There are many myths and misconceptions that people have about room acoustics.  Many aspects of acoustics are counterintuitive.  Here’s a quick sampling of fast facts about room acoustics. dB (Decibel) is a term used to describe sound pressure level. An increase of 3dB in sound pressure level requires twice the power.  Likewise, a drop of 3dB cuts the sound power in half. 3dB is the smallest amount of sound pressure change normal people can discern. RT60 (aka “reverberation time”) is [...]

What is NRC? NRC stands for Noise Reduction Coefficient and is a standard rating for how well a material absorbs sound.  The NRC rating of a material can be viewed as a percentage.  For example, an NRC of .75 means 75% of the sound energy that contacts that material is absorbed and is not reflected back into a room.  Likewise, this same material can be considered to be only 25% reflective. NRC is often thought to be [...]

STC stands for ''Sound Transmission Class.'' This is a single-number rating that is used for comparing the acoustical isolation that different barrier materials can provide.  Unfortunately, the process used to determine the ‘official’ STC of a material is a lot more complex than that single number might suggest. Just know that a material’s ability to block sound is measured at several frequencies in the middle range of human hearing, and some performance variation at different [...]