"Official" Audyssey thread (FAQ in post #1) - Page 613

Well, I really think her, Chuck Berry and Phil Spector are all phantom sounds... I would have said Yoko was the .1, but I've heard her sing

I have been using a single Sony SA-W3000 12” subwoofer with my Denon 1909 in my living room theater. I recently obtained a second SA-W3000 and would like to try using two subs. These subs have line-outs to feed each other (although I might use a Y splitter off the Denon instead because of the shorter wire run.)

1. After hooking up the second subwoofer, will I have to rerun Audyssey?
2. Can Audyssey calibrate two subwoofers? (does it have to be individually run for each sub or both at the same time.)

Thanks for any replies.

Yes, you should re-run Audyssey. Audyssey will measure and correct the sub "channel" as one. You will need to level match the two subs at mic position #1, theoretically your main listening position. Also, your dual sub results will be better if the subs are equal distance from that position #1.

There is a new product which can produce better results with two subs that is used in conjunction with Audyssey onboard your AVR or pre/pro.

Thanks Pepar;
After reading the Audyssey setup guide, I'm wondering if I am better off using only one sub (avoiding time delays, imprecise volume levels, lack of symmetry, etc). Any thoughts?
Thanks

"There's no replacement for displacement."

Using two identical subs usually results in a dramatic improvement in bass quantity and quality. If you can't place two subs close to "symmetrically" and/or you have a difficult room, then the AS-EQ1 would probably be worth considering. If you *can* locate them symmetrically, then it may not make any noticeable difference with two subs and the Audyssey onboard your AVR or pre/pro will suffice. But by all means, go with two subs if you have the space in your room and your budget!!

BTW, co-locating the two subs, i.e. sitting them next to each other, solves the symmetricity problem and *really* ups your game in the bottom end. In this case, unless you have a difficult room, you probably don't need an AS-EQ1.

Thanks again Pepar;
I hooked up the second sub in a diagonally opposite corner (fairly symmetrical but there's an open wall, rather no wall on one of the sides of the first sub) and it sounds really good...without redoing Audyssey yet.

BUT, you're the first person who I've ever heard say to set subs side-by-side. Do you think that's better than opposite corners?

Thanks again for all your help.

Good question with, probably, quite a few answers. Sitting them next to each other couples them and gives even MORE output than two separately placed subs. But two subs in two different locations is said to give better modal distribution (read: smoother bass). I'd recommend you try both ways and in different locations.

I've always counted side speakers as part of the surround field, for a couple of reasons: they typically only receive surround channel information and they're usually not placed forward of 90 degrees (i.e., they're either in the rear hemisphere or stradling it, but usually never in the front hemisphere). So I tend not to think of them as part of the front cluster.

True for 5.1 mixes. But Logic7 and PLIIx, when fed from 2-ch sources, are extracting what was once front channel information. We like to call it surround info, but is it really, or is it just marketing? Maybe it's really Wide info and we just didn't use the right name.


My humble 7.1 theater has 2 rows of seats, and it's interesting to move back and forth--and see what two different surround perspectives feels like. The front row has the Ls/Rs at 90* (and Lb/Rb are at 140*). The back row hears the Ls/Rs at 60* (and Lb/Rb at 110*). There is more surround envelopment in the rear seats, maybe partially a result of the fronts being further away. But I do not find it objectionable to hear "surround sounds" from slightly forward of the midline in this case.

ITU-R BS.775-2 (2006) shows surrounds being placed between 60* and 150* for the prime seat. (Toole's book shows this in Fig 22.1, p500.) Maybe pushing the surrounds a wee bit forward, across 'the border,' isn't such a bad idea.

You know, don't you, that using the "*" for the "°" is cheating?

Kind of like upside down for uʍop ǝpısdn.

First order of business 2 demerits to the professor for using the term "Main Surround Speakers".

Roger, thanks for that reference, but the figure is unattributed. A better example in Toole's book is Figure 15.10 on page 302.

So, what I gather from this relatively new 2006 standard is that all our discussions about compromises only apply to the 5.1 version of the standard, and my remark about it being time for a 7.1 standard has been realized and it shows "Wide" surrounds at 60°. However, apparently from your earlier remarks this hasn't been implemented on dubbing stages?

Larry

Hi Roger,

Yes, I have a similar arrangement and have made the same observations when sitting in the rear seats. I always thought I was sitting in the "cheap" seats in the back row.

Nevertheless, I recall ocassions when sitting in the front row where highly localized surround pans to the rear were startlingly realistic. An example I recall was the HD DVD "I am Legend" movie where Will Smith is hitting a golf ball. The rear pan was so good it made me snap my head around. You'll be gratified to know this was using a legacy format with matrix surround processing.

Larry

Hi All,

I've thought this over some more. Taking to consideration all the research that Chris showed us on how poorly we hear phantom imaging directly to the sides, it would appear that the new 7.1 standard still has a significant compromise on side imaging since there are no speakers directly to the sides.

Of course Audyssey has a solution which would permit us to locate the standard's Surrounds at 90° while still having a set of speakers at 60°. The only trouble is that if the studios ever started to implement the 7.1 standard when mixing then the directions of the Surround speakers would be off by 30°, but I guess that problem already exists when you have mutiple rows of seating.

Larry

Are you saying Hi to yourself? That's the first sign.

Hi Gary,

The first sign is spending as much time on AVS as I do.

No, my friendly "Hi" was directed at everyone, even you.

Larry

I was talking about 5.1 material, since most 2-channel sources don't contain (deliberately encoded) surround info.
Maybe. The couple of times I tried something like Toole's butterfly surround placement (even going through the trouble of recalibrating to give it a fair shake), I always wanted to go back to having the side speakers directly at my sides. Maybe it's just what I've been used to for the last couple of decades, but I did miss the lateral imaging stability and sense of spaciousness.

Instead of moving the sides forward of the listening position to widen the front soundstage, I'd rather add a pair of wides (a la DSX) and leave the sides at +/- 90 degrees. That would result in a speaker every 30 degrees in the front hemisphere and every 60 degrees in the surround field. I think we'd get into diminishing returns after that (at least on the listener plane).

Hi Sanjay,

Apparently Toole's butterfly surround placement is the new 2006 ITU standard for 7.1.


I agree. Do you have an opinion regarding my comments highlighted above?

Thanks.

Larry

As you noted using the same player for all sources can be the "problem". I have an Oppo 83, that I use for BlueRay/DVD/CD/SACD, so the work around you suggest while valid, would be involve a constant resetting of the source value. The Onkyo 906 while perhaps not as feature rich as many of the Denons, does allow source specific settings. Personally, I prefer to make all my settings as seamless as possible so I don't have to "remember" what settings I may have chosen on a source by source basis. What I have taken from all of this, is that DynamicEQ is meant mostly for BlueRay movie playback, and that the base level of MultiEQ is what I'll stick to for CD music playback from my Oppo, this was from some of the responses I had from Chris here in this thread. For BlueRay movie playback from the Oppo, I have already had to use the Onkyo 906's feature of lowering my LFE level to -10, so as to save my Rythmik F12G subwoofer from blowing up. For me, with my gear I certainly don't need more low freqs, and in most cases the DynamicEQ setting adds a lot of bass. I've kept your response in my records as these work-arounds are certainly interesting for the Audyssey part of my AVR.

BTW: When are you going to get an Onkyo so you can WRITE the revised manual for it? The Onkyo manual is almost useless. I have to come here to learn how to use most of the useful settings!

While I have tried to read every post in this thread since I bought my Onkyo 906, I may have missed "Intellivolume" post in regard to DynamicEQ. I'll have to play with this idea for the same source my Oppo 83 and see if I can't make those changes so DynamicEQ is lower for CD sources and at normal level for BlueRay movie playback. Oh, the world or "work-arounds".

Hi Larry,
What is "Volume Scaling Limitation"?

Hi,

Please refer to posting #6677.

Also follow the link provided in a1sy's question. Gene DellaScalla describes it in detail for the Denon prepro, and provides a few suggested workarounds.

Larry

Very funny, very true. "director's intent" is so crazy a term these days. I work with them, and I'll say this, other then the very TOP/top/top directors, read; old school men/women, that learned anything technical, using the term "directors intent" these days is funny to me. Most of the posts in this thread as well as the knowledge of audio by members posting is well beyond most of the directors I have worked with in the past 10 years. The more pertinent term or correct term should be "faithful to final content" whatever the final mix is on the DVD or BlueRay, and the credit for that would more be due to almost anyone then the "director", when it comes to overall audio you hear. The battle begins on the shooting set to just get decent audio recordings, then moves to post production, where most of today's audio is really done, at these stages the less then TOP directors are already almost "out of the loop", pun kinda of intended, many are already on there next project and are lucky if they have any "important" input at these stages.

Some of you may have sat in on some movie mixes, did you see the director? Okay, assume the director can hear the audio at some other point (email/discs in the mail), do you think most of them know the real tech involved, or just say, "I like that, I don't like this".

While remaining faithful to someone's idea of what the final product should look like or sound like is a good starting point, it's not the end all many make it out to be, for many reasons. Just look at the position of colorist in the visual realm of movie production.

While I would love to listen to a fully tricked out DXS system, and I'm sure it would sound great, I'm stuck with dealing with 7.1 for sometime now, and just want to eek out the best audio possible, even from all the 5.1 sources. Thankfully on the audio/music side there are 7.1 discrete disks and they sound awesome to me, while I do admit to originally being disappointed with my REAR surrounds when I moved from 2.1 to 7.1, meaning with certain sources and various listening modes and source codecs barely being able to hear the two rears, I've read a lot here, as well as my Onkyo 906 manual, and now enjoy them in more cases then before, and since the rears were my old mains, I just consider them a bonus.

Hi Larry,

Pulling your attention from the screen - and The Story - is exactly what the early surround "thinkers" wanted to avoid.

Jeff

Who is responsible for hiring those "under" the director?

Yup. This is a classic case of what Tom Holman calls "Exit Sign Effect" and it drives cinematographers nuts. As in: "don't you dare turn your head away from my beautiful picture".

Very interesting, just like any computer chip, there is only so much processing power built in, until the next updated/improved chip. I wonder if this is why whenever I go from 2.1/stereo music playback to 5.1 or 7.1 that the volume level is immediately "lower"? My Onkyo 906 AVR does 145w/per channel and at moderate levels of db, the switch to more speakers always produces less output volume wise, not sure if it related to this or not. But after reading this I did make one adjustment on my AVR. I had originally set the "Master Volume Output to +6 db, so as not to accidently dial it up to far for my speakers limitations, but just in case of processor overhead, I've reset that AVR custom setting to "OFF". Now I can crank it up till the speakers explode, but maybe it can or will effect this other issue, I'll just be more careful now when adjusting volumes in the extreme range.

The person with the most money! Seldom does any NON AAA rated director have more money then the studio or the producers, therefore less power. If only decisions were based on talent as opposed to lets say shear "availability".

Hi,

I agree that, based on the way 7.1 discrete recordings are currently produced, that the term "director's intent" can't legitimately be used to support the argument for the benefits of Surround Back speakers. Nevertheless, as Mactavish states there still is an intent, perhaps more accurately its the re-recording engineer. So the argument for conventional 7.1 based on intent is not entirely misplaced, just weaken by the lack of director involvement.

Stated another way, the re-recording engineer, intended for some sounds he/she mixed to sound like they were coming from the rear. Having physical speakers in the rear is the best means of realistically reproducing that mix for that intended sound.

In contrast, no supporting argument about "intent" can be applied in any way to either the Wides or Height channels in current mixes. No one, in the entire production process, including the re-recording engineer, consciously placed this content in these channels.

This is not to say that these non-directional, derived channels don't add something that is beneficial to perceived sound quality. Its just that they are not meant as a substitute for directional sounds in rear channels that were placed there intentionally by the re-recording engineer.

Larry

Hi Guys,

I appreciate what Mr. Holman is saying. However, it is fair to say that those of us who appreciate Surround Back effects, don't expect or want a continual shift of focus to the rear. A transient shift is extremely effective in certain movies, such as horror movies where the monster has snuck up behind you. Having bullets whiz past your ear in "Saving Private Ryan" absolutely didn't detract from the presentation.

Nevertheless, I have run into situations where I had too much of a "good" thing. The one that is most painful for me is the Roy Orbison & Friends: Black & White music DVD. I both love and hate this DVD. Love because of Roy's near operatic voice. Hate because of the emphasis on the surround presentation.

This was what I would call a radical mix. Perhaps the intent was to hear the music from Roy's perspective. What was done sounded novel at first, but after a while it became very distracting. The chorus, which was behind Roy, was shifted to the surround channels behind the listener. Not good in my view.

So in the case of a sustained surround back presentation I would have to emphatically agree with Mr. Holman. In the case of some classic, well-mixed action movies, with well conceived transient effects, I would have to emphatically disagree.

By the way, I don't disagree that some cinematographers may go nuts, but they might need to be reminded that movies are more than just video.

Larry