ABSTRACT
The discussions of the preceding chapter have clearly shown that it is not very promising to apply the methods of wave theory in order to find answers to questions of practical interest, especially if the room under consideration is large and somewhat irregular in shape. In such cases even the calculation of one single eigenvalue and the associated normal mode is quite difficult. Moreover, in order to obtain a survey of the sound fields which are to be expected for different types of excitation it would be necessary to calculate not one but a very large number of modes. On the other hand, such a computation, supposing it were at all practicable, would yield far more detailed information than would be required and meaningful for the judgement of the acoustical properties of the room.
