Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al. - Page 2

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Hi Kevin,

The answer is: Dynamic EQ looks at both. In developing Dynamic EQ, we looked at the exact problem you are referring to. To have proper loudness correction, there are several things to pay attention to:

1) the reference level at which the recording was made
2) the playback level measured in the room where the recording is being reproduced
3) the proper psychoacoustic loudness curves
4) the loudness level of the content measured moment-by-moment
5) for surround content, the "surround impression" delivered by the surround speakers

For movie content all the reference level at which the recording was made is known in advance. It is a standard that all mixes adhere to. However, for music content there are no strict standards imposed by the industry. We surveyed several key mastering studios and found that the best ones are starting to converge to the same reference as film, but there is still some variation. One of the key elements in Dynamic EQ is to monitor the perceived loudness of the content as it is playing. So, for softer passages we apply more loudness correction and for louder passages we apply less. This is required even if the volume control is not changing in order to better match what human hearing expects.

Regards,
Chris

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Well I just got my 3808 and finished the Audyssey setup, and I must admit, it sounds very light on bass.

If I tweak the sub level, it kills my Audyssey settings right?

I think I can adjust the gain on the sub amp to suit my tastes.

Still messing with it.



And BTW - It found all my speakers as "small" as is should!

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Chris- Sweet. You are exactly right about movies. For Dolby Digital (and most DTS) DVD soundtracks, I can pretty much set the volume at -25 dB and I'm good to go. It's CDs where the big difference comes in. Cool !!

I have a Lexicon MC-12 and it has a similar feature, but I don't think it's content level dependent. (Although I'll have to check on that sometime.) I don't use it because it increases the bass response too much for my taste.

Oh, Chris- Is that dynamic eq function tweakble at all? For example, if I could tweak Lexicon's approach to do almost exactly 50% of what it's doing now, I'd be happy. Kind of like a low, med, high dynamic eq setting instead of just on or off.

??

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Hi Kevin,

You haven't even tried it and you want to tweak it already? Give it a chance!

But seriously, what we try very hard to do at Audyssey is to stay in the objective domain as much as possible. Just like MultEQ, Dynamic EQ is about rendering sound as close to reference conditions as possible. So for now, there is no ability to tweak it within Audyssey as that would put us in the business of subjective adjustments. You can, of course, still play with tone controls to tweak the bass if you end up not liking it.

Regards,
Chris

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

I'll have to check it out sometime. I do like the idea.

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Adam,

A quick thought (which may or may not apply in your particular situation).

Does your subwoofer have an "auto" or "standby" or "sleep" mode (which removes power to the SW if it doesn't receive a signal after a certain amount of time)? If so, you should disable this mode before performing the Audyssey calibration so that the SW is always putting out the test signal when required. If not, then there is a chance that you might get inaccurate SW measurements in the calibration process which might be the cause of your "thin" bass.

Like I said, this might not apply in your case, but it can't hurt to make sure.

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Thanks for the tip, but yes, my sub is "on". It's a SVS 20-39 PCi and I have the crossover disable, the power on, and the phase at 0 degrees.

I just did the calibration with the gain on the sub amp at 50% and have manually tweaked it to my liking. I think other than that, the Audyssey setup has been really nice. I am still listening. It takes a LONG time to really hear it all.

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

No kidding Adam. I am still trying to figure out all of the features of this receiver. I finally got to try Audessy last night, but wasn't too thrilled with the results. I have gotten a few tips and will try again tonight. Thanks again for the tip on the 3808. 6th Ave service was great.

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Well, I guess I should chime in on this thread. I recently picked up my 3808 on Black Friday which replaced my Outlaw 990. This is my second Denon receiver I've owned, my 3805 is on the upstairs rig and as with the 3805, been 80% pleased so far. Why 80% you ask, for the life of me I just can't seem to get the Audyssey Auto setup to work correctly. My front speaker are approximately 12.5' from my main setting position and after running the Auto setup they are showing the speakers as being 0.8' from the main seating position. When checking the speaker sizes the unit doesn't even show me as having front speakers, it set the rear speakers as large and the side speakers as small. Things just seem so out of wack but yet it sounds amazing other than the fact that the LFE just seems to low. I've ran the setup at least 3 different times using atleast 6 positions and everytime something is different. When I first purchased the unit the very first thing I did was downloaded the "LATEST" firmware. This was verified after trying to redownload and it clearly stated "LATEST". I never reset the microprocessor so I'm not even sure if this will help. Can anyone verify that if you reset the microprocessor if this would help with the Audyssey? Thanks.

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Anyone, can't beleive it's been over 24 hours and still no reply. I ran the auto setup last night 2 more times and still get roughly the same readings. I'm thinking the Audyssey is adjusting correctly because it just sounds so good once it's completely but I'm curious if anyone else is getting these type of readings. Thanks again.

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Hi Rob,

Something isn't right here...MultEQ shouldn't even be able to finish if it doesn't find front speakers. Can you tell us more about how the speakers are connected, where you have the mic, where your speakers are, etc.

Chris

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Hey Chris,

Let me start from the beginning. The Audyssey Setup did find ALL my speakers and set them all to large. After the calculation is done and you have the option to verify the settings Audyssey has done (size, distance, levels, etc.) it shows all the speakers as large with no crossover set, it's just blank. Seems everyone else is getting pretty good results as far as their distances go except for me. Like I said, all my fronts are roughly 12 feet away and the Audyssey keeps setting them at 0.8' away. I'm not sure if Audyssey is setting these distances this way to compensate for my room or what but if this is the case, I don't have an issue with it I would just like someone to verify it.

The mic is on a tri-pod, first placement is between the two front chairs of the room at ear level, second and third placement the tri-pod is placed in the chairs just above the headrest, forth, fifth and sixth placement are the back three chairs with the mic height just above the headrest. If you click the link below my thread you can see pictures of my entire H/T room but if for some reason you can't see the pictures, my Front, Center and Subs are roughly 12 feet from the front row, the side surrounds are mounted roughly 2' above ear level on the side walls about 8' away from the first mic placement between the front and rear rows and the rears are mounted 2' above ear level on the rear wall which are roughly 9.5' away from the first mic placement. The overall room dimensions are roughly 14' wide, 24' long with 8' ceilings.

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Hi Rob,

Everything looks pretty normal. The fronts are found as "Large" because they probably measure as having a -3 dB rolloff point at 40 Hz or below. You can manually set them to "Small" if you like without affecting the EQ filters. Alternatively, you can set the subwoofer mode to "LFE+Main" so that even "Large" speakers are bass managed.

The front distances are obviously not normal, however. Can you please PM me the actual distance for all the speakers including subs and what MultEQ finds for all of them? The distance calculation is based on low frequencies so I'm wondering if some electrical noise or hum could be influencing them. In the meantime, I would recommend setting the wrong distances to the correct number manually.

Chris

Speaker "Sizes"

Sorry to interrupt this very interesting thread, but I have a slightly unrelated question.

I have an old receiver that obviously does not have Audyssey, but the talk about how to set speaker sizes has confused me. I always thought that it was highly recommended that all speakers be set to "small" regardless of their capabilities (with a few exceptions). Is this no longer the recommendation, or is this an Audyssey-specific issue?

All of five of my main speakers are easily capable of going far below 80Hz, so should I be setting the system up as all speakers large, and with LFE+Main the other critical setting. Right now I have everything set as "small" and the bass only going to the subwoofer.

Thanks for any suggestions, and once again, I am sorry for jumping into the middle of this discussion.

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Hi Chris,

I just ordered a 3808 to replace my Outlaw 950. Obviously I haven't had a chance to play with it yet but I was wondering if the Audyssey setup accounts for the subwoofer phase or if this is still something I will need to adjust manually?

Thanks,

Alex

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Hi Alex,

If your subwoofer has a phase control, I would suggest that you disable it when running the calibration. It will add more problems than it will fix. Any time misalignments between the sub and the satellites will be taken care of when MultEQ measures the distances. For the sub, don't be surprised if the distance you see reported is longer than the actual distance. MultEQ is compensating for the delay introduced by lowpass filters that can't be defeated in the sub.

Regards,
Chris

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

The phase on my sub is variable from 0-180 with no means of turning the control off. Should I then set it on zero?

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Well, in the past week I've been speaking with Chris to try and figure out exactly why I was getting incorrect readings using the Audyssey MultEQ XT auto setup. Well, I'm happy to say we finally got it figured out and the after effects are absolutely amazing. Apparently, the setup mic on the Audyssey is way more sensitive than I had thought. My first three calculated points in my H/T room were directly under my projector for the most part, apparently the cooling fan within the projector was causing a low hum on the auto setup which totally wacked out my readings. Granted, my fan runs at a low 20db when in echo mode but I had no idea that could throw my readings way off. Yesterday I re-ran the Audyssey using only the front display on the 3808 while the projector was in the off position and everything came back dead on within a inch or two. It still set all speakers to large, full range but I guess thats pretty much a given do to the size of the speakers, I quick change within the manual setup and now I good to go. So, for any of you guys out there having trouble getting the Audyssey to work correctly, keep in mind, your listening enviroment has to be dead "SILENT". All I have to do now is keep my fingers crossed that Outlaw can get my amp back to me within the next week or so that way I can give a review of how the 3808 serves as a pre/amp while I'm on vacation the week after Christmas. Thanks a million Chris.

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Alex,

Yes, set the phase to 0.

Regards,
Chris

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Hello together

I'm new to HTF. A little problem drove me to you guys.
Hope it belongs in this thread here?
Since yesterday I'm a owner of the Onkyo TX-RS605 and I really love this thing. I have it hooked up to the Polk RM6880 5.1 Speaker set.
Now i can finaly enjoy the uncompressed PCM track of the Blu-Rays.

The Problem: The Audyssey 2EQ automatic speaker setup will not work at all for me. So far i adjusted everything myself.
If I plug the mic in the setup screen pops up and i start the automatic setup by pushing ENTER. Mic is on Hearing position 1(on a tripod). And here it's starts to get crazy. I can hear the test tone from the Front left speaker and when it tells me it could not recognize the FL speaker. It gives me the option to retry or cancle. If i move the mic closer to the speaker, it comes most at the time up with Noise level too high. The wiring is as intended. Playback of any source sound great after i adjusted everything manually.
I tried it about 20 times already without success, read the owners manuall forward and backward and still searching the web. But all i can find is, that it works great. Oh well not for me.
What could i have done wrong. Hope someone can help me.

/Ronny

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

//double post removed

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Ronny,

It sounds like there is background noise in your room during calibration that is causing this. A video projector, computer fan or drive, fridge, A/C or heating, street rumble, etc. could all be causing this. Is your room quiet when you try to calibrate?

Regards,
Chris

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Hi Chris,
and thanks for the quick response.

Yes it is very quiet. No fans on, turned even the PS3 off. No Computer or external hard drives running. Fridge is not cooling my beer no more and the heating is turned of. Nothing running, just the TV and the Onkyo.
The only thing what is still on is a transformer for the 12V door bell in the closet. Realy hard to hear. Could that thing hit the right frequenz to affect the calibration. (grid would be 60Hz, right??)
I can hear street traffic in front of my house. But a the time of calibration there was no car passing. I even tried it this morning at 4am with no traffic at all. So it is either the Onkyo itself or the door bell transformer?!
I tried also to wire the speaker out of phase and i moved the mic direct in front of speaker 10inch away. Still came up with noise level too high.

Thanks again
/Ronny

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Hi Ronny,

Did you resolve this? It's definitely not the doorbell causing it. I checked with Onkyo and there is no known issue with noise or detection of speakers. So, I am pretty sure it is either internal electrical hum that is throwing off the measurement or perhaps faulty wiring (in the mic cable?).

Regards,
Chris

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Chris- I suppose this is a generic question, but it seems as though a lot of people have problems with ambient noise (refrigerators, etc) causing problems for Audyssey calibration. Just wondering if either there's some way you could take that kind of noise out of the picture, or, do a test for it before calibration begins, and let the user know if it's a problem. ??

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Hello Chris,

I got the test done, bit just once. After I disconnect the transformer for the door bell it worked. And I was amazed what the test tone is really loud. Didn't know that. Before I always hear just a really quiet sound. So thought that's it. After I moved some stuff around... couch closer to my TV set I tried it again and same problem. The test tone was way to quiet.
After I read you post I think I did the right thing and got it replaced. CC is out of stock right now so I think I have to wait a bit.
Thanks a lot and I will keep you updated...

Thanks,
/Ronny

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Chris-
I just wanted to say that I really appricate your participation in this thread. I just had my Denon 3808 upgraded to the Audyssey Pro with Dynamic EQ and I am very pleased with the results

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

Kevin,

MultEQ already does that. It first measures the ambient noise in the room to see if the signal to noise is sufficient for good measurements. If it's not, then it increases the level of the chirps and tries again. It will try that three times (at elevated levels each time) and then give the warning that there is too much ambient noise.

Regards,
Chris

Re: Audyssey MultEQ: Questions and Answers - Onkyo, Denon, et. al.

But people still have problems though and don't what the cause is. Maybe Audyssey looks for overall noise issues and misses if there are problems at specific freqs, that it then tries to fix or something?