On the steady-state and the transient decay methods for the estimation of reverberation time

The discrepancy between reverberation times of an enclosed sound field measured by the steady-state method and by the transient decay method is well-known. So far, no clear explanation has been obtained. In this paper, the steady-state bandlimited energy in an enclosure and bandlimited power flow into modally reactive boundaries are derived to describe the energy balance relationship and thus the reverberation time in a frequency band. This reverberation time is then compared to that obtained from the transient decay of the sound field based on the modal analysis. The comparison provides an understanding of the discrepancy mentioned above as well as the physical interpretations of the reverberation times estimated by both methods.