Anthem D2/D2v/AVM50/AVM50v/ARC1 tweaking guide - Page 575

Yes!

The PS3 cannot pass a signal via bitstream. The D2V2 when used with a PS3 will show the same Multi Channel In as the current D2. I think the important thing to keep in mind is there's no difference in what the end product will be. It will be the exact same result so there's no need to replace your PS3 with a BD player that will bitstream the formats.

I think you might benefit from raising that to 15KHz or perhaps a little higher (particularly in the Rear channels). You should try 20KHz for comparison to see just how much (if any) it degrades your lower frequency Calculated results. You can do these experiments without having to re-Measure, and you don't have to Upload unless you get a result that looks better to you.
--Bob

I've had a chance to do more listening with the "test" ARC V1.2.13 20KHz results from my second set of Measurements, and the results are mixed.

The sound is very accurate and detailed. I really like the additional improvements I'm hearing in the higher frequencies. Bass is tight with a good transition from deep bass to low mid-range.

But the sound appears a little deader to me -- perhaps a bit more "back in the box" rather than airy. There's not as much wow factor.

I may be hearing the 0.8dB decrease in Room Gain compared to what ARC V1.2.5 set me up with -- i.e., may just need to get used to this sound. Or it may be something else in what the new ARC is doing -- or my ears may still be recovering from airline travel.

Anyway, there haven't been many reports on what this new "test" ARC sounds like so I thought I throw in some comments.
--Bob

Bob, I'd be curious to hear your opinion of the sound if you set the ARC bandwidth down to something like 200 Hz. Confine ARC operation to the area below the room's Schreoder frequency so as to only treat the dominant room modes. Then see what blooms. Or maybe you have done this previously...

I understand that the final outcome will not be different, but there is something preferable to me about doing the decoding in the processor. Is that rational? No, of course not, but I still kinda feel that way. A leftover from the old days of Dolby Digital processing in the DVD player with analog outs.

Anyway, I am not about to run out and replace my PS3, but it is interesting to know. I'm surprised that the PS3 can't do that. I wonder if future versions will upgrade the hardware???

Roger that is a really interesting idea, I'm not sure anyone has tried that but you might just have motivated me to give it a shot.

I have not tried that, and I'm loathe to give up the patent gains in mid-range and highs that I've achieved with the "official" ARC V1.2.5 by RAISING the Max EQ Frequency above the default 5KHz.

I suspect V1.2.13 still just needs a little more tweaking.

One thing I have noticed is that the white noise timbre of all the main speakers seems more closely matched with V1.2.13 than with any previous ARC version. I suspect that has to do with their improved analysis/processing of the high frequencies as well as generally lowering the crossovers a bit.

Anyway, ARC V1.2.5 remains my "wow factor champ" for now.
--Bob

I just did a quick experiment with my second set of V1.2.13 Measurements -- lowering Max EQ Frequency to 200Hz and just doing a Calculation -- and right off the bat I can see a problem.

The Calculated results of course match the Target almost perfectly below 200Hz, but to achieve this ARC has adjusted the speaker gains to account for the gross level of peaks or dips in just that region -- which means the volume trim for the higher frequencies can be off quite a bit.

For example, my Center speaker Measured with a significant dip between 45Hz and 110Hz. With a "normal" Max EQ Frequency Target, ARC was not able to fully correct for that. It left a residual error of just a few dB in a small part of that region.

But when I lower Max EQ Frequency to 200Hz, ARC raises the speaker volume trim for Center to achieve "perfection" below 200Hz. That means I've got, for example, Calculated results about 6dB hot at 1900Hz. Since my highs were also a little low for that speaker (see the charts I posted yesterday), they come in pretty good with this method, but the entire mid-range is significantly too hot.

Similarly, my Right Surround speaker has a peak at 70Hz that causes ARC to lower its speaker volume trim a bit when Max EQ Frequency is lowered to 200Hz. My mid-range for that speaker thus comes in low by about 3dB.

The method works better for my other speakers since they don't have significant peaks or dips below 200Hz that might trigger this.

It looks like Anthem would need to reconsider how it is choosing its speaker gains for cases where the Max EQ Frequency is lowered so much. But this still might be worth a try for folks who don't have significant volume peaks or dips below 200Hz for any speaker.
--Bob

Using version 1.2.13 I ran cases with 9Khz, 12Khz, 15KHz and 20Khz (see the attached file).

There is no difference between the 15KHz and 20Khz calculated that I can see. That is perhaps because there is no change in the target curve at the top end with any of the calculations (9-20) and by the time I get to 15KHz the L/R matches the target curve. It does not seem to try and move closer to the target curve for the surrounds or the center.

Above 12Khz the lower end starts to deviate more which is not really surprising in my opinion as it is having to deal with some pretty major peaks and troughs, which might be improved with some speaker placement correction for the mains (tough to do with the space I have available).

 

ARC Graphs.pdf 106.8779296875k . file

That presentation makes it very easy to see some of the subtle differences! In Preview on my Mac (the standard PDF viewer on the Mac), I can zoom in and position one page and then switch to another page and it comes up in the same position so you can flip back and forth between pages and easily see the changes.

I agree that going from 15KHz to 20KHz is not making any changes that show on the chart. You might want to give a listen to both to see if you can HEAR something the charts don't show.

You have some tiny ripples that appear between the 12KHz and 15KHz charts. Look around 110Hz and around 600Hz. These are so tiny that they could easily be ignored, but if you decide 15KHz sounds just as good as 20KHz, then you might want to try LOWERING 15KHz closer to 12KHz in, say 500Hz steps, to see where those ripples go away, and then compare THAT to your original 15KHz in a listening test. Mind you it's not clear these ripples aren't just rounding limits in the charting stuff rather than real differences.

Despite those ripples, I would tend to lean towards 15Khz (or 20KHz) instead of the 12kHz results. Your speakers can use some help up there even if you are running into the 6dB protection limit of how much correction ARC will attempt to force through the amp and speakers up there.
--Bob

Thanks much for checking into this. Since ARC allows 200Hz-20kHz for MaxEQ, it seems they may have understood the validity of choosing a rather lower frequency limit. Maybe this gain issue you found just gets added to the bug list for further review.

On a different topic, I was looking thru the EQ plots as provided by Bob, Dlynch, MikeFL52, and Spridle1. I stopped there. In every case, there is a distinct but narrow notch in the measured room responses between 13kHz and 15kHz. It is the same freq for every speaker in a given system. I'm wondering if this is a characteristic of the microphone. If so, and the ARC is removing it (which it does in every case) then it's really adding a peak in the playback system response. Any thoughts? Am I just seeing things?

One way to check would be to try a measurement with an alternative brand of mic--assuming it doesn't have the same characteristic, to see if the notch goes away.

After several testing, I decided I for sure like 1.2.9 the best..


Sounds very airy, nice bass, and Just awesome sound..

I use the 20000hz option for max freq..


Anyway, hope anthem can keep the sound of this firmware, but do the bass enhancements they are doing in new firmwares..

I doubt it's the mic. The ARC mics are individually calibrated and come with a calibration correction file specific to that mic serial number.

You also won't be able to use a non-ARC mic with the ARC software. The USB connection from the mic identifies the mic as an ARC mic and the software looks for that.

I suspect it is, rather, an artifact of the way the charts are constructed as an average of the different mic positions, along with the natural tendency of many speakers to have a hole in their dispersion right around 15KHz (which emphasizes directionality concerns).

Consider for example the V1.2.5 charts from my setup found in this post:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...s#post14422227

These were taken with the same ARC mic I used for the V1.2.13 charts I just posted.. You'll note that thsee older charts don't show anything particularly alarming around 13KHz. But in the newer ARC software Anthem has revised the way they analyze the raw data upwards of 15Khz to help eliminate directionality issues from the speakers. And I'm not sure the charts fully show what's really going on just below that.

We've had other V1.2.5 results posted that are flat up there, and we've also had posts from folks who had severe dips around 15Khz in their surrounds but flat on the mains. Again, I don't think it is the mic, but I also don't think the chart is telling us the whole story of what's going on up there.
--Bob

I sent an email to Nick at Anthem with instructions for how to reproduce this odd Center speaker result by doing a 200Hz Calculation using one of the ARC V1.2.13 files I'd already sent him. I'll let you know what I hear back.
--Bob

ARC is a great tool as it allows me to quickly do analytical simulations (once you have taken the mic readings), choose the ones that look promising and compare those on my system.

I listened to the 15KHz and 20KHz and could not tell any audible difference, both sounded excellent by the way. When I tried 20KHz with an earlier version it tended to sound brittle at the top end, with the new version (1.2.13) it doesn't. I also seem to remember that the target curve for earlier versions did not have the fall off slope beyond 5KHz, but I might be wrong in that.

Over the weekend I will focus in on the 12-15KHz region and see what I get. Sometimes my family doesn't enjoy hearing the same piece of music or watching the same excerpt of bluray concert or movie over and over again!!

For me it would be interesting if anyone had what they might call reference pieces of multi-channel music (not DVDA or SACD). I have enough good pieces of 2-channel music that I can use for the "Music" or in my case stereo set up. I also have some good concert DVDs and Blurays but I am not sure that I would call them reference.

Mikefl52
The best sounding recorded music now available are the multichannel Acoustic Reality Experience recordings on Blu-ray. They are 7.1 DTS-HD Master Audio Discs (awesome sounding). You can purchase them from Amazon (http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_d?...dio+&x=17&y=24), Enjoy!

I just uploaded the lastest version of arc and ran new measurements etc and uploaded to the D2. I then checked the speaker levels that the arc set against measurements that I took with the my radioshack SPL meter. ARC had set my center channel at +3 which conflicted with my in balance measurement of -1 with my radioshack SPL meter. All other channels were pretty much spot on...mayby off by .5 in a few cases. Is there a reason for this or just an error on ARCs part? I adjusted the center back down to -1 to balance that channel with the rest. Should I not have done this?

Why do you assume that ARC is less accurate than your RS meter? Pink noise readings from the RS (calibrated or not) are likely to be less accurate than gated sweeps into a calibrated system.

Thanks a lot, I will look at those and maybe put some on my Christmas list

Pick just about any movie with a solid audio track and you'll find that the music running during the closing credits represents about the best music quality you'll find anywhere on the disc.

For example, I use the closing credits score from "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End" Blu-Ray.

The reason is that there's no mix of dialog or effects audio at that point and so the music audio editor gets to show off.
--Bob

ARC uses a wider frequency range than your SPL meter in picking the target volume trim. The ACTUAL volume you get when playing real content is a combo of the volume trim and the cuts/boosts that are implemented by the Room Correction stuff.

Now, the latest "test" ARC software may still have some bugs here -- I've got some questions about this myself and I've sent files off to Nick -- but in general it is typical for the SPL readings to be off by a couple dB even with the "official" V1.2.5 ARC. That's normal.

If you are convinced the "test" ARC has chosen the wrong speaker trims, however, i.e., if it SOUNDS wrong using ARC's values, by all means please do send your ARC results file (not just pictures of the charts) to Anthem tech support. The engineers can see all the raw data in the file and can tell if something is getting screwed up.
--Bob

Guys,

I've had a problem with my AVM50 crop up a few days ago, and it's getting worse. The unit will go nuts and turn on every zone, change inputs, etc. It doesn't matter if its off or already on.

I've tried connecting it from the wall to my panamax conditioner, unhooking all HDMI, removing the batteries from the remote (universal mx-850) all with no luck.

Anybody seen anything like this? I was going to try and call Nick today, but it got too late.

Could a cordless phone, wireless internet, etc cause interference like this. We dont have a home phone, and tried shutting down the wireless net.

????

If you're looking for a reference BD, the Dave Matthews at Radio City Music Hall is imo, outstanding and can be had for under $20.
Even if it doesn't suit your needs for the test, it is killer for both PQ & AQ & content.
There's no deep bass or uber-highs but lots of acoustic guitar and vocal.

Do a Save User Settings (so you can recover later). Then do a Restore Factory Defaults. Then power cycle the unit both at the front panel and with the back panel switch (to force a complete fresh start). If you have anything attached to the serial port, disconnect it while the unit is off.

Leave the unit powered on in Factory Defaults like this -- you probably won't have video but you'll be able to see what it is doing on the Front Panel.

Does it still make random changes? If so, use the Front Panel buttons to get to Setup > Trigger / IR / RS-232 > Set IR Inputs and clear the "*" from every single location in that matrix. Once you do this, you will have to continue via just the Front Panel as you have turned off all remote control IR access.

Does the unit still make random changes with all IR ports disabled and with no serial connection? If so that sounds like a hardware fault, but you can try re-loading the V1.33 firmware on top of itself to see if that clears it. This may be dangerous if the unit thinks it is receiving IR or Serial commands WHILE the firmware install is in progress. So it would probably be best to call Anthem tech support and have them work this with you.

If the Reload Factory Defaults or the turning off of the IR inputs makes the problem go away, then you can work your way back from that. Obviously you should make sure the original Anthem remotes are not in the room. Leaving the unit in Factory Defaults, try enabling just the Front IR input for just the Main Path and see if your remote seems to work normally with the unit (remembering that it is still in Factory Defaults). If so, Reload your Saved User Settings and go in and disable all but the Front IR input for the Main Path and try it that way for a while.

If the unit works properly in Factory Defaults, but not when loaded with your User Settings, then something may be corrupted in your User Settings. Try manually re-entering enough of your user settings to get video and to play a source and see if things still work.

-----------------------------------------------------

Some display panels put out a lot of IR into the room. The usual result of that is that devices can't see the IR from your remote and so they don't respond -- rather than responding randomly. But it still wouldn't hurt to turn off your display and see if the problem goes away.

Radio devices like cordless phones, cell phones, and wireless internet can not affect the IR inputs. Even if the Anthem picked up radio frequency interference from the, the frequencies are so different it would not trigger IR style responses.

Normally I would suspect your programmable remote (bad programming or faulty remote), but you say you removed the batteries to disable that remote and the problem is still happening. I presume you are not using any OTHER IR remotes in the room besides that programmable remote, right?
--Bob

As I'm getting more used to the lower Room Gain which "test" ARC V1.2.13 preserved, I'm starting to like the sound a lot. The high frequencies are the sweetest yet and there's a lot of nifty detail in the low mid-range and in attacks on percussion and plucked strings.

Obviously Anthem has some more work to do on this one before it is ready for prime time, but I'm really looking forward to hearing the final result!
--Bob

Bob,
Are you using 20K setting? I'm using 15K and I agree with your observtions.
John

John:

Have you had any luck resoling this issue yet? Anthem appears to be ignoring me with regards to this issue.

Sorry I didn't respond earlier as my wireless was out of commission. I am not getting anything mentioning my security settings. I more or less gave up on trying to stream from my pc to the PS3.

It is still an issue but I am waiting for new fimware, supposedly after V2s come.
John

Yes, I am using a 20KHz calculation based on my second set of V1.2.13 Measurements. I posted the charts here a couple days ago. I'm not sure I like the lower crossover it chose for my Center speaker. And I'm puzzled why it found a Room Gain almost 1dB below what V1.2.5 found (which I think is the cause of my initial reaction that the sound was "deader" -- as perhaps in anechoic). But I'm getting more enthused by this "new" sound.
--Bob