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I can only use the living room in my new apartment. I need advice where to place my desk and monitors. The 3D rendering is of the apartment but the furnishings aren't mine. Think of the living room empty. I haven't moved in yet.

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pb69 Tue, 04/18/2017 - 21:49

audiokid, post: 449615, member: 1 wrote: Not much choice but it will work. Put it where the TV is now. Use your TV for monitor. Then treatment which others will help advice.

Thank you.
My wife and I just finished a discussion about where to put things. We both want each other to be happy. She decided she would rather I set up in the master bedroom (the one on the right in the picture) because it will be easier for me and she will use the living room as her writing and dancing space. We are both relieved of much stress and worry. I think I can easily set up on the short wall across from the foot of the bed. The master bedroom is 12 x 15ft with 9ft ceiling.

audiokid Tue, 04/18/2017 - 22:06

I use 13 of these http://realtraps.com/p_roomkits.htm

I can't stand the company but they make a good product that will be ideal for you and your wife, meaning, they look good, work good enough and will look good in a nice home like you've shown us. Girls like them which means you aren't going to be turning her off with wires and stuff that bothers them. The traps give it a cool look and help with sound. She will love showing her friends. ;)

If they are beyond your budget, you can make traps which the guys here will advice you on.

pb69 Tue, 04/18/2017 - 22:10

audiokid, post: 449618, member: 1 wrote: I use 13 of these http://realtraps.com/p_roomkits.htm

I can't stand the company but they make a good product that will be ideal for you and your wife, meaning, they look good, work good enough and will look good in a nice home like you've shown us. Girls like them which means you aren't going to be turning her off with wires and stuff that bothers them. The traps give it a cool look and help with sound. She will love showing her friends. ;)

If they are beyond you budget, you can make traps which the guys here will advice you on.

Thank you very much!

DonnyThompson Wed, 04/19/2017 - 03:16

Ideally, your monitors should be a minimum of 30" from their nearest boundary to the rear. You may be able to get away with a bit of a shorter distance than that if the monitors are front firing ports, but still, your best placement would still be a minimum of 2' off the boundary in that case.
Acoustic treatment will definitely help, although the right way to do it would be to measure your room first, using a program like REW ( it's free to download) and a small diaphragm Omni condenser that has a calibration file for the program. Davis mics sells their SDC's for around $79 that come with cal files for that program.
Measuring the room will not only help you to determine what type of treatment to use, but will also help you determine how much of it to use, as opposed to just randomly throwing up treatment that may -or may not - handle the issues your room has.

http://www.roomeqwi…

FWIW
-d.

DonnyThompson Wed, 04/19/2017 - 03:41

Addendum:
If you have a choice, try not to "short fire" ... meaning don't set up your monitors and listening position so that they point to the short end of a room. You'll get a better response ( the degrees of which will depend on the total dimensions and shape) if you fire your monitors into the long section of your room.
If your ceiling is canted, point your monitors into the section of the room where the ceiling is highest.

In the end, it's all about translation of your audio to the outside world. Just because a mix may sound great in your space, doesn't necessarily mean it will sound good on other playback systems outside of your room.
You'll need to take some time to check your mixes on a variety of systems away from yours to see what is happening.

By the same token, it's possible that your room will just "work" and will require little treatment. This generally isn't the case in houses, condos and apartments, because these places aren't built with good room acoustics in mind - but you never know - which is why I suggest doing some sonic measurements first. This will also help you to determine what type of treatment measures to put into place. Perhaps you don't need absorption but instead diffusion; or maybe you need to treat more of the ceiling than you do your walls... I can't say what you need... these are "hypotheticals". ;)

If you find that you do have issues, various forms of Acoustic treatment can definitely help with some ( perhaps even many) of them, but treatment can't do everything... it can't change the dimensions or shape of your room, the story of your dwelling that it occupies, or the materials originally used to construct it, and these factors also come into play.
There are also "those" rooms that simply can't be corrected by any means to a point where balanced sonics will ever be achieved. You can always improve these types of rooms to a certain degree, but there will be a point of diminishing returns where further treatment simply won't do anything in terms of making the room "trust-able", and of achieving good mix translation.

For a continuation on that, I'd need to refer you to someone far more knowledgeable than myself... and while I do have experience in measuring and treating some rooms, and using speaker adjustment/compensation programs, I'm not an acoustics expert. ;)

(@Brien Holcombe )
Brien could tell you the other factors involved.

FWIW.
-d.

pb69 Wed, 04/19/2017 - 11:07

DonnyThompson, post: 449625, member: 46114 wrote: Addendum:
If you have a choice, try not to "short fire" ... meaning don't set up your monitors and listening position so that they point to the short end of a room. You'll get a better response ( the degrees of which will depend on the total dimensions and shape) if you fire your monitors into the long section of your room.
If your ceiling is canted, point your monitors into the section of the room where the ceiling is highest.

In the end, it's all about translation of your audio to the outside world. Just because a mix may sound great in your space, doesn't necessarily mean it will sound good on other playback systems outside of your room.
You'll need to take some time to check your mixes on a variety of systems away from yours to see what is happening.

By the same token, it's possible that your room will just "work" and will require little treatment. This generally isn't the case in houses, condos and apartments, because these places aren't built with good room acoustics in mind - but you never know - which is why I suggest doing some sonic measurements first. This will also help you to determine what type of treatment measures to put into place. Perhaps you don't need absorption but instead diffusion; or maybe you need to treat more of the ceiling than you do your walls... I can't say what you need... these are "hypotheticals". ;)

If you find that you do have issues, various forms of Acoustic treatment can definitely help with some ( perhaps even many) of them, but treatment can't do everything... it can't change the dimensions or shape of your room, the story of your dwelling that it occupies, or the materials originally used to construct it, and these factors also come into play.
There are also "those" rooms that simply can't be corrected by any means to a point where balanced sonics will ever be achieved. You can always improve these types of rooms to a certain degree, but there will be a point of diminishing returns where further treatment simply won't do anything in terms of making the room "trust-able", and of achieving good mix translation.

For a continuation on that, I'd need to refer you to someone far more knowledgeable than myself... and while I do have experience in measuring and treating some rooms, and using speaker adjustment/compensation programs, I'm not an acoustics expert. ;)

(@Brien Holcombe )
Brien could tell you the other factors involved.

FWIW.
-d.

Thank you!

pb69 Wed, 04/19/2017 - 11:10

audiokid, post: 449630, member: 1 wrote: Good info Donny.

I never though to ask, what are you using the room for? Obviously he's not tracking live drums or a band? I'm assuming you are tracking yourself, composing, using electronics, VSTi and mixing ?

You assume correct.
I can also mike guitar amps in the large walk in closet. Will try vocals in it also.

KurtFoster Wed, 04/19/2017 - 11:44

studio areas in a condo / apartment are always problematic. you might want to take your neighbors into consideration when deciding which bedroom to set up in. you wouldn't want to set up in a room that is next to a neighbors bed room for instance. is there a room available on an outside wall? that room may be a better choice for that reason alone. both rooms appear to be close to the same size, the master looks like it has a slightly larger closet but is also next to the washing machine and dryer. also to be considered, will you and your wife be content to take only showers? i would be concerned with the humidity issues with a studio being next to both a bath area and the laundry room. damp air, wet towels and people tramping through a control room daily isn't the ideal.

pb69 Wed, 04/19/2017 - 13:28

Kurt Foster, post: 449634, member: 7836 wrote: studio areas in a condo / apartment are always problematic. you might want to take your neighbors into consideration when deciding which bedroom to set up in. you wouldn't want to set up in a room that is next to a neighbors bed room for instance. is there a room available on an outside wall? that room may be a better choice for that reason alone. both rooms appear to be close to the same size, the master looks like it has a slightly larger closet but is also next to the washing machine and dryer. also to be considered, will you and your wife be content to take only showers? i would be concerned with the humidity issues with a studio being next to both a bath area and the laundry room. damp air, wet towels and people tramping through a control room daily isn't the ideal.

The apartment is on the right side ground floor in a four-plex. Only the dining, kitchen and second bathroom touches the neighbor. The rendering isn't exact. The master is quite a bit larger. Humidity isn't a problem. It's currently 14% here in Albuquerque NM. And the laundry room has exhaust to the outside.

OBrien Wed, 04/19/2017 - 15:57

So you are on the bottom floor...I would expect the upstairs to be your next consideration.

I would take the bedroom over any other room based on that fact alone....less footfall noise.

As to humidity...it my be 14 percent outdoors but a balaced hvac system will keep your indoor environment at 40 to 50 percent give or take.

pb69 Wed, 04/19/2017 - 16:11

Brien Holcombe, post: 449638, member: 48996 wrote: So you are on the bottom floor...I would expect the upstairs to be your next consideration.

I would take the bedroom over any other room based on that fact alone....less footfall noise.

As to humidity...it my be 14 percent outdoors but a balaced hvac system will keep your indoor environment at 40 to 50 percent give or take.

What sort of considerations for the upstairs?

OBrien Wed, 04/19/2017 - 19:46

Which is exactly why I said what I said about choosing the bedroom...there is another bedroom of the same foot print above it...but bedrooms typically have traffic that can be definded...meaning you can mitigate the insertion of footfall low frequency noise once you experience it and define what times to most expect it.
Trust me...it's in your future...lol

These structures are built modular, western framing style unless it is a concrete structure where you are free to design with limited restrictions from floor to floor.

pb69 Wed, 04/19/2017 - 20:50

Brien Holcombe, post: 449649, member: 48996 wrote: Which is exactly why I said what I said about choosing the bedroom...there is another bedroom of the same foot print above it...but bedrooms typically have traffic that can be definded...meaning you can mitigate the insertion of footfall low frequency noise once you experience it and define what times to most expect it.
Trust me...it's in your future...lol

These structures are built modular, western framing style unless it is a concrete structure where you are free to design with limited restrictions from floor to floor.

Thank you. Understood.