Dedicated muisc room, am I making a big mistake?

[Sloop John B]

We are getting a full retrofit of the house to get it better insulated and this gives me the opportunity to make my music room bigger by some internal rearrangement.

However the room I will end up with will be close to a perfect square 14 x 14 (feet).



My only real options to stop it being square like is to make one axis smaller (left towards right or bottom towards top).

From peoples experience am I better to go for:

(a) most space, leave square as is
(b) reduce space and aim for more of a rectangle

If (b) what dimensions would you recommend?

Thanks,


.sjb

[Diapason]

I had a perfectly square room before, about the same size, and it was horrendous. I now have a rectangular room where the short dimension is too short and it's also horrendous. I'm starting to think I'm doomed never to have an even vaguely passable room. I have no advice other than to sell all your gear, put a pool table in there instead and forget about the whole thing.

;)

If you actually want me to be serious, I'd probably take the bigger space and deal with it, as it allows for more flexibility of positioning and even sound treatments if you're so inclined. I spend my life wishing for more space to allow speakers to breathe, so I might be a bit biased on that score. In fairness, bass problems are generally related to corners and you've already "confused" the normal room acoustics by sticking a door at one corner and a chamfer to the other. You may find that acoustically speaking this room is no longer a square even as it stands.

[HiFiFan]

There are quite a few good articles about the perfect ratio etc.I can't remember all the references now but I know Cardas had a paper. I would agree that you are probably better having more room and treating the space as/if needed.

[tony]

That sounds like a decent space John you should be able to get it to work fine. Is there any particular reason the room being square is a problem? My room is a little bigger than that but with the exception of the chimney breast it is almost a perfect square. I think room treatments can improve any room but I don't think any of us are enamoured with sticking spongy things around the room. Anne has never warmed to the various bits of junk I use!

[Ivor]

Take the maximum space John, you can break it up with shelving. Even if you don't have LPs or CDs you'll always have books. Extra chairs etc can break up waves too. You could always opt for a smaller room and THEN find you don't like the sound anyway! Unless there's some other hidden benefit to reducing the size of the room I'd go for what I can get and work around that.

[Fran]

I think like the lads have said, take all the space you can - but bear in mind that being able to have the sofa/chair out into the room a bit, and maybe the speakers too could be very handy. I've heard more issues with a sofa right at the back wall with bass boom than from an awkwardly shaped room.

Might I add extra wiring/sockets while you're at it anyway? Cat5 from the router to the room too?

[Sloop John B]

Thanks for the help guys.

I'll go with the most space and deal with what I have.

Don't worry Fran, I'm a Naim guy, dedicated mains and wired Ethernet are going into the room most especially.


.sjb