View from the throne! Note the books shelves filled up to solidify the bass!

Referring to October's home visit post of the same tittle. Mr Wong, the home/system owner at that time felt it was not right to publish photos of his room, for the fear of people looking and perhaps, intending to follow his room treatment works. Reason being that at that point in time, he felt not totally satisfied with the room treatment results.

The first deflection point deflector/absorption panels

He has since made some pretty drastic changes and further refinement to the concept. And now that he's reasonably satisfied, 80% he says! He has allowed me to share with our readers, the pictures after much persuasion.

A more detailed look at the panels

The final results were all in the listening as they say, the proof of the pudding is in the eating! The room treatment had allowed Wong to house the Wilsons in a smaller room than otherwise recommended. With it's big, bold gutsy, bad ass bass response, the Wilsons had been giving Wong a "hard" time(as commented by ML in his earlier visit). The room treatment had more or less taken care of the area. Wong wanted his bass solid, no overhang and most importantly, cleanly distinguishing the cello and contra bass play note for note.

Ceiling diffuser panels, note the varying height arrangement!

Room treatment is a funny thing, because if you take small baby steps approach like me, you can pretty much know what you're gonna get. But if you make major changes like Wong does, the results can be down right unpredictable. He started out room treatment to fix his "hard" bass issue, but once done he realised there's some over hang in the mids at certain frequencies.

The basic first reflection point absorption/deflector panels at both sides of the room helped somewhat but could not cure all. The ceiling was lowered twice, to satisfy Wong. First time, the ceiling was lowered by 24 inches, but this then caused some problems with the highs, which made high hats sound somewhat brittle, for the lack of a better word, and lack of air and decay. Then it was decided that the ceiling would instead be raised back upwards by 6 inches, then the results were pretty good(final results had ceiling lowered by 18 inches). Ceiling diffuser panels were then added to free up the highs. The high hat's attack, sustain and naturally extended decay were all there!


The throne, with rear wall "treatment"

With the completetion of the room treatment, I noticed the staging depth and layering improved too! I could place each instrument in an orchestra in their place. Solo piano works, a favourite of Wong's, I could easily perceived the whole grand piano sitting in mid hall of the recording. Stage width is as wide as the room. The overall sonic presentation is one of lushness, refinement, coherence and power on demand. Who says you can't have your cake and eat it too?

And finally, you can say he's a happy man on the throne!


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9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Nicely done.


I've always feel that If done properly,Any Wilson could be tamed;just very difficult.

Anonymous said...

I love the stuff on the ceilings.What are they actuallY?

hifikaki said...

Congratulations to Wong for the success in his hifi quest!

The biggest difference from my last visit to his place is the treatment to the ceiling, as far as I could see from the photos.

I am darn eager to visit Wong again to listen to the fruits of his great work.

Thanks, Panzer, for another great write-up.

Anonymous said...

Is there a basis to any of this "treatment"? Just looking at the rooms suggests no attempt has been made to measure, adjust and balance as required i.e its more cosmetic than functional.

Anonymous said...

I love the ceiling too .I suspect they act as diffuserS?

Anonymous said...

Panzer,

Has Wong done speaker/room frequency response curve measurements?

Panzer said...

aldridge,

I am sure Mr Wong knows the feeling too.

Zeen,

The stuff on the ceiling are wooden panels of random north/south & east/west defusers custom built by a carpenter.

hifikaki,

You heard it for yourself this morning!

Anonymous 1.34pm,

Mr Wong has been reading a few books and countless web sites dedicated to room treatment, mostly in chinese, which I am ill equipped to spell out for you. hifikaki has borrowed one of the said books, and perhaps he can better explain to you. As far as I know, mainly, Wong uses the Cardas Golden Ratios as the basis of his numerous calculations, and a host of other parameters his picked up elsewhere. I am in no position to convince you if the results are purely cosmetic or otherwise.

TG loh,

Yes the stuff on the ceilings are difusers. You should be able to spot them in some of the high end showrooms too, in one form or another.

KM,

As far as I know, no measurements were taken prior or after the treatments. So objective comparisons are not possible.

hifikaki said...

嘿嘿﹐Panzer 所言非虛﹐音響武林調音大法密笈在我手上!! 我必須閉關十年修行方會有所成!!!
(translate: hehe, Panzer speaks the truth, I am in possession now of the hifi kungfu ultimate sound tuning secret scripture!! But I'd need to contemplate on it for ten years to learn anything!!!).


Pardon me, talk silly a bit after too many kungfu tv shows with my kids during the holidays. :-)

Happy New Year to all.

Panzer said...

hifikaki,

What happen to the "9 Octaves True Reproduction manual???

In cantonese speak, "kau yum chan king"


Ha!Ha!