"Official" Audyssey thread (FAQ in post #1) - Page 12

This sounds like my exact situation and I asked this question before but can't seem to find the post. I tried several different scenarios but got tired of the fun of doing so.

What seemed to work the best for me was to do 3 on a tripod on the couch and the 3 more measurements at ear level 2 1/2 feet in front. I also remember reading that it's best to set the microphone away from any boundaries such as a wall and make sure it's above the back of the couch.

Curly,

I have a friend that has delved into this LFE problem. It's a mixed bag. Some pre-pros and receivers do it right (hand off LFE to the subs separately from the crossover material from the satellites) but many don't. The only way to tell is to test the receiver in a lab. Not an easy task. In hopes your LFE does all go to the sub, be sure the sub's own LP is set high.

It sure sounds like the Audyssey mic isn't hearing everything you are from the center. Be sure the mic height is at your ear height and pointed at the ceiling. Don't be shy about using your receiver's tone control to crank down the highs. That won't interfere with the benefits of EQ (clearer voices, better blend with sub, etc.). From what I've read, there is no good center channel speaker location, all have unfortunate problems. My sense is that on top of the TV is better, but that's not always an option. You might move it forward a foot if you can and change the distance setting accordingly. You could try an Audyssey profile that rolls the high-end off more, but that would take highs down on your satellites as well.

The loss of bass is common. Most rooms have room gain and resonances that make bass volume higher than it should be and we are used to it. You can turn the bass up to your liking without losing the benefits from the EQ. But, I would use (or at least try) the receivers bass tone control. Turning up the sub gives bass boost that is nearly a step increase at the crossover. Moving the bass tone control up will give you a smooth increase, probably starting at 200 or 300 Hz and smoothly increasing down to about 20 Hz (if it's designed to compensate for the human ear's loss of bass response at lower volumes which I think is usually the case ... or should be).

As to the listening bubble, do keep all of your measurements within the listening area. Don't go more than a foot or two beyond any head position with one exception. In your case Audyssey recommends as a minimum the three head positions and three measurements three feet forward of the three head positions and at the same height. You can repeat measurements at a prime listening position if you want to favor that position. I have three seats also and usually do 8 measurements, the last two between the seats or repeating the center seat.

Harrison

Good to know I wasn't making that *stuff* up.

I also have my center on top of the TV and am pleased with the results. My front soundstage is seamless. I also commented earlier in the thread that I preferred my analog cables in 5.1 to the DenonLink converting High-Rez audio to 7.1--I have since changed my opinion.

Zen, Sorry, I completely overlooked your post. My center now sits on top of a 45" CRT rear-projection TV. I'm due for an upgrade to a 50" Plasma and will try the center below it, but really think I'm going to end up looking for a way to support it above the Plasma.

This is going to be receiver dependent though. The tone controls on my last two Onkyo receivers only affected the front L & R channels. So adjusting the tone would do nothing to low bass, and in fact interject it's own shelf problem. I have, however, recently purchased an 875, and while I haven't installed it yet, the owners manual does state that the tone controls affect all 7.1 channels (and is even individually adjustable for each channel). But it does add the footnote that the tone controls are not in effect for any of the THX modes. So even with this model, adjusting either the sub's gain or the sub out level, is the only way to add bass in all listening modes. At least for those of you who don't further trim your bass EQ with a BFD or similar tool.

Darin,
Not surprising I guess. There seems to be no meeting of the minds on BM. My Outlaw 950 pre-pro does a great job with the bass tone control. It is limited to 6 db, but that is the amount of boost needed at 30 Hz to compensate for the human ear's loss of bass sensitivity when the SPL is reduced from reference level to the more common 80 db peak SPL listening level. There's a similar treble adjustment, making it a good poor man's DynamicEQ, albeit a manual adjustment.

Well, I have the Integra 9.8 so very similar to yours. I use the 70hz Xover from all speakers to the sub, and 120hz on the LFE, I can't say I've heard any issues with localization at all.I also use Audyssey which does a very good job to flatten the sub's output.
It is true that the content over 80hz on the LFE channel is rare and usually at low levels, so I wouldn't make a big deal out of this, either if you leave it at 120hz or set it to lower to match your BM setting. Though I wouldn't set it lower below 80hz in any case.

Tonight while doing some listening tests, I could definitely hear sound from the sub at 120 that I could not hear when set at 80. However, the tones that were audible at that setting made voices sound very tubby and unnatural. Now it could be just a poor 5.1 broadcast signal, but is was bad enough for me to change the LFE to 80, because otherwise it was just too distracting.

As far as Audessy as a whole, I can't decide what to do with it. It definitely makes a more seamless soundfield al around. But it does make the high end on my center channel sound was to pronounced. So much so that it is fatiguing. Pixar films are great for testing your front soundstage because they move characters from left to center to right often. With Audessy on, it was painfully obvious that the center stood out and was EQ'd very differently. Maybe I could use Cinema EQ to help with that, but I thought Audessy is supposed to roll off the high end. This is my first AVR with Audessy, but so far it has been a mixed bag. I am going to rerun the setup tonight when there is no background noise and see how it goes. If the EQ on my center could be a little more flat, I would be happy enough to keep it on.

Also, I think I will see if turning my sub to mid volume makes a difference during setup, and then adjust the gain afterward.

I am definitely not an expert on this but my thoughts are:

1) You may have started with your sub too hot to begin with, if you have it turned way up on setup it may have done something to your center to compensate. Lowering it may alleviate the situation.

2) From my understanding on Dolby Digital the highest frequency by specification on the LFE channel is 80 Hz so nothing above that should be going to your sub. (possible caveat: Unless any of your speakers are set to channel 100 Hz or above to the sub)

3) You don't have your bass mgmt set to "LFE + mains" do you? That may possibly make your bass sound muddy.

4) You may have a faulty unit. If you still experience the situation after a couple more attempts I would call Denon directly or contact the dealer.

Good Luck.

The LFE don't have voices mixed in there. You must have watched a 2.0 Dolby which don't even have dedicated LFE to begin with. Are you even talking about the LFE LPF or the the LPF for redirected bass?

....and no I wouldn't use cable broadcast to evaluate any sound system. It is so different to one channel to another, that it becomes irrelevant to me. Just like the PQ from certain channels.

You might wanna read this:

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volum...rs-9-2002.html

and this:


http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volum...pril-2000.html

Thanks for the links. I believe it's DTS specs that limit it's LFE crossover at 80 Hz...My bad.

Do I really need a tripod to do this setup? im a noob so be gentle but suppose i didnt do the setup or touch any of the settings on the reciever and just played it as is, wouldnt i still have good sound?

Maybe Kylan.

You may have sound coming out of all of the speakers, but if you want the sound from each speaker to hit your listening position at the same time as the creative person behind the scenes want it to, you need to set the distances. The sound level is also important. If your speakers aren't identical or if you sit closer to any one of the speakers the sound will be louder or quieter than it is supposed to be from either one of the speakers.

Fwiw, You came to the right place to ask any questions and I would use a tripod but I can't comment what would happen if you used something else except the possible vibration of what you set it on may effect setup. I would borrow one or purchase a cheap small backpackers tripod. Btw, what AVR do you have?

We're keeping a FAQ on the Onkyo 705 and I did the Audyssey portion of the FAQ here. Seems like a lot of the same questions get asked in this thread, so I figured I'd drop the link here.

Also, Jerm357 took a reading of his subwoofer (crossed over at 80Hz) before and after MultEQ XT that does a pretty good job of showing its effect (and potentially why people feel that there's a lack of bass afterwards). You can find that here.

If any Audyssey-philes see anything inaccurate in my portion of the FAQ or think any other questions should be added, please let me know.

The answer is no; you would not have good sound. You may be satisfied with it, as a noob, but it would not be working as intended.

What I am finding, after running Audessy over a dozen times, is that each time produces something slightly different. Sometimes, There is way too much high end, usually only in the center channel. This seems to follow if the center is detected as small, instead of large. (I set it small manually anyway when it does find it as large) Other times, the front soundstage is pretty good, but the low end is missing punch. One thing that did help was to turn the sum gain down, run the setup, then turn it up again. That seemed to help.

So it seems that if I can lower the sub gain, run the first position over until I get a large reading for my center, then run the other positions at the places in the room I found produce the best results, maybe I can get all the pieces to line up just right. What's difficult is that we live near a main road, so I really need to wait until late at night to run setup so it is silent enough.

I do like the sound stage and surround field Audessy produces, so if I can iron out some of these kinks, I think it would prove beneficial.

When engineers are mixing films, they aren't using delay. The introduction of delay is a home theater addition designed to simulate the dimensions of a theater.

You're comparing apples and oranges there. The delay introduced by speaker distance settings is to correct the difference in distances between our listening position and the various speakers. It is not there to simulate anything, it is there to ensure that sound from each speaker reaches our head at the same time. This is critical for proper imaging, as timing differences would cause the sounds from the different speakers to not have the relative phase that was intended. To imagine it in simplistic terms, picture a simple stereo setup with the L & R speakers equidistant from our listening position. The same signal from each speaker, in phase, causes the psycho-acoustic processing in our brains to believe the sound is originating from a point between the two speakers. Change the distance of one of the speakers, and the phasing gets screwed up... most frequencies will no longer be in phase (though certain ones will), and we no longer get precise imaging at the center point. This same process is used to present a 360° soundfield (infinite possible perceived sound points, not just 5 or 7). If a sound should be perceived to be somewhere between the front left and surround left channel, the timing of that signal from those two channels determines where our brains interpret that to be.

The delay used to simulate dimensions of a theater (or other venue) is function of certain DSP processing modes. This is not the same as an across the board delay applied for speaker distance settings. This is an additional delay applied to certain sounds and played through specific speakers, multiple times, to create an artificial echo. These fake echoes make our brain believe the space is larger than it is.

No. Delays are used to time align speakers placed at uneaqual distances from the listener. Nothing more.

Without time alignment, your speaker set-up would introduce its own delays: sound from speakers placed further away would end up arriving later than sound from nearby speakers. Time alignement addresses this problem by delaying sound from the nearby speakers, so that sound from every channel arrives at the same time.

You may be thinking about DSP modes (Hall, Church, Stadium), which use reverb and echos to simulate larger spaces. Not the same as speaker delays.

Sanjay

Someone suggested, in a different forum, to use the base of a lamp instead of a tripod.

They suggested removing the lamp shade and attaching the microphone for Audyssey to the threads on the lamp. Then just move that to where you need it.

I would imagine you would need a short lamp to be able to place it on a sofa and have the microphone at ear level, but this idea may be worth a try.

Jim

first of all, thanks for the info! im getting the Denon 2808 installed Tues, dont get me wrong, i love sound and think i can hear good sound when i hear it. im just wondering if i should just play with the settings myself to my ear and set what sounds good to me instead of messing with the Audessey esp since i dont have a tripod. I had a Yamaha reciever for about 6 yrs and loved it, really didnt mess with the settings much. speakers were set to small. its a relatively small setup i have as far as room size. a medium sized bedroom. got the Def Technology Pro-Cinema 5.1 sat system. great speakers. i know what will probably give me the most fits is my sub.

You got that right. The rules are myriad. Corner is good. 1/3 or 2/3 wall locations are good, mid-room is okay so long as the sub is not equidistant from multiple walls, the sub should not be on your right when there's a wall on your left (or vice versa), etc. I don't know what controls the 2808 gives you but my problem was that the subs could not be the same distance from my prime seat as the mains and had no phase control of their own, and my pre-pro does not have a separate distance adjustment for the sub. Hence I have no way to phase match the subs to the mains. Audyssey says they should be set 11.8 feet while the mains are to be set 10 feet. So, I'm off 1.8 feet (assuming my pre-pro defaults the subs as the same as the most distant speakers). Thats about 35 degrees phase error at the crossover. Not ideal, but it will have to do for now. The locations are good otherwise, no large peaks or valleys in the "before" plots and similar before plots for each seat, so other than the distance problem, Audyssey has given me very solid bass. You didn't solicit help with your subs, but I had to share.

Kylan,

I enjoyed my first couple of AVRs as you described, by doing it by ear. After I learned about the Radio Shack SPL meter I enjoyed the Art of Home Theater more. Now with the help of the Audyssey EQ program I only use my Rat shack meter to gage how loud I am experiencing what I am listening to at my house and other venues.

If I am reading your right, I feel you are like me--I only read the manual as a last resort after something I thought I knew about goes wrong. ;-) The Denon manual can be daunting but Audyssey really isn't that hard and finding a tripod would be worth it, imo. Borrow one or buy one and return it to a store that has a liberal return policy after setup (I didn't say that).

In a nutshell you:

1) Make sure you start with a quiet environment.
2) Set the microphone at head level at your main seat to take the first 2 measurements (1st for distance measurements; 2nd for primary EQing).
3) Let Audyssey do 5 to 7 more measurements at ear level as described on page 1 of this thread.
4) Go to page 7 of this Thread and look starting at post 188 (when I got confused with the Denon manual and various sources) where the experts here steered me in the right direction to Audio Nirvana.
5) If you get confused or seem to have bad results report back and we can go from there.

I also might add, there is nothing wrong with running Audyssey and then tweaking some of the gain levels that you may have become accustomed (I would try listening to the results for a couple of days unless something really sounds out of whack). If you don't like the results you can turn Audyssey EQ off and keep the distance and gain results. After the slight hassle of setup, you won't have to do it again for sometime.

Insofar as your sub is concern, hclarkx gave some good points and fwiw, I would make sure you don't start with the sub's volume turned to far up on setup.

Good luck or enjoy as is.

Kylan,

Got to the thread/post indicated above. There is EXTENSIVE Audyssey information there.

thanks bud for all the info! thing is, my setup is a small to med size bedroom. think it would still be worth it to run Audyssey?

It certainly can't hurt. Worse case, you get a great starting point for speaker distances and levels. I have run it over a dozen times now. Each time, it nails those to where I have only needed to change one or two things by either inches, or .5 db increments.

I am probably not going to use the EQ settings, as no matter what I do my center channel just has WAY to much high end....it's painful to listen to on some sources. IT might be useful to use in on duller sounding material, but since the new HD sound formats have so much range, it just puts the highs over the top.

I tried to get it to work for me, and am disappointed, but nothing lost! So try it and see how it works for you.

Yep. My main HT is in a small library which is less than 250 sq ft/2,000 cu ft.

I have a denon 987 (same as 2807) and with audyessy Eq it seems to always roll of my LFE right where I wouldn't want it rolled off.

If I run test tones at 16hz and 20hz as well as 25hz, with the EQ engaged, I get as much as a 6db drop at some or all of those frequencies. And they aren't peaks that are getting rolled off either.

I've run it numerous times with the gain on my sub's changed just to see If I could get it to stop cutting the very low LFE and it always does.

Any ideas?

What are you measuring this with? If it's a Radio Shack SPL meter, remember that it is less accurate with lower frequencies and requires a correction value to get a proper reading (hence the reason we have correction charts for doing coarse equalization with that meter). A 6dB rolloff as measured on the meter may well indicate flat response with the correction.

If that's not it, well... I got nothin'.