> Roundffusor1
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R1'musicality is like that...

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 ROUNDFFUSOR 1

PATENTED & INTERNATIONAL PCT
THE ART OF SOUND - THE PLEASURE OF MUSIC
 

Contents

A detailed description of our invention		Important note from the PCT Int. search report for our patent
Theory		About quality and money
The detailed R1's measurements		Roundffusor1's - terms and conditions
Diffusion or absorption ?		Roundffusor1 - the model ''any surface'' or portable
The perfectly * diffuse sound field		Some conclusions resulted from R1's practice
What is the Roundffusor1 and how it works		The Roundffusor1 introduces a new concept
Perceptual observations		Roundffusor1's mounting instructions
Some important psychoacoustical / subjective aspects		The R1's paper - ''Acoustics 2002'' at the Patras Univ.- Greece. Proceedings for Hellenic Acoustics, Patras 2002, ISBN: 960-7620-27-5, pp.41-48, 2003.
More evidence on diffusing phenomena from other researchers Some case studies  Few testimonials		The R1's published European Patent - EP 1506541. is here: WIDE BAND SOUND DIFFUSER WITH SELF REGULATED LOW FREQUENCY ABSORPTION AND METHODS OF MOUNTING IT. Inventor: Zainea Liviu - Nikolae [GR]. This text has being written by the inventor before April 2002. The Roundffusor1 is now an US PATENT NR.7261182

In order to provide you specific information in your own language, here we have this page, pc translated into 10 languages. Continuously, we will try to improve the translation's quality. Each is a ''PDF'' file , between of 0.8 and 1,5 MB. Russian file is corrected

DUTCH   FRENCH   GERMAN   ITALIAN   JAPANESE   KOREAN   PORTUGUESE   RUSSIAN   SPANISH   SWEDISH

Our bigger projects: the road from important works to the unique Roundffusor1  

Some of our activities : Room acoustics improvement or new constructions for sound recording facilities: Studios, TV, amphitheatres, music halls or dedicated rooms for listening music. One  project was Thanos Mikroutsiko's recording studio where he already finished enough professional recordings.

 The GIALINO MOUSIKO THEATRO in Athens (the Gialino Teatro's site is here), our most complex project, maybe, is the best music hall in Greece, built with the previous acoustical materials technology and very expensive.

  We design and supervise special sound insulation constructions for any industrial or naval situation.

Our bigger industrial project was a successful prototype sound insulation of machinery engine room to a 110 meters cruise ship ''Princess Danae'' and a much bigger one, a Greek military complex of 16 tank motors testing chambers. It is finished a full project heavy sound insulation, interior acoustical design and 12  KW audio array-a multipurpose hall in Sparta. 

We were invited paper at the Acoustical Society of America's Pittsburgh 2002 Poster Session: Halls for Music Performance: Another Two Decades of Experience 1982-2002. We presented ''THE GIALINO MOUSIKO THEATRO''.

In Greece, a paper about the ROUNDFFUSOR1, was presented at the first Congress of the Hellenic Institute of Acoustics (HELINA)  University of Patras, September 30, 2002. HELINA is a member of EUROPEAN ACOUSTICS ASSOCIATION (E.A.A.).

In Romania, a work about the corrected studios of the State Romanian Broadcasting Co.  was presented at the Second International Conference of Romanian Society of Acoustics on Sound and Vibration (is a member of EUROPEAN ACOUSTICS ASSOCIATION (E.A.A.),14 – 17 October 2004, Bucharest.

In the last  months, 15 new recording studios were built or acoustically corrected in Athens, 2 more in Thessalonica and 6 new studios abroad [ 4 in Romania and 2 in Holland ], all using our Roundffusor1. Twelve of them are built using ONLY the Roundfusor1 with or without small carpets on the floor, the same for control room and all recording rooms. In Athens, the new Eurosound's demo room, it was built only with R1 on the ceiling. 

He who rejects change is the architect of decay. (Harold Wilson)    Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler. (Albert Einstein) The man who cannot occasionally imagine events and conditions of existence that are contrary to the causal principle as he knows it will never enrich his science by the addition of a new idea. (Max Planck)

We excuse that we don't have too many representatives around the world (we work hard on this). Until you will have a representative near to your place, in order to hear and believe that our R1 is indeed so good, please note that there will always be experts to say Forget it: such things are impossible... 

From a study was based on 1950's work by a psychologist we have some unexpected conclusions... The unpleasantness of standing alone can make a majority opinion seem more appealing than sticking to one's own beliefs. If other people's views can actually affect how someone perceives the external world, then truth itself is called into question. See more here.

The big challenge :  How we try to improve the World's architectural acoustics data and attitude

The Roundffusor1 is in a totally new category, a giant step in the art of acoustical materials !

A detailed description of our invention  

The ideal [overall] predicted sound diffuser polar plots, something thought and desired, but difficult to believe as being ever practically produced...

UNTIL NOW !

Above, a more specific prediction [using Matlab] for scattering from hemispheres and hemi cylinders, variation with distance.

Regarding the Roundffusor1 which is built from a complex combination of  hemispheres and hemi cylinders , please note that our device when grouped mounted, is simultaneously a very active diffuser and much more complex Helmholtz resonator and, the combination of two is almost impossible to be emulated into an equation. We may say that the superposition principle is somehow the explanation phenomenon, but not only...

Theory

This two examples are the ''ideal'' or best predicted polar diagrams ( from bibliography ) for situations similar with the Roundffusor's measurement setup. The heavy lines (hemicycles) represents 99% diffusion factor, and the incidence angles are : a) 0, b) 30 and c) 60°. The Roundffusor1's measurement were made at 45° and the above Matlab calculations are also made for 45°. Please note that the Roundffusor1 was measured with a TEF20, in a range from 12-19368 Hz .

Generally, please note that almost all predicted plots found in the bibliography or other acoustical materials characteristics are results from programs working down to 125 Hz only. As you know [ and the High-End users knows better than all because they are paying hard for this] the bass contents determine the so named ''body'' of music, his bass contour containing a plethora of musical information which transmits to our ears the intimate feeling of each source we are approaching by. So from most PC's predictions, the ''abyss'' bellow 125 Hz is unknown or not included.

The off axis polar plots '' from another company '' (as far as we know that their provenience is reliable), are chosen from the best of their diffusers, also at 45° and similar measurements setup.

We are ''forced'' to say , that the Roundffusor1 polar plots , are similar in many ways with the ''ideal'' ones. Hopefully for us, the listening tests out-performed and anticipated the excellent TEF20 measurements.

We present the following polar plots diagrams from diffusers applications : a) a case study were the R1 was used as room treatment, b)- a QRD diffuser type from an US company and, c) - a gypsum pyramid diffuser from a US Co. You may compare them with the '' ideal ones'' diagrams and have your own opinions.

 Few detailed R1's measurements are here

Cluj-Napoca - Romania. State Radio station control room. All polar plots were obtained from a 45 deg. incidence angle.  

A case study - Comments:

1. The R1's correction factor it was limited only by the found on site loudspeaker's low frequency capability.

2. The measurements were made into the control room shown below 

3. The Roundffusor1 were mounted directly upon the absorption material found there. After the R1's treatment, the rest of the studios surfaces, except R1's covered ones, remained with the absorption materials as built before.

4. Please note, that R1 was effective even mounted upon and between absorptive materials. The tiles in the ''after'' correction, tends slightly to left indicating that the existing absorptive materials, quantitatively, covered a much more surface on the left surface of the studio as we look at the loudspeakers.

It is an evidence that using the R1the acoustic field is ''forced'' to symmetry, or ...the wrong stereo image becomes a wide natural well defined stereo image.

Measurements made before the acoustical treatment with R1		Measurements made after the acoustical treatment with R1
63-8000 Hz		125-16000 Hz

The critical Roundffusor 1's measurements

...

Or, if you prefer, stay put in the past...   

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Diagrams for acoustical materials (diffusers) from another companies

250-6300 Hz  b) Here are the polar plots of a diffuser (QRD Type) from an US company

250-6300 Hz  c) Here are the polar plots from the same US's Co. - a gypsum pyramid diffuser

Diffusion or absorption ?

From more than 70 years ago, prestigious scientists remarked and proposed the use of diffusion instead of absorption in all qualitative acoustical situations. Interfering reflections can be controlled by absorption or diffusion.

In small and medium sized rooms, it is often desirable to control interfering reflections, from the rear wall, using diffusion instead of absorption. In this way you can provide a diffuse ambient sound field, while controlling interfering reflections.

When the room's surfaces are relative close to the listener, a very efficient diffusing surface is needed, this because as known, the smaller the room the most difficult to smooth the many resonance modes. To solve this problem, ONCE AND FOR ALL,  ESR by its owner and acoustical consultant Zainea Liviu, designed, patented and then produced the ROUNDFFUSOR1. When the shape / geometry determines the function, in the design effort, subconsciously, it may reach the Mandalas sacred symmetry or the Chladny evident also symmetrical situations. More, perhaps I was influenced in its design by the purity and simplicity of ancient Greek art. As much as archeology unveiled the past, the ancient Greeks used no absorptive materials in their theatres, just hard materials and ingenuity...The subjective geometry / aesthetics perception should be subordinate by the very performance, an unique situation in the architectural acoustical field. Now, the Roundffusor1 it is the industry first, and from far away, the most efficient sound diffuser.<<  I agree that all this statements are at the edge between self-confidence and arrogance, but please, take all this as self-confidence or deep joy resulted from the outstanding invention's performances. And deep joy from musicians using the R1, is much more satisfactory and comes to me all the time.  >> I am indebted to the earlier work done by Peter D'Antonio, PhD & CEO and his collaborators at the RPG Diffuser Systems. Without their previous efforts, my invention couldn't be so quickly possible.<< But, a  good initial idea (M. R. Schroeder, around 1975) being commercialized continuously in ''small pieces'' is not real progress. About real technological progress you may read '' The Law of Accelerating Returns'' by Ray Kurzweil.
 

'' The perfectly * diffuse sound field ''

Even though unattainable [ they said] , it is instructive to consider the characteristics of a diffuse sound field. Randall and Ward’ have given us a list of these:

• The frequency and spatial irregularities obtained from steady-state measurements must be negligible.
• Beats in the decay characteristic must be negligible.
• Decays must be perfectly exponential, i.e., they must be straight lines on a logarithmic scale.
• Reverberation time will be the same at all positions in the room.
• The character of the decay will be essentially the same for different frequencies.
• The character of the decay will be independent of the directional characteristics of the measuring microphone.

These six factors are observation oriented. A professional physicist specializing in acoustics might stress fundamental and basic factors in his definition of a diffuse sound field such as energy density, energy flow, superposition of an infinite number of plane progressive waves, and so on. The six characteristics suggested by Randall and Ward point us to practical ways of obtaining solid evidence for judging the diffuseness of the sound field of a given room. From :The Handbook of Acoustics-3rd Editions- F. Alton Everest, TAB Books, page 223. (* Personally I don't agree with the term '' perfect ''. For this reason I use ''near perfect'', even if the Roundffusor1 is making beautiful and ''perfect'' the sound of music.   

THE ROUNDFFUSOR1 FULFILLS ALL THE ABOVE CONDITIONS!

THE PHILOSOPHY & HISTORY AROUND ACOUSTICAL MATERIALS ARE  IRREVOCABLY CHANGED! 

What is the Roundffusor1 and how it works

We present here a new kind of a sound diffuser, enough simple in his construction but very active in doing his job. It is composed from a main body and two lateral drivers. This two drivers serves to sustain very steady the diffuser upon the surface to be mounted: walls or ceiling. This diffuser may be used in any kind of room where the critical listening is needed. His main advantage is that it is working simultaneously in two ways: as a clean diffuser for mid and high frequencies and as a self controlled absorber, below 250 Hz, for low and very low frequencies. This is possible, because being mounted in a new way, works like a complex Helmholtz resonator.

In real time, there is a kind of reconstruction of all music characteristics – parts diffused or absorbed or both. Even for the trained ears, there is no time to percept when and how the music is processed and the listener is just immersed in the sound without any trace of coloration. The ‘’ historical’’ focus place of listening, become obsolete.

The invention is relative simple as an object but being very easy to be installed  by anybody with simple tools and being also very cheap , will let the people to buy their beloved stereo equipment or professional electronics and put them in a room where the acoustical environment will become also... a ''professional tool''. 

Believe it or not, this ''tool'' exists - there is no other like this and in the rooms treated with our Roundffusor1 there is no place and no need for any other acoustical material. The reason is simple: the Roundffusor1 is doing all that is necessary on a minimal surface.

It's the useful change and I'll not exaggerate at all that, regarding the audio field, after the phonograph, transistor & valve and the audio CD, the Roundffusor1 is the most mass orientated product on the market.

I'm fully responsible saying that all other acoustical materials besides their more or less announced and true diffusing function, are ''performing'' a so much damage on mid and high frequencies - there when the music plays, so much that the absorption ''induced'' is actually removing the essential from music.  

In fact, the inertial ''traditional'' absorption removes the natural feeling of a real human musical performance !

.....

Perceptual observations

Regarding the precedence effect, it is also soften. Axial or left / right head movements don’t arrives to dramatically induced changes. There is an incredible stability of sound image. At the first sound heard from the loudspeakers, the listener, instinctively [meaning very quickly, something between 0.1 to 1 second] focus the ears/ eyes on the location of each musician. During the music, all those spatial references, are easily memorized / visualized by the listener. More, if the musicians changes their places, or are moving here and there, their movements are easily sensed. In a way, you may  VOTE  to  see what kind of ''room decoration'' is your preferred one.

The Roundffusor1 have NOTHING in common with the ''QRD - Diffractal / RPG'' type diffuser, or with any of their products, just being much better overall and of course substantially less expensive.

One of the things that might be a key ingredient in the design of R1, is that scattering from spheres / hemi spheres produces focusing on a line behind the sphere. This line lies inside the wall , considering the original source, but the scattering from the virtual image source will focus sound into the room. Thereby the scattered sound may be heard at long distances from the R1. The same might happen with the cylindrical parts of the R1, but to a lesser degree. In this way the scattered sound may perhaps be audible at longer distances from the R1 than from other diffusors. Because real sound sources aren't point-like, and since the hemispheres on an R1 wall are close to other scattering objects, the focusing will be somewhat smeared, which in turn might reduce any negative effects of focusing.

The Roundffusor's subjective phase perception ( and easily measured ) is near zero phase or, more correct - no irregular phase curves, regardless the center frequencies or music bandwidth. All this phenomena are valid and perceived at more than 6-7 meters - for average audio cultivated people and even to 12-14 meters for very trained ones- from the music source and the '' critical focused point of listening '' or '' sweet <stereo> spot '' is obsolete. 

Normal discussions are easy in the rooms fitted with Roundffusor1 - the voices are clear and not influenced / disturbed by the acoustical field. Speaking, you understand that the room is almost empty from '' strange materials'' , but any kind of echoes or anything which may interfere and disturb the intelligibility are simply NOT THERE.

For music, a kind of ''aura'' envelope reconstruction from the initial room's recording session is obtained. The clean perception for speech or music arrives at all levels- from about 50 dB SPL to the personal pain limits. Think that all this arrives from a very hard plastic area-of at least 9 Roundffusors1, mounted on the back wall or ceiling and, ... there is nothing to be changed on your electronics.  

 THE ABSORPTION OF MID AND HIGH FREQUENCIES REMOVES THE PLEASURE FROM THE MUSIC ! 

Here is an interpretation about the damages ''obtained'' when using absorption in a room dedicated to music: '' As a result, the "naturalness" of recorded is destroyed, and its ideological effect severely curtailed, if not totally obliterated. The result is double-alienation, both material and formal there is an emphasis of distance-the distance between the musician and the listener, the distance created by the mediation of recording and playback technology. Unlike with less self-critical rock, there is no "insistence that nothing a man comes in touch with may be better, or may be regarded as better, than he himself is or thinks he is" (28). The lo-fi listener encounters a form, as a form-and not any transparent font of "emotion," etc. The music may still be pleasurable, but it is pleasure in a cultural product which refuses to be merely what it appears to be, which constantly puts its very ontological status into question. In a world dominated by the cultural industry and its products, such pleasure seems to be, in a way, progressive-even if not in the sense that Adorno would favor. [Play "It's Only Lena."]''.

The live or recorded music will sounds beautifully similar from room to room

THE SO CALLED INTERCHANGEABILITY OR REPEATABILITY BETWEEN VARIOUS ENVIRONMENTS IS ACQUIRED 

The inventor

What matters ? The quality of the Invention or the tenacity of the Inventor ?

The people perceive only the quality of the Invention

The Roundffusor1 was invented by Mr. Zainea Liviu Nicolae who studied mechanical engineering at the University Brasov - Romania. Mr. Zainea is member of HELINA and American Acoustical Society, being an acoustical consultant and a freelance sound engineer. His published technical articles/papers are posted in this site. It is listed in the Who's Who in the World & Science & Engineering for the 1996-2005 editions and IBC - The Lifetime of Achievement One Hundred.

Some important psychoacoustical aspects when R1 is used: the sweet spot becomes obsolete, a perceptible EDT's reduction, the masking produced by the low frequencies is lowered, an estimated 1,5-2 dB of loudness increase. This enhancement may be explained as a statistical coupling of incident and scattered waves.

The theory that the mind works like a computer, in a series of distinct stages, was an important steppingstone in cognitive science, but it has outlived its usefulness, concludes a new Cornell University study. Instead, the mind should be thought of more as working the way biological organisms do: as a dynamic continuum, cascading through shades of grey. New Cornell University study suggests that mental processing is continuous, not like a computer. In humans the neural activation patterns flow back and forth to produce nonlinear, self-organized, emergent properties of a biological organism and their resolution of the ambiguity is gradual rather than the discrete 0 and 1; it's a dynamical system." If there was ambiguity, the model assumed that the mind jumps the gun to one state or the other, and if it realizes it is wrong, it then makes a correction. Michael Spivey, a psycholinguist and associate professor of psychology at Cornell wrote: "In thinking of cognition as working as a biological organism does, on the other hand, you do not have to be in one state or another like a computer, but can have values in between -- you can be partially in one state and another, and then eventually gravitate to a unique interpretation, as in finally recognizing a spoken word.’’ Regarding speech recognition, he argue that the older models of language processing theorized that neural systems process words in a series of discrete stages, the alternative model suggests that sensory input is processed continuously so that even partial linguistic input can start "the dynamic competition between simultaneously active representations." 

We believe that listening instrumental music doesn’t need so much ‘’brain computing’’ but when various kind of masking are present the well known or dynamically remembered musical patterns flow back and forth trying to ‘’put back’’ the missing (masked) music details and, if the acoustical environment is not appropriate for clear listening (because of too much damping / absorption or too much reverberation), those ‘’missing parts’’ (being below the subjective / personal perceptive threshold ) are ignored, and... gone is the aesthetical pleasure as initially intended by the very composer -  musician/s.

Here below, are some technical , physiological, psychological, technical and aesthetical considerations regarding a professional or a personal session of judging a recording in an acoustically treated room - be a recording or broadcasting studio or a room dedicated to music listening,  in a normal, Hi-Fi or High-End category.   

Table 1.  Parameters and examples of common descriptive terms

(taken from EBU Doc.Tech. 3286 [10]) 

Terms : more detailed explanations. From [EBU TECHNICAL REVIEW – September 2000 8 / 17 ,G. Spikofski ]

The listening panel should be composed of listening experts, that is people who understand and have been in trained in the agreed method of subjective quality evaluation. These listening experts should:

  work daily in the production of sound programmes of the subject genre chosen for the evaluations or have extensive experience in listening to sound in a professional way,

  have ontologically normal hearing: ISO Standard 389 [3] should be used as a guideline. (Ontologically normal person: A person in a normal state of health who at the time of testing is free from all signs or symptoms of ear disease and from obstructing wax in the ear canal, and who has no history of undue exposure to noise.)

be reasonably fluent in the working language of the evaluations, because verbal expression is an important part of the method.  

Explaining the ''grade'' significances, below (same source)

Grade	Impairment
1	Very annoying defects
2	Too many annoying defects
3	A number of annoying defects
4	Some slightly annoying defects
5	Some perceptible but not annoying defects
6	No perceptible defects

Table 2: Impairment grades

 

Grade	Quality
1	Bad. Substantial technical defects. Unsuitable for transmission.
2	Poor . Should be used for transmission only in exceptional cases. Only of documentary value.
3	Fair
4	Good
5	Vary good
6	Excellent

Table 3: Qualify grades