As several propagation properties are common to all types of waves, is not absolutely necessary to use sound waves for measurement model home theater. More cost effective is the use of light as a substitute for sound. The detection of the distribution of energy in the home theater room can be carried out by photocells or photo.Although physical models have dedicated home theater proved a useful tool for acoustic design, which are gradually being replaced by a cheaper method, faster and more efficient, ie, through digital simulation of sound propagation in enclosures. The introduction of the digital computer in room acoustics is probably due to Schroeder and his associates. Meanwhile, computer simulation has been applied not only to home cinema systems, but at factories, an auditorium and other areas of work too.
There are basically two methods of sound field simulation in use today for home theater design, ie, ray tracing and the method of image sources, and both are based on geometrical acoustics. The most tedious part and the whole process is the collection and input data of the room such as positions and orientations of the walls of the home theater and its acoustic properties. One can study the combined effect of more than one source, and consider all home theater speaker together.
