Recording Studio Construction, Splitting thread away from Todd's OP - Speaker Placement Options

[SirJamsalot]

Per Tony's request, I'm creating a new thread dedicated to ideas/concepts concerning remodeling or building from the ground up a sound-worthy recording studio.

In my OP, I asked the question - what would you do if you had 13 square feet in which to put up walls to create a recording studio.

Tony Miro replied, to that thread, which I'm pasting here to start the thread.

====================================================================



Chris,
may I suggest that we discuss your build in a spearate thread? It's probably going to be require quite a few backwards and forwards responses and lots of questions, answers and discussions.

In the interim a couple of quick questions, comments and suggestions from me...

Preliminary questions
1/ Do you need to soundproof in order to meet any local noise regulations/not upset family or neighours, rather than just isolate the recording area to minimse bleed? Effective soundproofing, particularly if its to meet legal noise requirements, is often quite expensive and needs quite different materials than sound treatment.
2/ Is the room single purpose? Is it recording and/or mixing?
3/ If it involves recording then how many and what instruments etc would be on the sound stage?
4/ Are you happy to break th space up in separate defined areas or do you want it as a single large space?
5/ What equipment and any instruments need to be located?
6/ What are the electrics, water, lighting and aircon like?
7/ What is the floor made of?

Preliminary comments
Todd's post has got some good stuff in it and certainly worth the read.

Also Ethan Winner has a good site about acoustic treatment for studios here. He's quite opinionated and whilst he knows his stuff not everyone agrees with everything he says but his site is still very helpful and well worth at least a quick read. Also, he has a room mode calculator which will be helpful once you know your dimensions etc :-).

1/ 13x13 isn't a great shape as it's a square. Squares are actually the worst shape as you will have big problems with reflections and standing waves. So you will need to as a minimum put in a partition to break that up. When you do you do not want to end up with a perfect regular rectangle (where one wall is a mutiple of the perpendicular one i.e.6x12). Those are better than a square but not much. A sort of ship type shape/irregular hexagon or octagon is a much better shape bit would need careful thinking to use the space you've got effectively.

I'd consider at this point if you have enough room to have a small machine room. If you do then you can put your pc daw, AD/DA and anything else that can be a bit noisy/intrusive but whch you don't needs hands on all the time and so keep them out of the studio. Including a small machine room at the build stage might be cheaper than buying a rack pc and trying to soundproof and isolate it.

2/ You may need to consider the floor particularly as the room isn't on the ground so might need more consideration about vibrations etc.
This means that you might have to look in to some form of resin/polymer washer/seal between the floor joists and floor covering. You might also need to double layer the floor so that a false floor floats on top of but is isolated from the actual floor.

3/ 3 stud walls and a concrete one isn't that bad. You'll have to put in at least one major stud partition though to break up the 13x13 square. You should also consider having sufficient depth between the stud and partition so that you can place some sound insolation to a depth of at least 4''. If you don't need to sound proof then the stud walls can help let frequencies escape and so reduce build up of standing waves. They also are good as you can run cabling etc thorugh them rather than having it snaking all over the floor...

4/ Corners are a pain as the bass frequencies tend to accumulate there. So these need a lot more treatment than the walls. Foam does not absorb low end effectively so you need a much better material. Most of us use mineral glass wool and I think in the US that is probably made and sold as Corning 740. The number is related to the density and it needs to be no less than 703 - 705 is better. If you use a lower density then you end up having to use increasingle more layers of it and can end up with a really thick trap that is too bulky to site. With 740 the trap still probably needs to 6'' or more in depth - less than this and you just won't trap. Glass/rock wool will sag so you need to build a frame around it to support it. The frame also makes it easier to site and move around. (Note: glass mineral wall can cause dermititis so you need to wear gloves and face mask when you handle and cut it.)

5/ Straight walls need a mix of reflection and absorption. Here you can use foam but it needs to be open cellular and not closed. It's probably easiest to buy sready made pecialised acoustic foam panels for this.

6/ You'll need ceiling clouds as well, which will need to be suspended from the roof joists.

7/ If you can have the flouescent light changed as it will almost certainly generate hum.

8/ Speaker placement is going to partly depend on the final room dimension and shape. However, if you're using 2 way mixing monitors they are probably a ported design. Ported designs nearly always need to be sited very close to the wall behind them as the wall acts to increase the bass. That wall also needs to be solid one - a stud would just let the bass escape and you'd get no help from it.

So with the room design you need to remember that your monitors will probably have to have the concrete wall close behind them.

Small 2 way monitors also have a requirement for you to be quite close as they often don't produce sufficient spl and volume for you sit some way away. If you sit quite a long way away th n you need to drive a small speaker really quite hard to get sufficient spl and volume. That often means they distort at either the power amp and/or spakers.

Getting an ideal equilateral triangle between you and the speakers can be compromised by a need to also get a desk/console/surface in front of you. (The need to have computer monitors, rack equipment and studio furniture don't help either.) Often you end up having to compromise and accept that you just won't end up with an ideal stereo. To be honest very, very few mixing and recording studios have their monitors placed ideally. We usually achieve this in mastering partly because we don't need the big console and tons of outboar but even then I know quite a few mastering engineers/studios who accept a non-ideal stereo as a consequence of their room and other things.

Monitors should fire down the longest length of the room. So the rear and facing wall - and consequently your concrete wall - need to be the narrow ones. They should also be set symmetrical from the rear and side walls. Again all of this limits where you put them, how you dimension the room and so on and ultimately you might end up having to live with a bit of a compromise.

Oh and I wouldn't plan on soffit mounting them in to a wall. I don't think there is enough space here to really warrant it and you'd have to use a solid wall to do it - messy and expensive and limits up any future upgrade. To be honest I also don't think the normal 2 ways in most home studios are of a high enough quality to merit it.

9/ If the mix room is separated from the sound stage you may need to put a glass window and door between them. The window will need to be double, or better still triple, glazed and ideally use glass that minimise reflections. You can buy glass that is specialist for studios but it is really quite expensive. It's a lot cheaper, although not as good, to use a drop down persian blind or heavy curtains. Doors ideally should be the sort of air lock type construction and well sealed to the floor.

10/ You should think about how you are going to provide talk back to the soundstage and also how you run audio cabling. If your budget allow then its worth looking into ou might want to look at looms and wall boxes to do this.

11/ Cabling - try to use balanced connections and cables throughout. If you can use a multicore, coloured loom as the colours help you know which connector is which and the loom helps keep things neat and tidy. Audio cables ideally should not run parallel to electric cables or you can getinduced hum. Different types of cable have different maximum distances that you can run them before you get appreciable signal loss etc.

12/ If you have some outboard and a few mics consider a patch bay for the control room. It will make connecting and unconnecting stuff a lot simpler and save you trying to access the back of stuff that's racked.

If you have, or plan on getting hardware outboard like eqs and compressors etc then you should plan to put them in to proper racks. If you can think about using a floor mounted one on wheels. That way you can put it out of the way if you're not using and so hopefully help minimise comb filtiering and reflections from them. If you do need the equipment sited so that all the controls are easyily to hand then consider having racks that are set in to a desk at an angle rather than just sit them on top.

Also consider building some studio furniture at this point if you have the time and budget. Most people use computer desks but to be honest they're not great places to put a console etc.



------------------------

Great project Chris and I wish you lots of luck with it. I'lll try and help offer opinion as much as I can. If you post something youwant me to look at nudge me and I'll try and respond asap :-).

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[SirJamsalot]

Tony, per you questions

Preliminary questions

Do you need to soundproof in order to meet any local noise regulations/not upset family or neighours, rather than just isolate the recording area to minimse bleed? Effective soundproofing, particularly if its to meet legal noise requirements, is often quite expensive and needs quite different materials than sound treatment.

Oddly enough (and this speaks to two points you raised about glass partitioning (window, etc.)., the stuidio itself is located inside of a glass art studio (my parents are artists). The building itself is in an industrial part of town, so noise requirements are quite laxed. Add to that the fact that the studio I'm building is inside a large industrial bay (I'm butted up against one of its 10" thick concrete walls), means I'm already double-insulated in terms of sound getting out. Think of it in terms of a box inside of a really large box.So I'm not too concerned about noise getting out of the room - I'm mostly focused on creating a good sound environment inside where I'll be recording/ mixing.

Is the room single purpose? Is it recording and/or mixing?

I consider it primarily a recording studio for my personal use, and for my friends / bandmates. Naturally, I'll want to be able to mix as well, since that is one of my aspirations - be all you can be I don't consider this is a commercial project / venture though. I am a serious hobbyist, but by no means a professional. I'm investing a lot of time/effort into making it a nice space where when you walk in, your first inclination is to take off your shoes and relax.

If it involves recording then how many and what instruments etc would be on the sound stage?

Recording is the primary purpose Everything except drums.

Are you happy to break th space up in separate defined areas or do you want it as a single large space?

I have free reign of 13 1/2 square feet.Two adjoining walls are framed and wired, but not sheet-rocked yet. Hence this thread. I can frame a second wall inside of the other to create a walk-in space in order to make the dimensions non-square. I'll likely do this after having read your advice on placing computer / noisy equipment to the other side of the wall.

What equipment and any instruments need to be located?

Recording equipment are a rack-mount PC, power conditioner, a very small mackie sound-board (will be upgraded at some point), several microphones, an AI, 3 computer screens, POD Hd500, Mesa Head and Speaker Cabinet, 2 near-field 6" speakers, guitars, bass, and furniture.

What are the electrics, water, lighting and aircon like?

The room itself has one vent leading outside that I will be adding a quiet fan on a switch. The fan will be ceiling joice mounted, and duct-work into the room. There is no heating or airconditioning, but the studio is near the Bay so the weather is moderate all year long. It has never been an issue, and if it ever gets too cold, a portable heating unit will work fine. There is a bathroom in the main building. The main building (the outter box, so to speak) has heating, water, refrigerator, etc.

As for lighting - the lights you saw in the picture are there so I can see what I'm doing while building. They will come out. I have free reign in the light department. I currently have two track-ligts that will be on a dimmer switch. I'm thinking about using them for "wall ligthing" so there are no harsh light-sources. Any equipment requiring more light, I can bring in. The wiring for the room has its own circuit box in the room - every wall is on its own circuit - I wanted to be able to isolate circuits to aid in noise reduction.

7/ What is the floor made of?

The floor was built using large load-bearing beams around the perimeter, and 2x6 floor joices, and skinned with 5/8" plywood. It is a very solid floor, and I intend to put down new carpeting - a room conducive to good mood.

I will be at my studio this evening doing a little construction and planning out how far I can bing in a second wall, and where best to tie-in. I will likely re-dimension by adding another wall, leaving a walk-in space where i can place noisy equipment, and of course all the cables.

Thanks,
Chris

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This post has been edited by SirJamsalot: Nov 20 2013, 06:32 PM

[Todd Simpson]

WOW!! The final results/suggestions of this thread should seriously go in the wiki A section on BUILDING OUT YOUR HOME STUDIO FROM THE GROUND UP. A section on what to do BEFORE one starts adding gear. So often, we just throw some gear in a corner and go from there when we are starting out and wonder why our mixes sound a bit crap. This could really help folks getting started on a home studio and those ready to re-do their first home studio.

Todd

Per Tony's request, I'm creating a new thread dedicated to ideas/concepts concerning remodeling or building from the ground up a sound-worthy recording studio.

In my OP, I asked the question - what would you do if you had 13 square feet in which to put up walls to create a recording studio.

Tony Miro replied, to that thread, which I'm pasting here to start the thread.

====================================================================



Chris,
may I suggest that we discuss your build in a spearate thread? It's probably going to be require quite a few backwards and forwards responses and lots of questions, answers and discussions.

In the interim a couple of quick questions, comments and suggestions from me...

Preliminary questions
1/ Do you need to soundproof in order to meet any local noise regulations/not upset family or neighours, rather than just isolate the recording area to minimse bleed? Effective soundproofing, particularly if its to meet legal noise requirements, is often quite expensive and needs quite different materials than sound treatment.
2/ Is the room single purpose? Is it recording and/or mixing?
3/ If it involves recording then how many and what instruments etc would be on the sound stage?
4/ Are you happy to break th space up in separate defined areas or do you want it as a single large space?
5/ What equipment and any instruments need to be located?
6/ What are the electrics, water, lighting and aircon like?
7/ What is the floor made of?

Preliminary comments
Todd's post has got some good stuff in it and certainly worth the read.

Also Ethan Winner has a good site about acoustic treatment for studios here. He's quite opinionated and whilst he knows his stuff not everyone agrees with everything he says but his site is still very helpful and well worth at least a quick read. Also, he has a room mode calculator which will be helpful once you know your dimensions etc :-).

1/ 13x13 isn't a great shape as it's a square. Squares are actually the worst shape as you will have big problems with reflections and standing waves. So you will need to as a minimum put in a partition to break that up. When you do you do not want to end up with a perfect regular rectangle (where one wall is a mutiple of the perpendicular one i.e.6x12). Those are better than a square but not much. A sort of ship type shape/irregular hexagon or octagon is a much better shape bit would need careful thinking to use the space you've got effectively.

I'd consider at this point if you have enough room to have a small machine room. If you do then you can put your pc daw, AD/DA and anything else that can be a bit noisy/intrusive but whch you don't needs hands on all the time and so keep them out of the studio. Including a small machine room at the build stage might be cheaper than buying a rack pc and trying to soundproof and isolate it.

2/ You may need to consider the floor particularly as the room isn't on the ground so might need more consideration about vibrations etc.
This means that you might have to look in to some form of resin/polymer washer/seal between the floor joists and floor covering. You might also need to double layer the floor so that a false floor floats on top of but is isolated from the actual floor.

3/ 3 stud walls and a concrete one isn't that bad. You'll have to put in at least one major stud partition though to break up the 13x13 square. You should also consider having sufficient depth between the stud and partition so that you can place some sound insolation to a depth of at least 4''. If you don't need to sound proof then the stud walls can help let frequencies escape and so reduce build up of standing waves. They also are good as you can run cabling etc thorugh them rather than having it snaking all over the floor...

4/ Corners are a pain as the bass frequencies tend to accumulate there. So these need a lot more treatment than the walls. Foam does not absorb low end effectively so you need a much better material. Most of us use mineral glass wool and I think in the US that is probably made and sold as Corning 740. The number is related to the density and it needs to be no less than 703 - 705 is better. If you use a lower density then you end up having to use increasingle more layers of it and can end up with a really thick trap that is too bulky to site. With 740 the trap still probably needs to 6'' or more in depth - less than this and you just won't trap. Glass/rock wool will sag so you need to build a frame around it to support it. The frame also makes it easier to site and move around. (Note: glass mineral wall can cause dermititis so you need to wear gloves and face mask when you handle and cut it.)

5/ Straight walls need a mix of reflection and absorption. Here you can use foam but it needs to be open cellular and not closed. It's probably easiest to buy sready made pecialised acoustic foam panels for this.

6/ You'll need ceiling clouds as well, which will need to be suspended from the roof joists.

7/ If you can have the flouescent light changed as it will almost certainly generate hum.

8/ Speaker placement is going to partly depend on the final room dimension and shape. However, if you're using 2 way mixing monitors they are probably a ported design. Ported designs nearly always need to be sited very close to the wall behind them as the wall acts to increase the bass. That wall also needs to be solid one - a stud would just let the bass escape and you'd get no help from it.

So with the room design you need to remember that your monitors will probably have to have the concrete wall close behind them.

Small 2 way monitors also have a requirement for you to be quite close as they often don't produce sufficient spl and volume for you sit some way away. If you sit quite a long way away th n you need to drive a small speaker really quite hard to get sufficient spl and volume. That often means they distort at either the power amp and/or spakers.

Getting an ideal equilateral triangle between you and the speakers can be compromised by a need to also get a desk/console/surface in front of you. (The need to have computer monitors, rack equipment and studio furniture don't help either.) Often you end up having to compromise and accept that you just won't end up with an ideal stereo. To be honest very, very few mixing and recording studios have their monitors placed ideally. We usually achieve this in mastering partly because we don't need the big console and tons of outboar but even then I know quite a few mastering engineers/studios who accept a non-ideal stereo as a consequence of their room and other things.

Monitors should fire down the longest length of the room. So the rear and facing wall - and consequently your concrete wall - need to be the narrow ones. They should also be set symmetrical from the rear and side walls. Again all of this limits where you put them, how you dimension the room and so on and ultimately you might end up having to live with a bit of a compromise.

Oh and I wouldn't plan on soffit mounting them in to a wall. I don't think there is enough space here to really warrant it and you'd have to use a solid wall to do it - messy and expensive and limits up any future upgrade. To be honest I also don't think the normal 2 ways in most home studios are of a high enough quality to merit it.

9/ If the mix room is separated from the sound stage you may need to put a glass window and door between them. The window will need to be double, or better still triple, glazed and ideally use glass that minimise reflections. You can buy glass that is specialist for studios but it is really quite expensive. It's a lot cheaper, although not as good, to use a drop down persian blind or heavy curtains. Doors ideally should be the sort of air lock type construction and well sealed to the floor.

10/ You should think about how you are going to provide talk back to the soundstage and also how you run audio cabling. If your budget allow then its worth looking into ou might want to look at looms and wall boxes to do this.

11/ Cabling - try to use balanced connections and cables throughout. If you can use a multicore, coloured loom as the colours help you know which connector is which and the loom helps keep things neat and tidy. Audio cables ideally should not run parallel to electric cables or you can getinduced hum. Different types of cable have different maximum distances that you can run them before you get appreciable signal loss etc.

12/ If you have some outboard and a few mics consider a patch bay for the control room. It will make connecting and unconnecting stuff a lot simpler and save you trying to access the back of stuff that's racked.

If you have, or plan on getting hardware outboard like eqs and compressors etc then you should plan to put them in to proper racks. If you can think about using a floor mounted one on wheels. That way you can put it out of the way if you're not using and so hopefully help minimise comb filtiering and reflections from them. If you do need the equipment sited so that all the controls are easyily to hand then consider having racks that are set in to a desk at an angle rather than just sit them on top.

Also consider building some studio furniture at this point if you have the time and budget. Most people use computer desks but to be honest they're not great places to put a console etc.



------------------------

Great project Chris and I wish you lots of luck with it. I'lll try and help offer opinion as much as I can. If you post something youwant me to look at nudge me and I'll try and respond asap :-).

You are at GuitarMasterClass.net

Don't miss today's free lick. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!

Don't miss today's free blues, jazz & country licks. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!

[Saoirse O'Shea]

Thanks for the answers Chris. I'll get back to you asap although it may not be today as we have an attended session.
Best,
T

You are at GuitarMasterClass.net

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[Saoirse O'Shea]

Hi Chris. 13'x13' , whilst it may seem quite a large space and is certainly much mre than most home studio have is quite small so you'll need to think about how you use it quite carefully.

As a suggestion for layout for the room. I think you'd get most by having the solid concrete wall behind the monitors and use that as the short/width with the monitors facing down the longer length. You could split the concrete wall in two with a partition stud running the length of the room and the control rrom and recording space/sound stage on opposite sies of the stud but sharing the concrete wall. (Hope that makes sense.)

I'm guessing that you'll use the recording space when your parents aren't working in the glass studio so that area is quiet. If so I'd also put the sound stage on the inside to minimise any stud walls that are outside building walls. This way it will help minimise noise from outside leaking in to the sound stage, and also help minimise noise from it leaking outside of the boundaries of the building. (I'm working on the assumption that volume levels from the soundstage will generally be more than the control room and so more likely to annoy neighbours/passersby who are outside the building.) So if you can you should have a sandwich going outside>> control room>> soundstage>> parent's glass studio. (I'm assuming that you can live with whatever outside noise leaking on to the control room and vice versa.)

Personally I think the sound stage needs more width than the control rrom. If you are happy with it I'd probably split the concrete wall to give the control room a width of 5 - 5/1/2' on the concrete and 7-7/1/2' for the sound stage. The other 1/2' would be the partition, which needs to be quite wide so that you can put in sound insulation to spearate the control room and sound stage to minimse spill.

5-5/1/2' would allow you to place the monitors symmetrically with concrete wall about 1/2' behind and the 1' from each side wall (ignoring how bass traps may affect positioning). The listenng position would then be about 3 1/2' - 4' from the concrete wall and so pretty close to 1/3 down the room if you have the control room run the full 13'. That is a pretty good position for stereo placement. The downsides, to me, are: the control room will be quite narrow and may be too narrow for you; if you put a window beween the control room and soundstage and a console in front of it then you need to turn to face the speakers and have the console and window to your side; 5 1/2' is quite narrow to be able to positioin corner bass traps (the 6'' bass/mid drivers on your monitors will not produce much in the way of low end anyway and the stud walls will help minimise bas build up).

BTW, at some future stage you may need to look at a console or some other multi channel i/o. For recording you should consider something that can do at least 8 channel simultaneous input and several outs (a main stereo out to your monitors and others to feed the musicians headphones etc out on the soundstage).


Cheers,
T
etc

Anyway just a suggestion for a possible way to lay the space out.

You are at GuitarMasterClass.net

Don't miss today's free lick. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!

Don't miss today's free blues, jazz & country licks. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!

This post has been edited by tonymiro: Nov 22 2013, 01:51 PM

[SirJamsalot]

Tony,

Thanks for all the great info and recommendations. I've given this project a fair amount of thought and came to the conclusion that using this space for recording (i.e. having a control room) is a bit of a stretch for the amount of space that I have. I've decided to change gears a little and be content with it being solely a mixing room. I'm prepared to put up another wall to un-square the room, but based on everything I've read to date, having an 8 foot ceiling iis a challenge.

I've tried using the ModeCalc calculator to come up with a decent width, but understanding the graph it produces is a bit beyond me (see link you provided in your first post. What do you think would be an optimal width given my particular circumstances?

thanks!
Chris

Hi Chris. 13'x13' , whilst it may seem quite a large space and is certainly much mre than most home studio have is quite small so you'll need to think about how you use it quite carefully.

As a suggestion for layout for the room. I think you'd get most by having the solid concrete wall behind the monitors and use that as the short/width with the monitors facing down the longer length. You could split the concrete wall in two with a partition stud running the length of the room and the control rrom and recording space/sound stage on opposite sies of the stud but sharing the concrete wall. (Hope that makes sense.)

I'm guessing that you'll use the recording space when your parents aren't working in the glass studio so that area is quiet. If so I'd also put the sound stage on the inside to minimise any stud walls that are outside building walls. This way it will help minimise noise from outside leaking in to the sound stage, and also help minimise noise from it leaking outside of the boundaries of the building. (I'm working on the assumption that volume levels from the soundstage will generally be more than the control room and so more likely to annoy neighbours/passersby who are outside the building.) So if you can you should have a sandwich going outside>> control room>> soundstage>> parent's glass studio. (I'm assuming that you can live with whatever outside noise leaking on to the control room and vice versa.)

Personally I think the sound stage needs more width than the control rrom. If you are happy with it I'd probably split the concrete wall to give the control room a width of 5 - 5/1/2' on the concrete and 7-7/1/2' for the sound stage. The other 1/2' would be the partition, which needs to be quite wide so that you can put in sound insulation to spearate the control room and sound stage to minimse spill.

5-5/1/2' would allow you to place the monitors symmetrically with concrete wall about 1/2' behind and the 1' from each side wall (ignoring how bass traps may affect positioning). The listenng position would then be about 3 1/2' - 4' from the concrete wall and so pretty close to 1/3 down the room if you have the control room run the full 13'. That is a pretty good position for stereo placement. The downsides, to me, are: the control room will be quite narrow and may be too narrow for you; if you put a window beween the control room and soundstage and a console in front of it then you need to turn to face the speakers and have the console and window to your side; 5 1/2' is quite narrow to be able to positioin corner bass traps (the 6'' bass/mid drivers on your monitors will not produce much in the way of low end anyway and the stud walls will help minimise bas build up).

BTW, at some future stage you may need to look at a console or some other multi channel i/o. For recording you should consider something that can do at least 8 channel simultaneous input and several outs (a main stereo out to your monitors and others to feed the musicians headphones etc out on the soundstage).


Cheers,
T
etc

Anyway just a suggestion for a possible way to lay the space out.

You are at GuitarMasterClass.net

Don't miss today's free lick. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!

Don't miss today's free blues, jazz & country licks. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!

[Saoirse O'Shea]

... What do you think would be an optimal width given my particular circumstances?

thanks!
Chris

Hi Chris,
what are the monitors as they'll have a big say on this? (I think you once said they had 6'' bass drivers but not sure what the actual make and model are.) If you have the manufacturer's spec sheet etc that should have come with them it sometimes will give details about ideal placement distances.
Best,
T

You are at GuitarMasterClass.net

Don't miss today's free lick. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!

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[SirJamsalot]

they are the KRK Rokit 6"

Hi Chris,
what are the monitors as they'll have a big say on this? (I think you once said they had 6'' bass drivers but not sure what the actual make and model are.) If you have the manufacturer's spec sheet etc that should have come with them it sometimes will give details about ideal placement distances.
Best,
T

You are at GuitarMasterClass.net

Don't miss today's free lick. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!

Don't miss today's free blues, jazz & country licks. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!

[Saoirse O'Shea]

Hi Chris,
I've taken a look at the manual and tech spec for the KRK Rokit6 on their website. There's not a lot of actual meaningful technical detail to be honest.

One of the very few things s their recommendation that the monitors be between 31/2 - 5' apart and symmetrically placed. So just based on this I'd put them close to the rear concrete wall and 41/2' apart. That means the length of the room needs to be 13 1/2' (3x41/2), which is what you already have. I'd then aim to have the room @10-11' wide, with either the partition walls one eiher side running the entire length. If you can only do one partition then it depends on whether there is more external noise from outside or from you parent's studio. (Assuming of course that you don't need to worry about the amount of noise you make!)

If the room is 11' wide then the speakers will be 3 1/4' from each side wall. To be honest I think you'll be relying on the rear wall to 'boost' what low end there is. (Without proper tech information I'm having to guess but I think your monitors will be rolling off from around 120Hz. They'e a front ported design and so probably rely heavily on this to artifically boost the perceived low end via reflection from corner and rear wall.) However any further apart and you'll lose the 1/3rd seating position and you'd also have to turn the level up on the monitor power amp to get appropriate volume, whichmay lead to increased distortion. As there is quite a bit of free space either side of the monitors there should be sufficient room to site bass traps in the corners. You'll also have to place ceiling clouds. I've not run this through Ethan Winner's room mode calculator but I think you'll have mirror points at the 1/3 and 2/3 room length, which will require some treatment.

Best,
T

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