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Naim SBL

Angelo said:
thanks 2ManyBoxes ...

unfortunately my room is the living room where the whole family lives.

the room is 9mt x 4mt and the system is placed in the center of the long wall ... I am in front of it ... on the sides (in the short walls) I can't do anything because on one side I have the entrance door (large almost as much as the wall) and on the other side I have the kitchen.

the only thing I could do is put soundproofing panels behind the speakers and / or behind my listening point (basically behind my head).

my system is: RegaP6 (Ania + PhonoMC Rega) / Bare NDX / 252 / SC / 250.2 / NacA5. Just 252 and 250 was recapped by me 1 month ago...
Click to expand...

Have you done / considered @Mr Tibbs 250 Mojo Mod?
 
Angelo said:
the room is 9mt x 4mt and the system is placed in the center of the long wall ... I am in front of it ... on the sides (in the short walls) I can't do anything because on one side I have the entrance door (large almost as much as the wall) and on the other side I have the kitchen.

the only thing I could do is put soundproofing panels behind the speakers and / or behind my listening point (basically behind my head).
Click to expand...

Acoustically having the speakers firing across the room instead of down it is less than ideal, you do get peaky treble. I know this because unfortunately it's the only alternative in my room.

Damping between the speakers probably won't do much but it might be worth a try. Don't put any damping behind your head, the idea is to have diffusion instead, so something that will bounce the treble around in all directions. Commercial diffusors are very expensive sadly. You could make one yourself out of different lengths of wood but they look really ugly :eek: so they're very unlikely to get accepted into a living room.

The door is the most likely source of the problem, especially if it's got glass in it. Try playing a record that's especially bad and then put your hand over one ear and then the other to find out which direction is the worst.

If it is the door then I can't think of anything you could do to it. However, if it's a sliding door with more than one part to it, try just slightly opening the door so that the panels are at a different angle. Hopefully the treble will bounce off the door in a different direction and miss your head. I bet that the problem is that the door is designed to shut off another room where people will be trying to do things so this won't be an option.

It could be that the OW1s are the way to go. Sorry :(
 
2ManyBoxes,

Firing across a room is no different from firing up or down a room as long as the SBLs have been setup correctly and are as close as possible to a solid wall with no kit in the middle of them.
I used SBLs passive and active for years.
 
2ManyBoxes said:
Acoustically having the speakers firing across the room instead of down it is less than ideal, you do get peaky treble. I know this because unfortunately it's the only alternative in my room.

Damping between the speakers probably won't do much but it might be worth a try. Don't put any damping behind your head, the idea is to have diffusion instead, so something that will bounce the treble around in all directions. Commercial diffusors are very expensive sadly. You could make one yourself out of different lengths of wood but they look really ugly :eek: so they're very unlikely to get accepted into a living room.

The door is the most likely source of the problem, especially if it's got glass in it. Try playing a record that's especially bad and then put your hand over one ear and then the other to find out which direction is the worst.

If it is the door then I can't think of anything you could do to it. However, if it's a sliding door with more than one part to it, try just slightly opening the door so that the panels are at a different angle. Hopefully the treble will bounce off the door in a different direction and miss your head. I bet that the problem is that the door is designed to shut off another room where people will be trying to do things so this won't be an option.

It could be that the OW1s are the way to go. Sorry :(
Click to expand...
Thx... you have given me many valid suggestions ... I will try to test and see what happens
 
Angelo said:
but can it also be done with the new version 250.2? I have the classic series to be precise ....
Click to expand...

I see, not sure on the 250.2 - I thought you had stated 250, as in original form. If the spitty treble is that bad, you might want to consider some form of DSP shaping?
 
As a bit of left field input, I think it may be the case that as we get older we become more susceptible to spitty treble / sibilance.

Clearly room and upstream components can exacerbate/alleviate in some ways, but the speaker may be the easiest fix.

For me, speakers with ribbon tweeters are typically less of an issue in this respect, whilst still maintaining the clarity I crave.

There are certainly other options. My (sold) Yamaha NS1000s never showed this behaviour in either the room in the old house (where other speakers had) nor our current lounge.

So, perhaps try alternative speakers before going mad trying to fix the current ones?!
 
Whaleblue said:
As a bit of left field input, I think it may be the case that as we get older we become more susceptible to spitty treble / sibilance.

Clearly room and upstream components can exacerbate/alleviate in some ways, but the speaker may be the easiest fix.

For me, speakers with ribbon tweeters are typically less of an issue in this respect, whilst still maintaining the clarity I crave.

There are certainly other options. My (sold) Yamaha NS1000s never showed this behaviour in either the room in the old house (where other speakers had) nor our current lounge.

So, perhaps try alternative speakers before going mad trying to fix the current ones?!
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This is very good advice. An SBL will always sound like what it is.
 
In the last 2 years I have changed starting from Rega Rs5, then to QAcoustic 3020, then to Ovator S400, then to Ariva, then to Allae and finally to SBL.

- Rega and Qacoustic: I don't even consider them
- Ovator S400: they needed too much space behind and I couldn't give it
- Ariva: probably the best of all in the medium / high frequencies ... soft ... velvety ... but too low ... too boom effect ...
- Allae: I managed to dry the bass ... maybe even too much ... medium / high too present and too few bass ...
- SBL: finally low frequencies present, natural, dry bass, fast ... just fantastic in my room. Medium high detailed and natural ... only defect (as already mentioned) sometimes a bit pungent and fatiguing.

The SBLs however remain the best I have had so far and I no longer intend to continue experimenting with other speakers ... in the end I am sure that I will fix one aspect but I would make another worse ...

So I stay with the SBLs trying to refine more and more what they can give and do ...
 
I know Naim-lore will say you should never ... but have you tried toeing the SBL in a tad? Keep the foam grilles on the tweeter.
 
I wonder if you could get agreement with the rest of the family to have a curtain across the door? You could say that it's to isolate the two rooms so it'll be good for everyone. Buy something in thick velvet and have a nice curtain rail, it might be OK. You could get a fabric sample and stick it to the door to check that it will fix the problem.
 
2ManyBoxes said:
I wonder if you could get agreement with the rest of the family to have a curtain across the door? You could say that it's to isolate the two rooms so it'll be good for everyone. Buy something in thick velvet and have a nice curtain rail, it might be OK. You could get a fabric sample and stick it to the door to check that it will fix the problem.
Click to expand...
it's actually what I wanted to do ... it's the front door of the house (it's not a door between two rooms). So I wanted to put a curtain (if I am able to use sound-absorbing material) and by letting my wife choose the color let's see if we can both be happier ... she furnishes the house and I (perhaps) mitigate the problem ...
 
Angelo said:
it's actually what I wanted to do ... it's the front door of the house (it's not a door between two rooms). So I wanted to put a curtain (if I am able to use sound-absorbing material) and by letting my wife choose the color let's see if we can both be happier ... she furnishes the house and I (perhaps) mitigate the problem ...
Click to expand...

If you put up a double rail curtain, so one with 2 poles not just one, you can put an insulation curtain on the second rail. Make sure that you use metal poles and metal curtain rings because then anyone should have no problem pulling the curtain back. That is enough to get rid of the treble problem in my room anyway. And it helps with the heat insulation - a double win :)

I am struggling to think what kind of house you have where the front door is so big that it takes up most of one wall. An old church or a medieval castle perhaps? :)
 
2ManyBoxes said:
If you put up a double rail curtain, so one with 2 poles not just one, you can put an insulation curtain on the second rail. Make sure that you use metal poles and metal curtain rings because then anyone should have no problem pulling the curtain back. That is enough to get rid of the treble problem in my room anyway. And it helps with the heat insulation - a double win :)

I am struggling to think what kind of house you have where the front door is so big that it takes up most of one wall. An old church or a medieval castle perhaps? :)
Click to expand...

unfortunately none of this ... I live in a simple villa with a large door (two sliding glass doors) overlooking the garden
 
chord said:
So the main tuning would be following: find a materia what airclosing and very-very soft and really flexible after weeks or years. Do you remember that disgusting toy for children what seems a gel? Something like that.
Click to expand...
Holy thread resurrection, Batman!

The grown-up version of kids' 'slime' is probably something close to Museum Gel: https://www.preservationequipment.c...s/Display-Identification/Museum-Gel-P085-3311

It basically behaves as a thixotropic 'plastic liquid' which can be removed and reused from non-porous surfaces, and should be able to 'replaceably' substitute for the silicone sealant.
 
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