I ran Room EQ Wizard for the first time on my Mac last night. My goal is to learn how to use it so I can identify issues with my very challenging room and optimize placement of speakers and treatments for bass before I apply Anthem Room Correction in the Anthem receiver.
I have two different Anthem Room Correction System microphones which technically work. I don't have compatible calibration files, but is that necessary for subwoofer calibration?
I am just testing for 2.1 (Monitor Audio RS6 and RSW12) I had a lot of variables to play with.
@pozz kindly suggested I get the early reflections out of the way sooner by putting the speakers as close to the corners as possible.
Here is a roomstyler rendering of the room without all the mess of objects in the room. I do have a lot of sound absorbing objects in the room currently but have not measured before and after. Also the beams (pictured above) are not in the rendering.
I placed the microphone on the stand in the sweetspot facing the ceiling and did abotu 20 sweeps with the following variables:
- Main speaker port plugs in/out (out seemed better, despite being close to the front wall)
- Subwoofer volume (a little lower seemed better, I never know where it should be set to start)
- Subwoofer polarity (180° was massively better despite manual suggesting otherwise for A/V LFE)
- A/V subwoofer crossover (60Hz seemed better than full range, 80hz,100hz or 150hz)
With my original settings (port plugs in, 80hz crossover, 0° sub polarity), if my mic and measurements are to be trusted from one location, left and right looked like this:
Inverting the sub polarity made the largest impact with the 60hz null.
Combined:
And up to 20kHz there is a terrible null at 200Hz:
I have no idea how to read this kind:
Some questions:
- Should I be testing the sub in isolation? Do I just unplug my speakers to do that or can REW control only the sub via HDMI? I think the sub should be able to go lower than what's measuring.
- Was inverting the sub polarity a mistake despite it looking good in my measurement?
- Is my mic okay for at least some of the frequencies?
- How can I know where to apply treatments? I do have about a dozen 2-inch thick 14x20" acoustic panels but no diffusers.
- The main issue I experience is a diffused image, which I assume is from vaulted ceiling reflections. I could fit thin diffusers or absorbers but how do I know where and what kind?
- I don't own an SPL meter, but could my iPhone work? I think I can connect the Anthem mic to it.
Any other measurement help is appreciated!