My Room is 2,5meters wide and where my studio stands, and 5meters long, the walls is concrete and room is almost empty, i have recorded my room with pink noise. i have attached images of the Frequency of pink noise, with, and without my room. The Mono microphone is pointet from my listening position. i've attached my microphone frequency respons as well... My microphone is the nt1A.

I have a budget on max 300USD

1. question, which Acoustic treatment solution are best in range of my budget

2. does cheap product foam from Wish and other reeeaally cheap solutions even work, like in the third attached image(about 45usd)

3. when i mount the foam on the wall, why haven't i seen any videos using glue, when many other using spray when it tear the paint down anyway. Glue just seems like the obviously choice

Read the stickies at the top of the forum. Measure with REW, its free. Foam is the most expensive thing you can buy on a cost vs performance stand point.

Pink noise is not a good way of measuring the acoustic response of your room, and frequency response is not even the most important parameter to be be looking at. As Jason said: Use REW to measure your room. Like this: John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum •

View topic - How to use REW to analyze the acoustics of your room... .

- Stuart -

it was tough to read all the basic on REW and how to measure and calibrate... But here it is attached!

i've the R&L speaker simultaneously with sweap set too frequency 300-500Hz
and the L&R speaker separately at full range. And i think i've calibrated the way i should!

Why did you do it like that? The instructions say to set the frequency range to 15Hz and 22khZ for all three tests... and also to calibrate at 80 dBC. They also say to put all three measurements in one single MDAT file...

No.... the instructions did not say that. Read the stickies post “BEFORE YOU POST ANY MEASUREMENTS”, look under frequency response. The instructions say “if you don’t know how too exactly millimeter wise place the microphone the right way”, you should do it this way.

But I’ve maybe done something wrong with attaching multiple files and I’m also not sure if I did the right thing with calibration.

But correct me if I’m wrong, I won’t rest until I figure this out.

Ummmm.... yes they do. I kind think I know what they say, since I wrote them myself...

That's NOT what I linked you to.... It seems you didn't read my post very well... Here it is again....

" As Jason said: Use REW to measure your room. Like this: John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum •

View topic - How to use REW to analyze the acoustics of your room... . "

- Stuart -

I don´t got all the equipment for a perfect measurement, so i had to go alternative ways around the problem, your article/link acquire expensive measurement tools. In the top of the thread i have already mentioned my microphone is the rode nt1a(No omni), and i got no budget.


I used the stickies threads as told and this link.

Room Measurement Tutorial for Dummies Part 1 | Audio Science Review (ASR) Forum

what else can i do, i got almost nothing to work with..?
actually all i needed was to get acoustic treatment advices, and i end up all night and day learning about something that doesn't make sense. The only thing i need help with is which foam too use and how much really.. This seems like total overkill.

And almost every word i've used i have looked up, cuz i'm from Denmark. Really frustrating LOL

I understand how frustrating this can be. All you want to do is make music, but you learned that acoustical treatment will help make your mixes translate better. So you want to just buy some foam and be done with it. I made that mistake long ago. I put up $2k in foam on my walls only to find that my mixes still werent translating like i'd like. So i measured my room and learned i wasted my money. If you dont treat your room properly, then you arent improving your situation. You are just going from one version of bad to another. $100 on a decent measurement mic is well worth it. The most cost effective way to treat your room is through measurement. Acoustics is a science, not an art.

But i still think i have done the measurement good, not perfect but good. most of the reverb i at the end where the microphone is pointed, it's very clear to me. and it's not a bad mic, but not omni. i've read all over the internet easy solutions, and i can tell that it sounds a lot better! Tell me, why can't you get some sort of recommendations based on my measurements? i've read articles diskussions that it's a fine way to do it without measurement mics.

And I'm not only missing an Omni mic but also a USB calibrated mic.
i'm starting to wonder if you only will read the measurement and help if it's 100% good, and not 80%.....

A calibrated mic is needed to get an accurate picture of the frequency response. If uncalibrated, decay and ETC should still be valid, but FR will be skewed. However, as far as i know, you must use an omni mic to capture sound reflections from all directions or you will not get useable data. Somone please correct me if i'm mistaken here, but i dont believe your measurements are going to be valid.

Regardless, you need to put insulation of appropriate GFR/thickness in a bare minimum of 8 corners and first reflection points. More is better, but i understand budget is a factor.

thank's for info! I read somewhere that the most important thing is not the value in the frequency respons but where the peaks is located in frequency, is that true? if so, i don't need a calibrated microphone i guess.

Which microphone do you recommend for low budget? Do i need 2 microphones for calibrated and omni? i have a pre amp with phantom power.

i've went through several websites looking bass traps and absorption and so on...
i don't think i've come across the terms GFR. Do you recommend a certain thickness or is it related to the room measurement? Do you have recommendations on specific brand worth the trouble?

I would say balanced decay times and supressing early reflections are more important than a flat frequency response.

Any calibrated reference mic is good enough. Here is one for $65 https://www.amazon.com/Dayton-Audio-.../dp/B002KI8X40

GFR stands for gas flow restivity. It measures the ability of a gas to flow through a material. The lower the GFR, the better a material will be at absorbing low frequencies, but the thicker it must be.

Read this thread and the threads it links to.
At what depth does fiberglass bat insulation become the better choice over rock wool?

^ Totally understand this feeling. It's where I started out myself. But I've since learned that if you don't approach acoustics scientifically (and inherent to that, slowly) then you're limited to relying on guesswork, which can only get you so far.

If your question really is just "The only thing i need help with is which foam too use and how much really" then answer can't be finessed much beyond:

1) Forget using foam.

2) Add as much fluffy/fibre-filled treatment your room as physically possible: first reflection points (walls and ceiling); corners; rear wall. Everywhere. You ideally want to cover >40% of the room's surface area. Then add wooden slats to some of the panels if the room ends up sounding too 'dead' (all subject to personal taste).

There are much more sophisticated approaches (for example pressure-based panels), but they all demand some understanding of acoustics and the ability to measure how sound behaves in the room. There's no getting around that, especially on a tight budget.

That’s true, and then find out which room dimension is causing what resonant peak. (The Sloping ridges in the Waterfall plots. Pic



BTW Your REW measurements looks valid. Congratulations!
The background noise is a little high. Ventilation?
Chose a lower sweep-start frequency. You have a resonance close to 30Hz which is barely visible now.

Of course one have to remember that a cardioid mic was used.
That means: ”Dead” for reflections from behind. (at least for freq. above 300Hz).

My advice is: Wait a little and learn a bit more before you decide what mic to buy. There are many to chose from and they all have their pros/cons.

Cheers

/ Ake

PS

1. Buy some rolls of soft mineral wool/ fiberglass and stack them from floor to ceiling in the four corners. You can test without opening the plastic casing.
2. Measure again and see what happens.

No, that post doesn't say that ...

It says that if you post a screen shot of a L+R measurement, you should plot only the lower range (since the upper range might be less useful if mic not exactly centered).

Yes and I did that? But unsure if I should have posted between 300-400Hz or all the way down from there..

Great!! thank's for the feedback!! i actually got auto ventilation going in all my apartment half of the time :-D

how do you go about placing the treatment? do you do multiple measurement after placing the soft mineral/fiber on the 4 walls separately?

I did buy one measurement microphone already before you engaged in this thread though.. i bought the Sonarworks XREF20, it got some cool software compatible with the mic, i don't know if i could have bought better though. I really appreciate all of you guys help! Actually i am the guy that just want to do everything perfect, but on the internet most people just jump into acoustic treatment, therefore it's a bit confusing.

"Skol303" is it taste, if the room sounding to dead? or did you meant something else are taste?

Sincerely, Michael.

Folks on the internet who "jump into Acoustic Treatment" are the ones who are trying to guide you to the best solution for your room. And that involves first testing your room the right way, then using that informatio to figure out what type of treatment you need, and where to put it.

First, you test the room correctly, then based on that you see what treatment is needed. If you have major modal issues, then you will need deep, thick, large bass traps. If you have flutter echo in the mid range, then you will need thinner treatment on the side walls and/or ceiling. If you have very short decay times on the high end, you will need diffusers and/or reflectors placed at appropriate locations. Etc.

Sort of, but not really! Start by installing the most important treatment in the best locations, and for most small rooms, that usually means large bass traps in as many corners as you can. Then you test the room again with REW, to make sure that you got the expected effect from that, and see what the NEXT biggest issue is. Then you treat that, test again, and repeat over and over, until the room is perfect, or you run out of money, or you run out of wall/ceiling space to install more treatment. Whichever comes first.

- Stuart -

yeah they TRY to guide, but never mention that they have done any measurement like you folks do it. So THEREFORE i thought that it was that easy like they do it! And the reason i said that, was to show you guys respect for your knowledge, because i was unsure if i really needed all that in depth measurement and calibrated microphone for this.. I'm not stupid or arrogant. But i definitely feel some bad vibes from you.


Okay. thanks.

okay, the measurement don't tell where to put the treatment, okay, nice to know. it suddenly seems more transparent to work with! But now it seems less important with a measurement microphone though. Shouldn't i hear the untreated noise by ear? just a thought..

sincerely Michael.

Well, the measurement itself won't tell you where to put the treatment, but the results you see on the graphs, combined with the basic concepts of room acoustics, will indicate the best locations. As I mentioned above, once you get your measurements done right, then it is reasonably easy to look at the graphs and figure out what treatment your room needs most, and where to put it. That's what folks here on the forum will be able to help you with, if you give them the right data.

In other words, the measurements don't directly TELL you where to put the treatment, but they do tell you what the problems are, then by applying acoustic treatment principles, you can put the right treatment in the right place.

True, unfortunately! Too may places seem to decide by magic what to use and where to put it! Only here and in a couple of other forums do people provide the actual technical details of how that "magic" is accomplished. It's easy when you know how! But some other places don't want to tell you the "how", while people here are happy to do that.

Once again, that depends on the goals you have for your room, and for yourself in the room. If you just want a rough improvement to do some basic hobby mixing, then you don't need high precision. But if you want your room to be the best it can be, so you can do accurate professional mixes with ease, then you should eventually get precision tools. Just like if you want to service a car: the tools you buy will depend on what you want to service. If all you want to do is replace the air filter and battery yourself every now and then, then you probably only need a pair of pliers and a screwdriver, but if you want to tune the entire engine for peak performance, you'll need a set of precision tools to do that.

- Stuart -

Your ears lie to you, microphones do not.

Sorry, I should have clarified!

The "deadness" of a room can be determined by acoustic measurements (e.g. very short decay and reverb times) and also by listening tests (dead rooms tending to sound what people refer to as "dry").

There are recommended values for things like reverb times (e.g. people often aim for RT60 values between 200-400ms), but these are broad recommendations that apply more to large studios than your typical home set up. But they can be a useful starting point.

The issue of "taste" is that some people prefer rooms to be more "lively" (longer reverb times) and others prefer rooms to be more "dead". This seems to vary due to personal taste and also, most likely, due to the material being produced (e.g. orchestral, minimal acoustic, stadium rock, EDM?). I personally like a "dead" room and tend to work on electronic music, but your own preferences and requirements may be different. Which is perfectly fine Key point is you want to avoid extremes of anything - not too lively, not too dead - and then adjust to what "sounds right" to you (easily done by adding/removing slats to your bass traps once the low end problems are dealt with).

Oh.. nice! is it also DIY friendly to look up the graphs with a correct measurement?

yeah, that's why i joined this forum :-) hurrah for keeping it real..!

how precisely should the average treatment work on specific Frequency's? I hope you get what i mean by this.

i'm beginning to understand SOME things now. I really like to do things the right way, and i got a market for building stuff, right next to my home, and my budget is low.

I'm beginning to speculate on building my own panels with insulation like this guy: YouTube but i haven't examined the field yet. Do you guys got any good thread to dig in?

The typical treatment used by most home-studio builders is "porous absorption". Materials like fiberglass insulation, or mineral wool insulation. The type that is used inside the walls of buildings. If it is thick enough (many cm) that absorbs most frequencies at similar levels, but thinner stuff does not do well for absorbing low frequencies. For bass traps, it needs to be VERY thick (maybe as much as 60cm in some places). But the TYPE of insulation also plays a part, and so does the DENSITY of the insulation (weight). In general, dense, heavy insulation isn't so good for the low frequencies, but is very good for the highs. And conversely, lighter insulation (lower density) is better for lows. Of course, there's an optimal range: if you go too high or too low, it's no longer any use, acoustically. The optimum range depnds on the type, so for example if you use fiberglass insulation, then somewhere around 30 kg/m3 density would be good for most acoustic treatment, but if you use mineral wool then it is more like 50 kg/m3 that you need.

For low budget, maybe you can find a build site near you where live, that have off-cuts of insulation that they would just throw away normally.... if you get lucky, you could pick those up for free!

Need suggestions on Acoustic treatment!!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Soundman2020 View Post
the results you see on the graphs, combined with the basic concepts of room acoustics, will indicate the best locations. As I mentioned above, once you get your measurements done right, then it is reasonably easy to look at the graphs and figure out what treatment your room needs most, and where to put it.
Oh.. nice! is it also DIY friendly to look up the graphs with a correct measurement?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Soundman2020 View Post
True, unfortunately! Too may places seem to decide by magic what to use and where to put it! Only here and in a couple of other forums do people provide the actual technical details of how that "magic" is accomplished. It's easy when you know how! But some other places don't want to tell you the "how", while people here are happy to do that.
yeah, that's why i joined this forum :-) hurrah for keeping it real..!

how precisely should the average treatment work on specific Frequency's? I hope you get what i mean by this.

i'm beginning to understand SOME things now. I really like to do things the right way, and i got a market for building stuff, right next to my home, and my budget is low.

He has the right basic idea, yes. Those panels would work fine for the mid and high frequencies, and some of the lows, but they aren't thick enough to get down to the deep lows.

- Stuart -

No, you didn’t …

What you did was making a measurement with limited range (and a pretty odd range also …).

That is something that is rarely needed (only time I can think of is when you are fiddling around with filters in a specific range and want to make many repeated measurements as quickly as possible).

What was suggested my post was that if you post screen shots (not the actual measurement file, that is recommended); you should limit the visible range up to about 300-500 Hz when plotting the L+R measurement.

hey, the WHY does the measurement guide on gearslutz say this!?:
Frequency range:

Well, not much to say about it really; 20 Hz (or 10-15 Hz if subwoofer in larger room) to 20 kHz (using a logarithmic scale) is normal (assuming the measurement mic is accurate to this range, more often; about 15 kHz is the practical limit) but the range can be limited in order to reveal more detail depending on the smoothing used (see below). Unless you know how to accurately center the measurement microphone exactly (millimeters count) between the L & R speaker *, plot L & R speaker separately in full range and plot the sum (L & R measured simultaneously) showing only the lower range (to about 300-500 Hz) since the range above it will suffer from comb filter effects due to the two signals arriving in slightly different time to the microphone.

I don't understand your attitude and tiny explanation....

Youre interpreting it wrong. Lower range TO 300-500. So, from 15hz to 500hz is what you should sweep

No no no ...

Always sweep full range (10 Hz or so to 20 kHz) when making measurements!

It's when posting screen shots of measurements you might want to show a limited range in order to provide better resolution.

If you read the full post you'll understand.