"Official" Yamaha RX-A1000/RX-A2000/RX-A3000 thread - Page 211

My A9s and two Adcom GFA-555mkIIs would disagree with you. My A3000 is rated (but likely goes a bit higher than) 140w/ch. I'm only considering the mains in stereo for this argument right now. Each of my Adcom amps powers a single A9 speaker in bi-amp mode. I'm not talking bridged, I'm talking bi-amped. So I've gone from 140w/ch (each speaker in total) to 200w/array for each speaker.

Whereas I could barely get my A9s to preferred movie listening levels before they started sounding like the A3000 was having trouble keeping up, I can push the A3000's volume all the way up to +10.0 with no audible issues. And my center/rear channels have more power to use on top of that. And considering I'm using an A6 for my center, it needs the extra juice.

Yes, I'm losing some power to the speaker's passive crossovers (each array has its own) in the form of heat dissipation, but the power I gained from the bi-amp far, far exceeds what I lose and I get to go louder without distortion as a bonus.

The real "difference" in sound (levels aside) that the bi-amp made weren't from the power, but the method of bi-amping. Since each amp controls only a single speaker (verticel bi-amping) instead of each one controlling one array for both speakers (horizontal bi-amping), I've eliminated the crosstalk between the two amps. That is where the improved clarity comes in (which does fit in with your side of the argument that bi-amping alone doesn't improve the audio quality).

Bi-amping will give more power (if you use external amps), but unless you alter the connection method to use a specific setup like I did, the audio won't change, only the levels at which you can produce the audio will change.

Crosstalk elimination was verified using an SNES audio emulator via WinAmp and SNESAmp set to full channel separation (no crosstalk as opposed to what the SNES' real hardware does, which is 20% cross-fade between channels). With the speakers on the A3000 solely, I could hear right channel info on the left channel faintly. With the A9s on the Adcoms, no channel info is mixed.

My speakers are as follows:

Polk RTi-A9 x2 (Front)
Polk RTi-A6 x1 (Center)
Polk TSi-300 x2 (Surround)
Polk DSW MicroPro 4000 (Sub)

The TSi speakers are close enough to the RTis to use virtually seamlessly without the ungodly price of the RTi-A3s.

Oh, and to give you an idea what the power reserves of the two 555s really is: I can have the volume at 0db on the A3000, turn off both Adcoms and the speakers will play at full levels for about 10 seconds. I'd like to see the A3000 do that.

So if I use the 7 amps for the 5.1 and the kitchen, then what kind of amp would I need or would you reccomend to power :
2 Dining Room Ceilings
4 OutDoor Speakers

BTW- I also have a really old Sony STR-SE501. Not sure if this could help things out.

Ok, so now I'm onto upgrading my subwoofer now. I've posted outside of this thread but it's not getting many (only 2) responses, so I'm hoping you guys can help.

Right now I have 2 subs (back and front) but setup as left/right in the A3000. These subs are about 10 years or more old and don't have a ton of power. They are a Boston PV600 and a Klipsch KSW-12.

I'd like to replace both of these with a much better sub and I want to feel the bass.

I'm a little concerned though with replacing with a better sub because of the following:
When I run YPAO, it always sets my subwoofer levels to like -7 or something like that. If I get a more powerful sub, I'm afraid it will set the level to like -50 (kidding) and then it won't be much better than what I already have. I know I can manually set the level higher, but I thought by doing that it wouldn't produce matching sound. Can someone set me straight on this? I'm assuming that my thoughts are wrong, otherwise why would anyone be buying very powerful subs?

My front speakers are B&W CM9's with CMC2 center and Bose 301's (don't laugh!) surrounds.

Also, I've seen many people say brands like SVS, HSU, and Outlaw are good brands to buy.

I've looked at some websites that have a lot of sales going on right now, specifically on a Boston that was originally about $1,700 and is $400 now. I could pay more (really as much as I want to, as long as I buy my wife something really nice to match!), but at what point am I getting a better deal not going with SVS, HSU or Outlaw?

One final question about HSU subs. On the HSU website, it shows they're discounting a specific model about $400 because it's new. Is that really a discount, or is it just a gimmick to make us think we're getting a deal? I'd provide the model number, but I'm not sure of AVS's price talk policies.

Thanks for your help.

To Pappaduke:

Delete the ap and re load it. That worked for me. Also make sure your phone is wi fi connected to the same network as the receivers LAN connection. Good luck! It is great once you get it going.

To lfox and Venomous, thanks for the tips. I'm not really sure what worked because I tried several things including call Yamaha support(if you want to call it that), but I think turning off the Mac address feature may be what finally did the trick. Now that it's working it is so nice. Next up, YPAO as soon as I get some alone time in the house.

I just bought a used set of Dahlquist DQ30i's which by all acounts I've read are very power hungry and also Bi-ampable.
Wouldnt Bi-Amping these use two of the 105 watt amps in my A1000 instead of one for a total of 210 ? I know adding channels reduces the total receiver watts but wouldnt I be stealing some from the center and the backs to add to the front (and surrounds for the bi-amp) to power these speakers ? My center and rears dont need the power.

Or am I going to have to add a seperate two channel (Emotiva?) Amp.

pappaduke as in J Popadiuk ?

this is simply because you have the gain control on the sub(s) set too high. Turn it down and re-run YPAO again till you get a channel level close to "0". This also effects all the other channel levels so it's a pretty important adjustment. You may find that one sub or the other is the culprit. It makes no difference how "powerful" the sub is, it's about levels.

I don't remember exactly, but I thought the OM said to set the gain control on the subs to between 4 and 5, and then run YPAO, which is what I did on both subs.

Hypothetically speaking, if my low powered subs require me to set the gain control to, let's say, a 2 in order to get a level of 0, wouldn't a more powerful sub then require me to set the gain control to less than 2 in order to get a level of 0? If so, it seems that I would have a more powerful sub that I wouldn't be using it's power, because I'm just lowering the gain control to get the same result (level = 0).

What am I missing?

You're confusing power with levels. 2 very different things. Replacing the subs will require re-running YPAO and more adjustments, but that's all.

When the sub is too hot and you run YPAO, all the other channels get boosted as well as the sub getting cut. Adjust and re-run YPAO. Instructions to set the sub at 50% are just a guideline. Anytime the level gets adjusted more than 2db by YPAO, you need to re-adjust. Once that is done you can increase it for personal preference. Most people will want to increase it just a tad.

You arn't missing anything. YPAO does a poor job setting levels and eq'ing subwoofers. Not only does it tend to set the subs low, it also murders any low frequencies (under 40hz). YPAO has a way to go for home theater sub calibration compared to MultEq XT. Fortunately Yamaha's have custom EQ functionality so you can eq them correctly using a tool such as REW or similar.

Almost none of this is accurate.

+1

I have a HSU Research VTF15H... Cant go wrong with either the VTF15H or the sealed 15H model. My wife actually wants another subwoofer... she likes how realistic the explosions are. If i would of know that, i would of gotten 4.. lol

So which part IS accurate?

I actually visited their store in person. VERY VERY nice people for starters and when you see the quality of their products, you will see first hand, they are not cutting any corners.

I drove their to pickup my VTF15H and was blown away at what a monster it was compared to their other models. Also, if you consider their rosenut finish, you will be impressed with it. Its one thing seeing something on the internet with pictures.. its another seeing it, in person.

Which sub were you considering?

The part about the manual EQ that you can use with a measurement tool and/or software.

Well, I do own an RX-A3000 and two subwoofers very capable of hitting 15hz flat at listenable levels (a ULS-15 DualDrive). I'm just speaking from experience here after about 20 runs of the YPAO program. I've tried different YPAO subwoofer configurations (Front/Back, Left/Right, and Mono) and different connections (individually off of sub 1 & 2, and just off of Sub 1 using a Y-Splitter). In every case the sub settings were set too low and verified by using a RS meter.

It also murders the lowest frequencies. Both my ears, SPL meter and REW verify that it starts to roll off a little before 40hz. The parametric EQ found in the receiver only goes down to 31.5hz, and based on the evidence i've gathered there's no proof YPAO is doing anything down low, except rolling it off. After spending an entire afternoon with REW and Yamaha's PEQ, I'm was able to get back to 15hz flat.

... but hey, don't just take my word for YPAO not doing the greatest job setting levels on subs...

Try this guy
... or this guy
... or this guy
... or this guy
... or this guy
... or this guy
... or this guy
... or this guy
... and that's not even counting the peeps using the same version of YPAO on the yamaha rx-z11 thread.

All of these people had issues with the substandard job YPAO did on subwoofers. You'll also notice rdgrimes came to the defense of YPAO's sub calibration almost every time in the last 3000 posts by telling people to turn up the gain on the subs and re-running YPAO...how about not having YPAO set the lfe channel to -9 instead? It doesn't make sense. It's not like it's hit -10 or +10 and ran out of channel gain room.

I just came from a Onkyo TX-SR876 and in the LFE channel YPAO needs help and does a worse job than MultEQ XT (never mind XT32).

I'm not hating on the RX-A3000... I actually like the receiver quite a bit and don't plan on changing out anytime soon, but it's ok to point out it's shortcomings.

I was looking at the VTF-15H also. Would you recommend buying it for the price they're advertising right now?

I didn't bother with YPAO on my setup - I live in an apartment and the sound of the trucks and cars outside confused the heck out of YPAO.

Now that you've had the 15H, would you choose the sealed or ported model?

Umm. If the YPAO LFE EQ was up to snuff, why do you use an Antimode in your setup?

EDIT: I don't think he even owns a RX-A2000/3000. He's got nothing to back up that statement.

Wow, what an incredible amount of great information about subwoofers.

So I don't continue to hijack this thread (so the mods don't disable my ID ), could each of you subscribe to and post on the following link:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1372938

I've copied your comments from this thread to the new thread to keep the conversation going.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Sorry, I can't really recommend anything specific. There's all sort of things specifically designed for this kinda of application, but I have no personal experience with any of them.

You can use the STR-SE501, but you'll be using it the control the volume for that zone, so you'll want to put it in convient location. It probably wouldn't work well (in combination with a speaker selector) for both the dining room and the outdoor speakers. It might work better in the kitchen, and have the other two sets of speakers driven off of the RX-A2000 (again with a speaker selector) where you can use the iPhone or Andriod app to control the volume.

No, that must be someone else

Only got the 15h because of wireless and its in the back portion of my room.. The VTF can be sealed.. You have the option of opening both ports, only one, or sealing. VTF gets down and dirty and will surpass your expectations.

I think its a great sub, you should consider it.

You're right. I don't own one. But I can certainly back up my post with empirical evidence (just look at a copy of the manual). I was merely responding to his question by identifying the part of your original post that is empirically true. The rest is opinion--one I may or may not share someday in the future, but either way, not something I can attest to at this moment.

Not by any means trying to start an argument here but from reading all those "guys" problems it sounds to me that none of them have an idea how to set up a sub. Comparing a 1900's YPAO to the 3000's version is like comparing the version of Audyssey in a Onkyo 609 to the version that's in a Onkyo 3009. Just doesn't work. I've used the 876 since it came out and now back to Yamaha A3000. IMO the YPAO does a better job of EQ'ing my sub than the 876 did. It's far more balanced and not nearly as bloated sounding. It sounds like these guys need to check out their placement, check the gain on those subs, and rerun YPAO. Some of them were also using a version of YPAO that doesn't even Eq subs. Of course as with Audyssey there is also the option of busting out the Radio Shack meter and adjusting everything manually. Sometimes due to the room these things are in that's the best way to try. JMHO.

There's nothing in the manual that states that the sub is properly EQ'd by YPAO under 40hz. Zippo. I would love to be proven wrong but finding official documentation on any kind of YPAO subwoofer calibrating was like trying to find Bin Ladin.

All of my findings are based on empirical evidence. Empirical evidence is based on observation and experience. I also have tools such as REW to help gather data for my findings, not just one sentence answers like rdgrimes. You are working off of... what was it again? I didn't set out to be rude, but the one sentence dismissals simply don't fly.

My emperical evidence has the subs being set entirely too low. This is after gain matching my subs at roughly 11 o'clock which matches the manual subwoofer example. The jimmy-fix of raising the subwoofer gain is no different than boosting the gain in the receiver from -9 to 0. Why would YPAO set a subwoofer that's too low on the subwoofer's gain knob lower? Makes 0 sense. It should try to compensate by moving the gain UP in the receiver. MultEQ XT wouldn't do this - it would attempt to raise the gain until it ran out of channel gain room.

I like the RX-A3000. No receiver is perfect... I really like what YPAO did with the regular speakers, not reducing the high range like MultEQ XT does when using the flat setting. I'm just pointing out its deficencies. I think that's ok.

Hey, there's a good debate, and there's answering in one short sentence "Almost none of this is accurate" which is almost certain to rub someone the wrong way.

All those posts came off of this thread, not the yammie 1700 thread. All the Yamaha 1000/2000/3000's set subwoofer gain *I believe* (does the 1000? not sure). Even with poor placement and having the gain at 10 o'clock vs. 12 o'clock Audyssey wouldn't make things worse by setting the LFE channel gain to -7. The whole point of AutoEQ is to take the EQing out of amatuer hands and attempt to give them a good experience. YPAO has blown that in the subwoofer channel *IMO*. Like you said, they do supply PEQ so we all can (with the proper tools) do a better job configuring to our tastes than Audyssey does unless you have a pro kit.

What also bothers me is the complete dropoff in the subsonic range after YPAO gets ahold of it. I had a 15 db dropoff from 40 hz to 15 hz according to REW (I wish I kept the readings). After fiddling with the PEQ and REW readings for 5 hours I was able to achieve the readings below.

I know you subjectively feel that the RX-A3000 "...(is) far more balanced and not nearly as bloated sounding (than MultEQ XT for LFE)" and I subjectively agree about the bloated sound, but do you have access to REW and does your sub reach the subsonic level to verify that YPAO isn't rolling off those frequencies? I would enjoy some verification or debunking from someone.