Core Audio Designs

Perhaps the most difficult to overcome enemy of fine audio reproduction is the room itself! The acoustic signature of any room is compromised by a swept comb-filter effect where peaks and notches are produced in the resultant frequency spectrum in linear harmonic series due to audio being reflected unevenly from walls. Unlike the intentional flanging and phasing used by musicians like the Beatles and Jimi Hendrix, this effect is a self-defeating and muddling law of physics that requires the attention to detail employed in a recording studio without the fun of playing a guitar.

Imagine for a minute that your listening environment is a 10ft x 10ft x 10ft cube with one speaker playing a solo cello suite and you sitting in the middle of the room. The recording begins as the bow is drawn across the strings. You hear this, and a fraction of a second later you hear it again from your left and right, then from above, then from the rear another fraction of a second later. Mix these together and you have lost the accuracy of the cellist’s work… and that is only the beginning!

Unless your listening environment is encased in acoustically neutral material some 10ft thick, you wont even be hearing an accurate reflection of the cello. Different frequencies are reflected with different intensities depending on the material of the walls. As the cellist employs a deft glissando causing the pitch to rise and fall smoothly, the actual volume of the sound changes in the reflections. There is also the ever-present concern for harmonics where the reflections cancel out or amplify the original signal as part of the comb-filter effect.

The easiest way to hear the need for room treatment is in the bass response. When you correct the acoustics of your environment, bass tightens up and becomes more articulate (less like a teenager’s car!) and becomes more even between the center and perimeter of the room. Physics dictates that bass will collect in corners and disrupt the midrange if not corralled. Bass traps serve a small range of frequencies and are very large (but at least not 10ft thick!) and that is only part of the problem!

Core Furniture provides the elegant solution. You need to address two forms of room treatment: absorption and diffusion. In an ideal situation, you would have no two parallel surfaces be reflective. Carpet on your floor and a reflective ceiling is good for producing quality acoustics. This is why a recording studio has acoustic treatment on the wall opposite the glass. Unless you intend on carpeting every other wall, you need a better solution that better addresses the complex problem. This is where diffuser panels come in. Normally, sound is reflected off the back wall, bounced back by any number of surfaces to the front wall (behind the speakers) and then reflected within the original sound stage of the speakers. This is the most degrading property in acoustics. Note: A big screen TV is a large reflective surface on the front wall. Sorry, home theater buffs! By placing acoustic diffusers behind the speakers on the front wall, you remove the reflection that upsets the sound stage. Adding more diffusers in corners and side walls continues the improvement in accuracy. The rear wall diffusers dramatically compensate for the size and shape of your room, making the sound stage seem to extend beyond the wall, thereby making your acoustic environment larger than the actual space! By mounting the acoustic panels with a small air gap away from the wall, the diffuser improves the overall absorption of rebellious bass frequencies that make the room your enemy.

When you increase the volume on your stereo, your room should sound bigger and fuller. If it sounds worse the louder you get, you need to address diffusion and absorption before you can appreciate the true quality of your audio components.