Rives Audio PARC

© 2011 Advanced Acoustics

Advanced Acoustics is part of Interiors Foam LTD, Registered In England No. 04672814, Address: Unit B Maunside, Greenline Ind. Est., Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, NG18 5GU

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For more information please contact us on any of the details below;

Tel: +44 (0)1623 643609

Fax: +44 (0)1623 400661

E-Mail: highendaudio@
advancedacoustics-uk.com

Our range of products includes wall mounted mid and high frequency absorbers, wall mounted bass absorbers, free standing acoustic panels, screen printed acoustic panels, room analysis equipment and room correction.

All of our products conform to stringent fire tests thanks to the specialist materials we use in the construction of our acoustic panels.

All of our Acoustic Panels are available in a choice of 25 different colours options and the panels are covered in a soft but durable open weave linen.  The colour options are shown below:

- Attenuate bass anomalies caused by standing waves (parallel walls)
- Pure Analog Design; no digital conversion; the most transparent eq on the market
- Studio Quality Design, Engineering, & Components
- Absolute Sound Golden Ear Award 2004
- Stereophile Product of the Year 2003,
- Stereophile Class A Recommended Component for 6 years running!

Price Per Unit - £2690.00 inc. VAT

The PARC is a Parametric Adaptive Room Compensation system. Rives Audio designed the PARC because current stereo and home theatre components have exceeded the capability of their environment. Todays hi end audio speakers and electronics have the capability of delivering a near flat response throughout the audible frequency range (20Hz to 20kHz). However, these systems interact with their environment, namely the room they are located in. One of the largest problems in typical listening rooms is standing waves or room modes (bass modes) caused by parallel walls. The PARC is specifically designed to alleviate this problem.

The PARC is a 2 channel, 3 band (per channel) parametric equalizer (parametric eq) that can attenuate 3 separate frequencies at different ranges and amplitudes. It is purely analogue based, so there is no digital conversion to corrupt the audio signal. The system uses components and modules developed for high end analogue recording studios. Every item in the signal path is of the lowest noise and highest quality available. The engineers that developed the unit have literally dozens of years experience in designing low noise parametric equalizers (parametric eq) for the recording industry.

The basic function of the PARC is to equalize bass anomalies in the room, commonly referred to as room modes. The most prominent bass anomalies occur when two parallel walls (or floor and ceiling) excite a particular frequency (an axial mode). The distance between the two walls determines which frequency is excited. The most problematic, or highest amplitude, is generally ½ of a wavelength between two walls. The way to calculate the distance is:
½ * speed of sound / distance between walls = Frequency

The speed of sound is 1130 feet per second. Thus a room with 17 foot spaced walls would have a frequency bump at:
565 / 17 = 33.2 Hz.

This is considered the first mode between those two walls. The second mode is for a full wavelength, which would be at 66.4 Hz. The third mode would be at 3/2 wavelengths, or 99.6 Hz. Each mode has lower amplitude than the previous mode. However, imagine a room where the length is 2 times the width. In this example 34 feet long. The first mode for that room is at the same frequency of the second mode of the width, or 66.4 Hz. When modes combine like this the problem is compounded, and the bass can become very bloated and distorted.

Even at Rives Audio they recommend reducing any bass anomalies as much as possible before employing the PARC; the less electrical equalization the better. However, over damping a room, or filling it with bass traps can be impractical, expensive, and may not lead to the best sounding environment. The PARC employs the highest grade components and shortest signal paths possible. The goal is to make these alterations to compensate for bass problems with as little effect as possible on anything else in the audio chain.

The PARC operates between 18 and 350 Hz. It attenuates ONLY, there is no gain in the PARC. The purpose is to reduce the frequencies caused by room excitation. There are three bands per channel. These three bands were originally designed to compensate for the 3 parallel surfaces in most rectangular rooms (side to side, front to back, and floor to ceiling). However, they can be cascaded or used in a variety of settings to best suit the room.

Their first priority was to keep the signal as clean as possible while still providing the flexibility of parametric equalization. The audio boards are separate from the power supply and from the digital control boards. Furthermore, the audio boards are 2 layer boards only, with minimal signal path length and crossings. The audio boards are designed by the same engineers that design API and ATI mixing boards and control consoles. These are considered by most to be the finest in the industry owned by the best musicians and studios.

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