Why do I hate Audyssey so much? (AVR-4311, MultEQ XT32) - Page 3

I stand corrected. I'll go to bed smarter(highly debatable)tonight

Audyssey does, in fact, suggest different methods of incorporating its room correction system to the equipment manufacturers but the ultimate decision rests with the manufacturer.

How the manufacturer chooses to implement Audyssey is up to the manufacturer, so I'd suggest if you have a complaint about this specific subject you should probably register it with them.

Cheers,
SB

Dude this is America, start as many threads as you want. I hate that about AVS. Some things are found easily....other things not. No one want to wade through 50 pages of information.

Wow, a response a year after the initial post . Not that there is anything wrong with that .

Bill

I was shocked how good my speakers sounded when I ran Audyssey for the first time. But, I admit it hurt my heart to turn my sub down so far. I think most people turn their subs up too high and they think something is wrong when every little sound doesn't shake their house. My frustration with Audyssey is running two subs that aren't identical. This is where the Audyssey thread has helped a ton. Tweaking your system is part of the fun of having a home theater system. Happy tweaking:D

Two "problems" usually show up after Audyssey EQ:
1) not enough bass, because room modes (boom) have been removed to a larger extent from the frequency response, thus "only" the original (natural) bass content is audible
2) expectation of "huge" bass output, instead of reference EQ to almost flat, although probably not even present in the source material
Someone used to all that bloated bass will naturally shrug off after listening to a cleaned up environment.
It takes some listening to get used to that new acoustics.

Whoa **** you are right. I found this thread through google search vs. actually coming to AVS and clicking through the most /recent active threads. I also saw 2/7 and was thinking 2013 and not 2012(it clearly says 12 though), My bad.
Either that or I am so impassioned with his right to start as many threads as he wants, that I thought I would comment in a 1 yr old thread. You know, because the guys that get upset about that are the same that get upset when you start new threads when there may be at least 1 other thread out there that covers the same topic. Yeah, we will go with that.

LMAO...

I have been using Audessey (in a Denon 4306) for the past 7 years, and it has its pros and cons. I have set up Audessey many times and have found out a few things along the way, which I will share. First, use as many positions as your receiver/processor allows. This really does improve things in the sweet spot, as well as making things sound better in the other seats. Use a mic stand or tripod. If your seat is higher than your ears, make sure the mic is higher than the back of the seat. (I actually weighed down the top of my seat with cloth-covered bricks so that I could have the mic exactly where my head is without changing the mic height.) Turn off the heater, phone, and anything else that will alter results. Do the calibration when no one else is home, if possible. After Audessey runs, adjust the crossover to where it should be, or to 80 Hz if you're not sure, and set your front speakers to "small." I know there are exceptions to this, but as a general rule, it is true. (A further suggestion: find good listening/speaker positions and then bass-trap your room, if possible. Then run Audessey again.)

Here is where I have a problem with Audessey and what I do to solve that problem. This program works wonders in tightening up the bass. It tames the room modes and allows the deep bass to come through cleanly without boom or muddiness. The bass sounds like real life! But Audessey devotes most of its computing power to the bass and, in my opinion, everything else suffers, whether in the Flat or Audessey selections. My solution is to use the manual EQ. I copy the base curve and then set everything above 500 Hz to 0 (i.e., no boost or cut). This will only work, by the way, if your subwoofer level closely matches your main speaker levels before you begin the calibration, so I run Audessey first so I can match the levels and then rerun it.

This is, I know, heresy. I know I lose the benefits of time alignment etc., but the tradeoff, for me, is worth it. I get clean bass and still get to keep the excellent sound of my Sunfire speakers. This approach is supported by many researchers who theorize that, above bass frequencies, equalization can do more harm than good. Equalization in the mids and highs will have radically different results in positions just a foot away from each other anyway, so what's the point? For those of you, like the starter of this thread, who hate Audessey, think about giving my approach a try. If your speakers are decent, it might be the solution to this problem. A better solution would be for Audessey to allow users (as Anthem does in its ARC) to set a maximum frequency for equalization. Someday, hopefully.

Some of those problems could be due to placement of speakers and toe-in. Of course, there is always the over riding factor of the room that acts like an equalizer, frequently to one's detriment. Once Audyssey runs, there is nothing that says you cannot do what you did. But it maybe a solution for some other users of the 4311CI.

Speaker placement in my room has been well thought out and experimented with. The speakers are Sunfires, which have very good horizontal dispersion due to their ribbons (and small woofers,) designed by Bob Carver to avoid too much vertical dispersion (to avoid floor-ceiling bounce). The main seating was worked out using mathematical ratios and then fine-tuned with experimentation. The speakers have no side wall reflections nearby. I added bass trapping (4-inch thick fire batts) in all corners and along the back of the room, and a bookcase filled with books sits behind the sofa in front of the back wall, adding some absorption and some diffusion. Before Audessey is run, the room now measures flat within a couple of decibels EXCEPT for the bass region, which has some nasty peaks coinciding with room modes, the main one due to the 8-foot floor-to-ceiling distance. Once the Audessey calibration diminishes those peaks, the bass sounds great, with no boom at all, but the Audessey and Flat curves still sound unnatural in the mids and highs. Perhaps the professional version of Audessey sounds better, but in my room correcting only the range below 500 Hz works best, which is why I suggested it as a possible alternative for those who "hate" Audessey. I personally love it, but the version I have is definitely not perfect. I am now enjoying music every day and not worrying at all about sound, which is the object, for me at least. (Movies sound great too, but that is not my main concern.) Don't be afraid to experiment, but be sure to measure too.

Also had weak subwoofer output with YAPO it sounded aweful. Audyssey xt32 works great in my listening room.

I recently sold my DENON 4311CI and replaced it with yamaha RX-A3020. I could not be happier. YPAO is wonderful especially after the installation of the latest firmware. Before that I had XT32 and utilized all 32 positions with a AUDYSSEY pro KIT. While it sounded good my preference is now an 8-point YPAO correction with RX-A3020.

Can you elaborate more, I am in market for new receiver ..I am currently have Onkyo 1009. Thanks

I think if you closely follow the instructions of either Audyssey or YPAO, you will be happy with the result . Then it becomes a matter of preference. I find YPAO to be simpler yet satisfies me with its correction. Audyssey , like Yamaha is an 8-position correction technology. The Audyssey Pro Kit expands the correction to 32. I had done both 8 and 32. I had been quite satisfied with the results.

With the Pro kit you can also tweak the target curve to your liking, so I'm, trying to understand why you preferred YPAO.  It would seem XT32 w/Pro is tough to beat as it has tons of flexibility.