The Article
DAMP YOUR HiFi ROOM – ON THE CHEAP!
10th October 2022
Just moved or will be moving house? Or…maybe your room is a bit on the echo-y side? Or…maybe your HiFi sounds a bit harsh and you’ve never really fathomed out why. Paul Rigby looks at a possible reason for that, the most important part of your hi-fi system: the listening room
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More matter with less art, please. I checked out after 11 minutes.
You could have bounced around the video using a combo of chapter headings and the transport controls at the base of the video – that’s what they’re there for.
Good video with some great points on room dampening but it would have been nice to see your actual room, where you placed the treatments, where your equipment is set up, speakers, etc.
Many thanks Mike – I’m currently running a HiFi and room tour which is reserved for Patreon users. The HiFi tour is already underway so Patreon supporters had first dibs on views of the room, etc.
Related to that, there were actually lots of images from my room in the video – close ups which, arguably, were more valid than general shots (after all, what does a general shot really show?). My fault for not labelling those clearly.
Part of the issue and maybe this better addresses your question, I had no ‘before’ images to offer to compare with the results of the final damping layout because I didn’t know I even had an article to write until I’d completed the task, to be honest. I was busy just moving in to my house and it was only after that changes occurred and I heard the massive change I thought, “Hang on, this might make a feature.” By then, it was too late. But I wanted to offer some sort of help to others in a similar position so I thought something was better than nothing.
As for Patreon, what I am referring to is a detailed tour of the room, bit by bit looking at HiFi, vinyl, box sets, etc spread over many videos. Call me old fashioned but I wanted the whole thing to be a surprise instead of blurting the whole thing out on a throwaway, general shot in this video to non Patreeon supporters which, I repeat, wouldn’t have said much, on its own, in terms of a specific product-by-product Buyers Guide.
Hello Paul,
You should use large indoor plants, apart from making the air quality better they breakup
Standing waves and look rather pleasant.
Gary
Hey Paul… could our own ears be deceiving us? Could they be causing distortion? Is it possible!? The reason I said this is because I came across these and one of the claims is it “increases sound quality while‚Ķ Listening to headphones / Listening to a car stereo / Listening to home HiFi” ‚Äì game for a demo?
https://www.flareaudio.com/collections/high-definition/products/earhd-360
Well, I thought I’d seen everything… 🙂
You have ‘golden ear’s so are probably immune to this but at the same time our hearing does deteriorate and change over time ‚Äì something I rarely see mentioned in Audiophile blogs and websites. For instance, are there such things as audiophile hearing aids? I don’t know… how would wearing these impair our enjoyment or could they potentially even enhance it? Again, I don’t know. Maybe someone else does…
Hi John – I’ve heard/seen a lot about the improvement of hearing aids in terms of sound quality and, in my Facebook Group, have read of a few Group members extolling the sonic benefits of their own fitted units. I don’t see why technology shouldn’t continue to improve in such a manner, bringing joy to many of us who suffer from damaged hearing.
In terms of editorial, I’ve never been approached by a hearing-aid manufacturer promoting the actual sound quality (in music listening terms) of their tech but would be interested to hear from any company who feels confident enough to talk about that.
Well I took the plunge with the EarHD 360 and my review can be summed up thus: it does attenuate high frequencies but the effect is to overall “veil” the music you are listening to. Instruments lack their overall top-end punch and clarity. To summarise I would say: OK for everyday hearing but for music? No. The moulded units are very rigid and not particular comfortable, not for me anyway. Sent back and refunded swiftly.
https://www.flareaudio.com/collections/high-definition/products/earhd-360
Fascinating stuff, John and thanks for the review. Very useful.