and I have plenty of bass. I also use the spikes with all my speakers to better couple them to the floor. I would try a corner & see if you notice a difference.

[bismarck]

the only corner i could try would be behind the coach, and i have heard the behind you isn't the ideal position. The questions is not having enough bass necessarily, i just wanted to know if it would sound different on wood. Someday i will build a home and have a dedicated HT room. Maybe even, depending upon where i am working some cool hydraulics so the speakers rise and lower. Oh the possibilities.

Maybe i am wrong, would right behind the couch work?

[Joe Shmoe]

Although you may be able to tell slightly where the bass is coming from (behind couch).... bass is supposedly undirectional.

[DrWho]

Although you may be able to tell slightly where

the bass is coming from (behind couch).... bass is supposedly

undirectional.

Unidirectionality and localizeability are two completely different

things. When somebody says that bass is unidirectional, they are merely

point out that the sound radiates out in every direction from a typical

subwoofer (due in larger part to the large wavelengths and relatively

small enclosure sizes).

Localizeability has to do with the ability of our ears to localize the

sound source. It is true that our ears alone are less capable of doing

this at lower frequencies, but we can't ignore the fact that the rest

of our body feels the bass too - which dramatically makes up for the

difference. If you closed your eyes I bet you would have no problem

telling where the sub is located.

But for what it's worth, I would spend an evening playing around with

the subwoofer location to get an idea of the kinds of changes that

occur. From the pic I'd say the corner by the mirrors would probably be

the best location...is there any way to damp the mirrors so they don't

vibrate?

[Paul]

The room was definately not designed for a HT, so i assume i am loosing alot of sound to the open side of the room but if i move the subwoofer to the other side of the tv then it just shakes the glass really bad. I resized the pictures so you don't have to scroll for a few mintues to see the whole thing

bismarck if you can place that sub in the middle under your pool table pointing to wards the listening area you will have the middle point of the room which will sound great and also this is hard to do for many other rooms but for you this would work, I think you will be happy with sound,only one thing is there away to run the wire under the carpet,And also i dont know the height under that table since i dont play pool.Also i was looking at the photos,You can also place the sub beside the blue couch on the left by the table and point the driver side of the sub reverse towards the wall,This will bounce sound wave off the tv wall and redirect it into the entire room,Try it i think you will be impressed.

[colterphoto1]

WELL SAID there Dr. Who. That illustrates a concept I've been preaching about here for quite some time. Although the bass tones are 'omnidirectional', that doens't mean that our ears can't 'localize' the sound. You put the arguement very well- thankyewverymuch.

I LOVE the feel of floor shock from having my HT on the main floor of my wood frame house. I've got the sub sitting on the same two floor joists where my favorite recliner postion is. It kicks my butt.

I'd say it's nearly impossible to get the same visceral sensation on a concrete floor. Just too much mass there, it isn't going to move no matter how big the sub.

M

[Jay481985]

Although you may be able to tell slightly where

the bass is coming from (behind couch).... bass is supposedly

undirectional.

Unidirectionality and localizeability are two completely different

things. When somebody says that bass is unidirectional, they are merely

point out that the sound radiates out in every direction from a typical

subwoofer (due in larger part to the large wavelengths and relatively

small enclosure sizes).

Localizeability has to do with the ability of our ears to localize the

sound source. It is true that our ears alone are less capable of doing

this at lower frequencies, but we can't ignore the fact that the rest

of our body feels the bass too - which dramatically makes up for the

difference. If you closed your eyes I bet you would have no problem

telling where the sub is located.

But for what it's worth, I would spend an evening playing around with

the subwoofer location to get an idea of the kinds of changes that

occur. From the pic I'd say the corner by the mirrors would probably be

the best location...is there any way to damp the mirrors so they don't

vibrate?

DrWho wouldn't you agree that it may be due to the over pressure of the

subwoofer, say if you were to hypothetically take the sub outside

or in a very big room say 50 feet or bigger, I would go as far as to

say that the localizeability would fall drastically then say in a 15

feet or smaller room

[DrWho]

The localizeability increases as the room gets bigger and is at a maximum outdoors.

Even at low SPL our ears aren't the main form of sound detection at

frequencies below say 40Hz...the eardrum is essentially mounted to the

skull which is connected to the rest of the body. The majority of our

hearing at these frequencies is due to bone conduction, where our brain

combines the conducted signal to our eardrum with the impulse felt

throughout the entire body (you won't percieve the impulse to the body

as a sound unless your ear is also getting the sound - it just happens

that the ear gets a better pickup from the bone conduction than the

normal way of sound going down the ear canal).

A dramatic example would be like going to a live concert where your

pant legs are literally flapping from the very loud bass....just

imagine this on a not so insane level, lol. (If you closed your eyes

and spun yourself around, you would have no problem locating the bass

cabinet at a concert like this).