"OFFICIAL" Pioneer MCACC thread - Page 8

Originally Posted by IVAN222

Thank you gamelover and others for your interestings informations about MCACC. Especially I am interested by the "time "of begennig mesure of micro (30-50 ms or other. Is it possible the "time" is different according the distance beetwen loudspeakers and microphone combinate with the accoustic of the room ?
To give a personal information : I tried use Velodyne's microphone with a mix table on MCACC . At the good level it works OK for distances but was strange on reverberation and phase control.
I think MCACC great, bonjour de France.

Ivan222

Originally Posted by nezff

I had a onkyo with audyssey before this pioneer elite. Audyssey does not to the job you think with the sub. sometimes it boost frequencies it shouldnt and lower others. good luck.

Originally Posted by Gov

Please don't discount Pioneer because of this. It does do standing wave calibration which I think helps the lower frequencies a bit.

Originally Posted by graphicguy

Sub calibration isn't something that's really effective in ANY AVR that I'm aware of (regardless of whether they use Audyssey or MCACC....and, I've used both, in different AVRs).

The only "good" way to do this is with some outboard subw EQ.

Originally Posted by S_rangeBrew

Yep, I've found not everybody is happy with Auto-EQ of *any* type.



Thanks, Gov, I love my Pioneer, but I've drank the Kool-Aid with Audyssey. If the actual engineers who designed MCACC were in this thread, like they are in the Audyssey thread, it might be different. Standing wave calibration doesn't come close to what Audyssey does in the low subwoofer area.



Funny you should mention that.
SVS is about to come out with the be-all and end-all of outboard subwoofer EQ, lots of people in the subwoofer threads are salivating over it. Guess what programming its using? Yeah... Audyssey.

I've done the SPL meter and test tones thing, and I'm done with it. I want something that can calibrate *all* my speakers, including the sub.

Originally Posted by NeoE46

I just purchased VSX-1018 this weekend. Had the Denon 1609. Audyssey seemed to work pretty good, but the MCACC seems to sound better. I also added a new external amp though, so some of this may be attributable to the extra power available.

My question about MCACC is can you change the X-over frequency for each group of speakers (Front, Center, Rear, Back, etc.)? 80, the recommended THX frequency is too high for my mains and too low for the center and surround channels. With Audyssey, the recommended LFE X-Over is 120hz, however this is overriden by the individual group settings. Anybody have any ideas if this can be done in MCACC?

Originally Posted by NeoE46

Bump. Can the crossover frequency be changed for each group of speakers?

Originally Posted by Gov

What are you guys using to place the mic on when taking the calibrations? I don't have a tripod handy so I just lay the mic on top of a stiff pillow that I place on top of a TV tray. This gets me to about ear height when in seated position.
Do you guys think that this is exceptable or is the pillow to absorbant of the test tones maybe goofing the test up?

Originally Posted by spongebob

I'd really try to find a cheap tripod at a garage sale or....

Originally Posted by Gov

What are you guys using to place the mic on when taking the calibrations? I don't have a tripod handy so I just lay the mic on top of a stiff pillow that I place on top of a TV tray. This gets me to about ear height when in seated position.
Do you guys think that this is exceptable or is the pillow to absorbant of the test tones maybe goofing the test up?

Originally Posted by jqmn

Would changing the response time have a significant affect, and I mean significant, on bass response? I re-q'd and for the first time ever ran with a different time at something like 40 - 50ms (or whatever that interval actually is). Watched Babylon A.D. and had doors and windows shaking like crazy and actually had to back off the master volume by quite a bit. Makes me want to rerun at lower numbers and see what happens.

Originally Posted by jqmn

Would changing the response time have a significant affect, and I mean significant, on bass response? I re-q'd and for the first time ever ran with a different time at something like 40 - 50ms (or whatever that interval actually is). Watched Babylon A.D. and had doors and windows shaking like crazy and actually had to back off the master volume by quite a bit. Makes me want to rerun at lower numbers and see what happens.

Originally Posted by spongebob

I noticed the same thing at 30-50. I'm ready for 20-40


bob

Originally Posted by NicksHitachi

Hmmmm, I found the opposite. When I moved the delay shorter I found that I lost bass response and the sound became empty and thin.


Maybe time to re-run those shorter delays and see if, maybe, I was wrong. I'll bet every room is different too, so what works one way for you guys, might not work the same for me. My room has nightmare dimensions though, a cube with ceilings within 1ft of a multiple of the width. Can't wait until my new house is finished. A new media room with proper dimenstions will probably be the best upgrade I have ever experienced.

Originally Posted by gamelover360

That is weird. Make sure the speaker is not loose in some manner. Then verify that their is no physical damage to the speaker that is causing a weird sonic output that is throwing MCAAC off. How to do that I am not sure. Maybe listen to test tones manually and listen for inconsistencies. Then you could of course manually set the speaker distance using your own ears and manual MCAAC.

But my worry would be that MCAAC will screw up the EQ and standing wave because of a bad speaker reading from that one speaker. Also check your connections.

Also is this in auto MCAAC, not some other mode where you have told it to only run certain calibration parts. Maybe it is sticking with the bad reading over and over because you are telling it in some inadvertent way.

Originally Posted by ZBoomer

All good ideas; I may swap my surround speakers, see if that makes a difference. Also maybe take the speaker off the wall, set it like 5' direct in view of the mic, see if it changes anything.

When the speaker distance routine is running, the left surround speaker sounds like it's making the same click as the other ones, but it just sets the distance to one inch. Wierd.

I wonder if there could maybe be a wierd echo or something on a wall confusing it, who knows?

Originally Posted by Stew4msu

No problem with my 03 and my Emotiva XPA-3 or UPA-7, nezff. No hum, no hiss.

Originally Posted by mrgribbles

The last couple of times when I ran MCACC I plug in the mic and when it starts to run I'm getting a loud speaker hum out of all the speakers. It does an ambient noise check and its OK. I don't recollect that this happened on the initial quick MCACC first run. I do not have any detected speaker hum in normal AVR operation. Sounds like a feedback thing (just like a ground fault type hum). The mic wire isn't crossing any DC or AC lines. Is this hum normal? Does anyone or everyone hear this?

Originally Posted by jqmn

I had this happen the very last time I ran MCACC. I had never had it happen before and it is not present during normal listening or while a test is actually running. Didn't appear to have any affect on the results. I plan to do some more today so I will see if it is still present.

Originally Posted by mrgribbles

The last couple of times when I ran MCACC I plug in the mic and when it starts to run I'm getting a loud speaker hum out of all the speakers. It does an ambient noise check and its OK. I don't recollect that this happened on the initial quick MCACC first run. I do not have any detected speaker hum in normal AVR operation. Sounds like a feedback thing (just like a ground fault type hum). The mic wire isn't crossing any DC or AC lines. Is this hum normal? Does anyone or everyone hear this?

Originally Posted by ZBoomer

Regarding MCACC; the last three times I've ran it, it sets the speaker distance for my left surround speaker as one inch; anyone seen this happen?