The Official VSX-1018AH-K Owners, Reviews, and Comments Thread! - Page 45

Anyone???

great .... I posted pages ago asking if this receiver can control individual input volume levels and someone said yes. That was one of the criteria of buying this AVR for me.

May be you should use individual speaker levels to your requirement and then store these settings in the 6 memory slots and keeps switching based on input. Just a workaround, but may work if you are not looking for too drastic differences in volume levels.

aaranddeeman did a better job of wording what I was trying to say. We're probably talking semantics here. The output volume to the speakers when playing the DVD player can be adjusted, and can be stored in one of the 5 or 6 MCACC memory slots. Pages 41-50 of the manual covers most of it. In a roundabout way that's the same as adjusting the input volume from the DVD player (the end result is the same). I think the person who responded earlier said that individual volume (and other parameters) can be set for each listening environment like movies, CD, TV, and IPod. That is correct, and that is what the MCACC memory settings are for.

YEAH, separate speaker levels per input was a HUGE factor on buying this receiver. The person who replied that it does should have specified. My old Pio did this, whatever setting you adjusted for speakers were stored by BY INPUT. It was very easy. Now I just have separate MCACC memory settings for music, movies, and games. I just have to push an extra button, not that big of a deal but sometimes I forget and wonder why things sound different.

sorry if these were addressed before

1. I listen to movies at around 20. Anyone listening at the same volume? Oppo dvd player with the auto MCACC setup. Quintet speakers.

2. When I switch to a source (dvd, xbox) the receiver briefly shows "DIAL NORM +4". I have perused the manual have have not found anything. ANYONE?

3. This receiver can decode WMA9 PRO. The xbox has a sound option of Dolby Digital with WMA PRO. I used this setting but the receiver did not show any other flags except Dolby Digital. Is WMA9 and WMA the same thing? What kind of material has WMA9 PRO encoded? Any use this feature in the xbox?

Thanks guys. BTW, love the receiver. Love the usb input, don't reget buying the 1909.

I THINK this refers to the dialog enhancement setting.

I just found the Dial Norm thing. Searching the online manual does have its benefits. I noticed the "Search this thread" button at the top too! Pretty nifty feature. I wonder if my old Yammie did dialnorm. Thanks tho.

Does each input remember the MCACC setting for it, or is the MCACC global and I have to manually select 1, 2, etc each time I select the DVD input and then select the previous MCACC setting when selecting any input other than DVD?

I havn't touched the MCACC manual settings yet, but does it also control the output of the subwoofer? I'm currently only using MCACC 1 which I did not adjust, but my subwoofer output is +10 on the advanced speaker setup page. I wonder if this will carry over the +10 so if I have all my speakers at +5 on MCACC setting 2 for instance, the sub will actually be +15.

Finally, How do I connect the FM radio antenna to this unit??. My previous shelf system had the clip open/close clip style so the bare wire just goes in and I clip the spring shut on the bare wire. This AVR makes no sense when it comes to that. The manual doesn't help either. I put the bare wire into the hole on the FM input next to the AM input but get NO reception.

One more thing ... I have the Yamaha NS-555 tower speakers and the Yamaha YST-SW215 8" sub (2.1 setup). The short manuals can be found here:

http://www.yamahamusic.com.au/produc...S777+NS555.pdf

http://www.4electronicwarehouse.com/...a/ystsw315.pdf

The sub manual has a frequency response graph. Using that and the specs of the NS-555, what would be the best crossover to the sub from the NS-555s for this Pioneer AVR? 100hz? 150? I don't understand all the technicality of this stuff like some of you experts do.


I'm using a monoprice 75ohm cable to connect to the subwoofer from the AVR. This is sufficient right?

One end of the FM wire should be a small metal piece; this slides tightly over the metal prong in the center of the FM antenna input on the back of the receiver. You said you put the "bare wire" into the hole, so I'm guessing the metal is on the other end. I get great reception despite being among highrises.

No, each input does not remember the settings for that input. That's sort of the good and the bad of it. The MCACC settings are global and designed for use not only with a single input but for different seating positions and environments when listening to any input (which makes them global). The thinking is that sometimes maybe viewing TV alone you might want a certain sound balance, but maybe with a large crowd (say a Super Bowl party) you might want an entirely different sound field. If you tie the settings to a single input, you can't so that. On the other hand, in your case where you are trying to level volume across all inputs, it becomes more of a pain than an advantage. Of course the answer is to provide both but in a $500 receiver that's asking a lot. Since all my components have roughly the same voltage output, I prefer the MCACC approach.

The subwooofer output should remain as set in each MCACC setting. You basically can copy them over (MCACC-1 to MCACC-2) and change what you want. They are separate and should not interact.

The FM antenna thing is kind of confusing and Pioneer could have done a better job explaining it (page 23). It appears that both FM wires and both AM wires go into the same slots UNLESS you want to use a dedicated FM antenna (not just the FM wire). The better reception approach would be to use the unbalanced FM connector but it appears you would need to buy a connector / converter. You can buy them at Radio Shack or Home Depot for around $4. Some after market antennas come with them. I think it's a bad choice but more popular in Europe (Yamaha used to use them and may still).

A lot of it is personal preference. Some people like a lot more bass than others and more bass benefits some music and movies more than others. Then again, there's the room acoustics. Doesn't help much does it?

Looking at the specs, you speakers are rated down to 35 but that is always optimistic. Without distortion, I would put it closer to 60-80. Even the sub graph examples indicate 60 - 90 would be good. So, I would start with 80 which is the THX standard for movies. Depending upon your preferences in music and movies and your mix of the two, you may prefer 60 or 100. It will be one of those 3 in my opinion.

I don't know the exact monoprice cable you are referring to but they make good stuff and if the run isn't too long it should be just fine.

Thanks mguy5, very good information and obviously I was wrong (mine doesn't get delivered until today). Thanks.

Nedd help, for some reason I could not find my bass and treble adjustment over audio parameter. I scroll up and down and could not find it. I wonder if turn off something that disabled the bass and treble adjusment. Could someone help me please.

I noticed that if the AVR readout says DDigital instead of "Stereo" the adjustment for trebble and bass are missing. Just the nature of DDigital?

The remote control codes in the 1018 owners manual don't seem to work for my Samsung LN46A550 LCD TV. I e-mailed Pioneer about the problem and they said that if the codes in the manual don't work, then my Samsung TV must be incompatible. Incompatible?!! There are millions of Samsung LN46A550's, 650's and 750's out there. How in the hell could they make a remote that's incompatible with the biggest selling LCD's of 2008?

I hope to hell that I'm doing something wrong or else this 1018 is going bye-bye.

Hey guys, I’m thinking of picking up this receiver soon and was wondering if anyone has any good suggestions of were to get it in the buffalo area for a good price. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

The only authorized retail store on the Pioneer website for Buffalo is Best Buy which has not been offering it on sale (except for the 10% oe 12% coupons they send out). There is quite a selection of authorized online places. Here's a link to the list of online dealers.

http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/PU...n+the+Internet

Since my DVD is hooked up via HDMI, I don't think it matters what sampling rate I set it to.

Still not sure what receiver settings(auto/direct, standard or auto surround) are best for my DVD or my ipod.

I have the same problem with my Sammy LF56A650 DLP. The codes didn't work.

I figured out the remote control code for my Samsung LN46A550 by myself, no thanks to Pioneer. The code is 626 and it probably works with most newer Sammys.

So far, Pioneer tech support has sucked, big time. They give me smug one-sentence blowoff answers to basic questions about the 1018. I think the people on AVS Forum know more about the 1018 than the morons at Pioneer.

Don't get me wrong, I love my 1018 and I think it's an Elite in street clothes, but I think we're just going to have to figure out problems on our own.

I suspect you will use more than one depending upon whether you switch between games, music (tuner, CD, etc.), IPod, movies, or TV - and whether you like the defaults provided by Auto Playback. For me, Auto is a good starting point for basic TV and DVD (movies) as both the defaults for non-Dolby Digital and 2-channel DD are what I would pick anyway. For music however, it would default to Stereo and I sometimes prefer a 5.1 mix so Standard would be a logical choice. If you are a gamer, I would think Standard IIX Game might be good (haven't tried it but don't do games). Stereo or Direct are the ones I use for more serious music listening.

Because I usually watch TV or DVD's, I prefer Auto Surround for most situations and switch to Standard and the others as needed. If I were mostly a music listener, it might be different. I used the charts around Page 93 to view the defaults and Auto fits most of the time, but not always.

I'm curious and since others may have similar issues - how did you figure out the right code? Did you just start going through the 600 series Samsung codes?

I do think you're right about using this forum and not depending on Pioneer support. It's not like their CS reps sit around and play with this stuff so they're at the mercy of a "database" of technical instructions that is probably not much more than a scan-able manual plus maybe a few tech support alerts. As for control codes, I do kind of see where companies like Pioneer are at the mercy of companies that may change their codes to enable new features. With 100's of brand/models and more features being added all the time, it's probably a real chore to keep up with it all. Hard to say where the fault lies on your Samsung issue but it appears the codes are there but got left out of the manual.

I believe DIALNORM refers to part of the metadata that comes across from the source. I don't think it's a setting that can be changed.

I agree 100%. I never, ever buy a device with the expectations that the remote control it uses will work on any of my other equipment. This is why you buy a good universal remote. These remotes that come with avrs rarely have more than the most basic functions for controlling other devices, and their learning capabilities are almost always quite limited; this universality is an afterthought.

And Pioneer's customer support, at least via e-mail, has been superb with me. I had some technical questions regarding crossover points in the MCACC routine, and they answered promptly and with lots of information. I'm sure, as Marty913 said, that the information/in depth knowledge these tech support grunts have is not very broad, and they are probably faced with the answers that their computer spits out at them after entering your query. Again, I've had no trouble whatsoever via e-mail, and will go as far as to say Pioneer has had some of the best customer support I have encountered. You also read relatively few complaints on this forum, while bad Onkyo customer support, for example, gets its own threads. Glad to hear you guys got your remotes sorted out though.

It is metadata contained in the source but I think you can have some control over it (or not, I suppose). There is one setting in the audio menu that may have some tie in (the DIALOG E setting which is supposed to be off by default). The only other setting having anything related to volume enhancement or prominence are DNR (off) and DNC (auto) but they technically should not have anything with Dialog Normalization since they should only address range compression and noise. I think it's a worthwhile question because there certainly are situations where you might not want Dialnorm active.

Yeah, the DNR is for noise reduction with analog equipment, Dialog enhancer just isolates the dialog in the center channel (which to me sounds god-awful), but Dial Norm is part of the metadata thats part of the DD signal. It cannot be changed, from my understanding. If you search this forum for Dial Norm, it will lead you to a link from "Secrets of Home Theater" article which fully explains dialnorm. I should have looked before posting the question.

Ask David @ ext 8474
The price will be a lil over $100 bucks
more than the RX-V663

I figured out the code by mindlessly entering 3-digit numbers between 600-699.

In my view, Pioneer support should have assigned some lowly janitor, etc. to find out the lousy code...not tell me it was hopeless and that my TV was "incompatible". That's why I was pissed off about the whole thing in the first place.

Yes, even after finding the code you soon realized that all the Pioneer remote can do is turn the TV off & on. A universal remote is the answer, I suppose.