"OFFICIAL" Pioneer MCACC thread - Page 91

Speaking of modes. What is best EQ for 7.1/9.1 setup??

I want the brightest/sweetest sound I can?

Thanks

I don't disagree, but could there be something to be said for having the higher input signal level to the amp stage?

nope... you can't create voltage that isn't there...

So I slid my center speaker to where the front baffle is about 1/2" over the top edge of the glass shelf. I reran the default auto MCACC "keeping my speaker settings" and I am still getting +8dB in the 125Hz band. This kind of concerns me since I sit 15 feet away and like to play movies -5 to -12dB MV from reference on my SC-05. I hope I am not putting to much strain on the receiver

Gov: Standing wave possibly? Just for grins try moving the mic 2-3 feet forward, see if the 125Hz hump goes away.

I just brought this up on the REW forum. The graphs below are the frequency response at my sitting position ("center") and ONE FOOT to the left and right.
You may want to run a series of sweeps (http://www.realtraps.com/test-cd.htm) and see if you can hear any dramatic peaks or nulls, and work from there using manual MCACC.
Or sit somewhere else.

Michael

edit: the RealTraps sweeps only go to 300Hz, so they're mostly for subs. Google led me to this, http://binkster.net/extras.shtml#cd, which includes higher test tones.

Thus the need for room treatment...

Pretty sure that is my problem

125 Hz sounds like a room mode to me. If you can't move the listening position you should be able to EQ it down, though that is getting to be a fairly large hump. Room treatment will tame it, but you may need a number of panels at 125 Hz (depends on size, thickness, placement, etc.)

Note 125 Hz has a wavelength of about 9', or a quarter-wave of about 2 1/4 feet. If you could move your listening position a couple of feet forward or back you might significantly reduce the hump. And potentially find a new one...

I'm not familiar with room treatment methods, what could you possibly do for bass frequencies? Obviously the mats they hang on walls in auditoriums would do nothing for bass, given the extremely long wavelength... The only think I can think of would be to put up big heavy panels at various locations in the room, a couple feet out from the walls, but that doesn't seem very desireable from a room aesthetics standpoint...

Well, since I cannot move my LP at all, I lowered the EQ to +5dB and changed the crossover from 80Hz to 100Hz. This seem to help clean up dialogue at near reference level with some male voices. I guess it makes sense.

The amount of bass absorption depends upon the panel material and placement. I use a number of 4" panels plus a few 6" spaced about 2" from the wall and they helped a lot to well below 100 Hz, probably down to 50 Hz or so. The panels don't suddenly stop working, but the roll-off is steeper with thinner panels. You can treat a room to absorb LF content, but it takes a lot of panels (I have a lot - there are definite trades to that approach).

Diffusion is more difficult at LF because the diffracting elements do need to be a significant fraction of the wavelength.

Check out the articles on sites like Ethan's: www.realtraps.com

Good thing he works for the company:
"Indeed, I have 40 RealTraps in my own living room home theater, but I also use the one-band cut-only EQ built into my SVS PB12-Plus/2 subwoofer to tame the worst modal peak around 40 Hz by a few dB."
RealTraps are $550 each!
That's a serious hobby.

You can roll your own or get kits. I have, um (counting), 26 in my room and the cost was about $3k. Building your own would be much cheaper; I figured I could do it for under $1k but liked the kits. About 15 - 20% of the cost of my system is room treatment, which does not seem unreasonable to me.

This is interesting, with the mic on a stand, and me outside the room during the calibration I get pretty consistant results from one cal run to another... but depending on setting the speakers large/small and keeping the speaker setting for the calibration, the standing wave compensation curve changes quite a bit and the 63Hz EQ changes accordingly.
With speakers set to large I get a deep notch in the standing wave and the 63Hz EQ is set to minimum.
With speakers set to small the notch is -5 and the 63Hz is set to -4.
I thought this was due to the sub woofer location verses the main speaker location relative to the mic position.
I do not have any documentation on how the calibration algorithm is coded but if its available I am interested in this kind of stuff.

Nor to me. But 5 x (40 x $550) would be one HECK of a home theater!
Got a link for the kits?
Michael

Hello Guys :

Just purchased vsx-52 and trying to wrap my head around the MCAAP cal. I am getting a headache from all the posts Soooo Mannnnny.

Should I set all speaker settings to small ?
should I set sub to plus ?

I have a 5.1 set up with two remote speakers in seperate room. The front left and right speakers are towers the rest are bookshelf and center and sub etc.

read things like double bass. Is that bad ?

I ran an auto cal then tweeked db level on some of the speakers. Right now I have fronts set to large and all others set to small left sub setting the same , whatever default is.

This receiver is replacing an older Denon 5.1 and it seems like the Denon was much brighter and not as muddy/mudled without any adjustments neccesary.
I like this receiver a lot but seems like factory settings are for elevator music..
Do I have to increase all speaker DB levels or what ?

New owner os VSX-52,

Thanks for inputs,

Also newbie to AVS,

norml4721

^^^
Set all speakers to small and crossover on the sub to 80. Do not set for plus as this sends low end to sub (good) and fronts (bad). Enjoy your new AVR. If you want to match the sound of your old AVR you can, but MCACC usually does better job of setting things up with a good cal.

^^^
I would not recommend setting the crossover on your sub to 80hz if you're setting the speakers to Small on the AVR with a crossover of 80hz. You'll have dual crossovers occurring in this scenario.

Set the crossover on the sub to the maximum setting and let the AVR handle the bass management.

Thanks for the input guys. When you say set the crossover on the sub to highest possible . Do you mean the crossover setting on the sub itself or the xover setting on the speaker nsetup menu ?

Also when you say highest possible do you mean more than 100Hz. This is the highest that I ever have set my sub crossover ?

I have 8 J.M. Labs, speakers in my home theater 5.1 and 2 remotes on sp. B dinning room. Also have an older Pioneer Elite Plasma display, I cant believe the picture quality improvement using the Marvell video processor in the 52 thru HDMI.

Thanks for all your help guys and have a Happy Holiday

norml4721

They mean set the crossover in the AVR at 80 Hz, but the one on your sub (physical knob) should be cranked to the max or bypassed entirely if you sub has a dedicated LFE in that doesn't use the sub's crossover. This way the only crossover is the one the AVR is dictating and your sub is also not applying a second crossover at the same point.

I just purchased an HSU VtF-15H sub as a replacement for the one in my system now. The HSU has five different "hybrid operating modes" which I'm anxious to try out, but wasn't sure how to go about comparing them and properly incorporate the best one into my system since my experience with MCACC thus far has been (embarrassingly) limited to running Full Auto

After much reading I put tother the following process...
(1) Run "Full Auto MCACC"
(2) Enter MCACC Manual Setup
(3) Change LCR Size to SMALL
(4) Enter "Auto MCACC"
(5) Select Custom
(6) Select "Keep SP Settings"
(7) Finish & Exit MCACC
(8) Setup HSU VTF-15H Subwoofer
(9) Run "Auto MCACC" Again

Step (8) is fairly vague since I'm not sure if I should repeat steps (4)-(7) as I test each of the five subwoofer modes. I'm also not sure how to properly adjust the volume knob on a sub when using MCACC. Finally, I got the idea I should set the crossover knob on the sub to it's max setting with front speakers set to Small when using MCACC.

My Current System...
Panasonic TC-P60ST30 Plasma TV
Pioneer SC-27 Receiver
Parasound 5250v.2 (5x250) Amplifier
Paradigm W5/W5C LCR Speakers
Definitive Technology (cheap) Rear Speakers (Next to get replaced)
HSU VTF-15H Subwoofer

Any help would be appreciated including suggestions on what else to read that could help. Thanks.

MCACC won't do anything to/for the sub.
For serious sub info, start here:
http://www.hometheatershack.com/roomeq/
Without test equipment (and an eq for the sub), you may as well try all the settings you have and pick the one that "sounds" best to you. If you want to be a little more scientific, use these test sweeps:
http://www.realtraps.com/test-cd.htm

I think you're pretty close on the MCACC workflow. I use the MCACC workflow from th efirst post of this thread and it works great. It's the same as yours except it it had the EQ reverb testing included that makes a big difference.

Read down about half way through the first post and you'll see the workflow.http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1112470

BTW like others have said MCACC doesn't EQ the su,b only the other speakers down to 62Hz. Many of us use a dedicated sub EQ to handle the bass. I use the SMS-1 http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volum...05-part-1.html

You can find them new on amazon for $350, but there are also cheaper ways EQ your sub like using the Behringer 1124 & REW but it's has a learning curve and setup time.

^^^^ Thanks for the replies. I'll definitely take a look at the links. Looks like I have a lot of reading to do. Ahhh, just when I thought my head was ready to explode there's even more to learn


Just to clarify... since the MCACC sends test tones to the sub, it must be checking the delay and setting the distance but does it do anything else with the sub?

Yes it sets the sub delay, distance and also the level.

^^^^ Perfect... makes a lot of sense. Already reading the other threads and making progress. Even figured out when I set the front left & right speakers to small, my sub will start working in stereo. This is going to be great. Thanks.

And it applies a standing-wave-correction for frequencies above 63 Hz, doesn't it? At least I have an entry for the sub in the standing-wave-section of my SC-LX72 that allows me to manipulate 2 or 3 frequencies with a parametric EQ.

But for any room-mode-related problems below 63 Hz MCACC istn't any help at all.

Cheers,
Markus

Yes 92 & 94 it will both apply standing wave correction, but as you said only down to 63Hz.

MCACC does not adjust frequencies\\ below 63Hz due to the length of the sound waves below that mark. The waves can be 2-4x as long as the room and will cause problems with the delay settings for the other speakers/frequencies. That is what reverb measurements and correction are for in MCACC. Most of what we hear, or Presence frequencies are in the 3.5-5kHz range. Few musical instruments produce frequencies below 40Hz. The pipe organ is one exception. So, sub equalization is not a key factor in getting your HT to sound good. That is also why musical sub, or sealed subs do not have has low of extension as ported subs. Low extension sub frequency does not necessarily mean louder. The low extension does give us the bone shaking experience when watching movies. Large vs Small settings for speaker is based on the speaker's frequency response and not how large or small the speaker is. Also having some speakers set to large with a sub can have a double effect where frequencies overlap or phase issues between the speakers. I paid good money for my tower speakers, and yes they are set to small, for HT. My x-over is set at 100 due to the frequency range of the surround speakers. The sub cannot be localized in my setup. Using the mic in three positions may gives the best room correction measurements to the avr. The long sound waves measured in MCACC for a sub reflects why the sub distances are commonly not the true physical distance, so nothing to loose sleep over.