[Anthony_I]

Well I'm new to this forum and fairly new to the world of HT.
I recently bought a Pioneer XV-HTD520 Home Theatre In A Box, Used. It came with no manual or speakers. I will build the speakers myself, matching the OEM speakers as closely as possible.

However my main problem lies in the fact that there are a bunch of features and menu items/settings that I do not understand. Some of them may be player specfiec, but I will break it down into catagories and perhaps someone here will know what I'm talking about and be able to help me out.
Alternativly if anyone owns this unit as well, it may be possible to scan the manual for me, which i would greatly appreciate.
But on with the questions that i have.

This unit has:
Surround Mode
DSP Mode
Sound Mode
CD Mode (Button)


The questions are as follows:

In The Surround Mode Menu I have;

Auto
Musical
Drama
Standard
Action
Virtual Surround 1/2
Rear Wide
What do these do to the sound?

In The DSP Mode Menu I have;

Hall 1/2
Jazz
Dance
Theatre 1/2
Simulated Stereo
Effect (Ranges from 10 - 90 and is only available when DSP is on)
What do these do and how does it correlate to the sourround mode/other sound modes?

In The Sound Mode Menu I Have;

P.Bass
Record Mode
Midnight Mode
(When toying with record mode and turning it on/off, i have to restart/open the DVD player to get it to play DVD's again.... same with the CD Mode whatever that is)
What do these functions do/what are they?

In the "System Setup" i have;

LFE (Off/ATT 0/ATT 10)
What Does this Do and how does it affect the sound in the sub? (I can also adjust the bass up to +3dB, and adjust the Sub channel up to +10dB seperatly)

D.R.C Mode, (Off/Low/Mid/High) What is this?
L-Ch1 R-Ch2/Ch1/Ch2/Mix. What does this do?
"FRT SP/CTR SP/SUR SP x.x m" what does this do? I know it has something to do with Front,Center And Surround, beyond that Im lost.

This is also a Dolby Digital/Pro Logic/DTS Decoder. is there a way to switch between these, or is it pretty much disc specfic?

I'm sorry if this doesnt make sense to anyone who doesnt own one of these units, but it has so many damn menus/functions/options that i simply do not understand.
since i do not have speakers as of yet i cannot tell how it will sound when certain settings are changed... so im hoping (guessing) that alot of these settings show up on other systems as well.

Thank you to anyone who can offer any type of help with this...does anyone else own one of these handy little units?

[Bob McElfresh]

Hi Anthony. Welcome to HTF!

Let's go through this:

Quote:

I will build the speakers myself, matching the OEM speakers as closely as possible.

Dont.

It's more important that you try and create 3 identical front speakers for your home theater. Do NOT try to match the specs of the original speakers. Make good speakers and most good receivers will drive them.

Surround Mode/DSP Mode/Sound Mode Menu --

Ok, There are 'tricks' that a receiver can do to play with the sound. Some are kind of gimicks, others can actually make the system sound better in your room with your speakers. But it's like spices - you use them to YOUR taste. Play with them and decide if you like/dont like them.

How they 'contribute' is kind of like a cookie recipe - they dont tell us. They just give you lots of options to play with.


LFE (Off/ATT 0/ATT 10)

The unit was likely designed to have a self-powered subwoofer. If you dont, you set LFE to OFF. If you do have a self-powered sub, you can choose ATTenuation 0 or ATTenuation 10 to get the sub to create a pleasing amount of volume.


D.R.C Mode, (Off/Low/Mid/High) What is this?

I think DRC is Dynamic Range Compression. Typically you want to leave it off.

Some people hate when a movie has huge swings in volume. The receiver will perform a 'trick' and keep the volume in a narrower range. "High" compression means keep the volume swings small. Mid/Low allow the volume to swing more. Off means let the movie sound swing as the production studio intended.

"FRT SP/CTR SP/SUR SP x.x m"

I think this allows you to tell the receiver how far away you sit from each speaker. This will change a small time-delay. It's not a big thing so dont worry much about it.

This is also a Dolby Digital/Pro Logic/DTS Decoder.

You want to leave this set to Dolby Digital. But when you insert a DVD, make sure to go to each disks "Audio Setup" menu and select the 5.1 sound track. (The default for most DVD's is ProLogic).

Quote:

since i do not have speakers as of yet i cannot tell how it will sound when certain settings are changed..

It will become clearer when you hook some speaker up.

[Ted Lee]

is this an older product?

i checked the pioneer website but couldn't find any info on this unit.

you may want to contact pioneer directly. they may be able to send you the owners manual. you may have to pay for it, but hey...whaddya going to do?

[Anthony_I]

AAHHHH FER FUCK SAKE..... i (tried) to post the URL for that unit, and it deleted my my reply when i came back.... now the entire post is gone damnit.

FUCK..... i will type it again later... it was long too.

[Anthony_I]

I found a page that gave a lot more info than the rest i have found.... so my last (long) post is kind if un-important anyway.
It shows that some of the speakers are 6 Ohms, however on the back of the unit it has a little box that basically says all speakers are 8 Ohms. However i may have read it wrong and im not gonna pull the unit out right now to check it.

Quote:

Amplifier :
Front: 115 watts RMS per channel (1kHz, 10% THD, 8 ohms) Rear: 52 watts RMS per channel (1kHz, 10% THD, 6 ohms) Center: 52 watts RMS (1kHz, 10% THD, 6 ohms) Subwoofer: 114 watts RMS (100Hz, 10% THD, 8 ohms)

Front Speakers:
Frequency Range: 50Hz to 20kHz
Maximum Input: 115 watts
Weight: 4 lbs. 7 oz.
Nominal Impedance: 8 ohms

Center Speaker:
Frequency Range: 70Hz to 20kHz
Maximum Input: 52 watts
Weight: 2 lbs. 3 oz.
Nominal Impedance: 6 ohms

Rear Speakers:
Frequency Range: 150Hz to 20kHz
Maximum Input: 52 watts
Weight: 1 lbs. 12 oz.
Nominal Impedance: 6 ohms

Subwoofer:
Frequency Range: 30Hz to 2kHz
Maximum Input: 115 watts
Weight: 10 lbs. 9 oz.
Nominal Impedance: 8 ohms

So if im going to build my own speakers im guessing that it would be best to get speakers that have the same freq. ranges right? I will be using a "Phoenix Gold Octane R12d" as my sub (Powered)

Also how good/bad would it be to make my own cables (audio/video) using radio shack "tips" and regular RG59 cable?

anything i should know about doing this?

[Anthony_I]

Not that im trying to be rude or anything, cause this is a great place, but there are lot of members here... why does it take so long for someone to reply?

[Ted Lee]

it's just the way it goes sometimes. some threads go for pages and pages, while others get zero replies. it's just one of the dynamics here.

bob gave some excellent advice, which you can use as a starting point. if you have specific questions, i recommend you go to the relevant forum (speakers, diy, etc.) there...you can expand on your questions.

it sounds like you still want to diy (speakers and cabling), so i recommend you start with the diy forum.

anyway, good luck.

[Joe Tilley]

Not trying to pick at you but

Quote:

AAHHH FER FUCK SAKE & Fuck..... I will type it again later ext ext

I don't think you will earn to many peoples respect here when every other post is contious cussing. Just a word of advice tone it down you may get better results.
Again not trying t offend you or anything just making a suggestion.

[Anthony_I]

Quote:

I don't think you will earn to many peoples respect here when every other post is contious cussing. Just a word of advice tone it down you may get better results.
Again not trying t offend you or anything just making a suggestion.

No offense taken, I just dont realize i do it sometimes, i kind of type like i speak sometimes, and as im new here im not used to the way people do things... most other boards are worse.
i apoligize for the language if i have offended anyone.

[Bob N]

Have you tried down loading a manual off the internet?