#1 of 266 Joe Pick

#2 of 266 JohnRice

#3 of 266 gene c

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Posted October 30 2007 – 10:42 AM

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Posted October 30 2007 – 11:01 AM

I’m not trying to be confrontational, I’m just frustrated.

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Hi All,

This is an interesting thread because I had similar results. I recently purchased an Integra DTR-7.8 AVR with the Audysey. I ran it several times, but it also kept comming up with front mains and center on full [even Snell recommends that my speakers be set to small or 80 HZ crossover and the my SVS sub on 80 HZ].

This setting sounds best to me, but maybe to others, the Audyssey setting would sound better. It’s all very subjective.

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What exactly are you frustrated with?

The Onkyo implementation has been reported to be somewhat “optimistic” in identifying speakers as large when they’re not. You’ve fixed that.

Same with the levels. The auto setup part of the Audyssey routine is calibrating the levels as the micrpophone measured them. Were you holding the mic during the measurements? Was there extra background noise…A/C, dog barking, planes overhead, etc….when you did any of the measurements. All of these can throw off level and EQ settings. Again, season to taste.

Lastly, Audyssey does much more than auto setup levels and distance delays. It attempts to achieve a flat frequency response at the measured locations using a combination of EQ and time alignment. That’s a tall order in the typical home listening environment. Depending on how “flat” your frame of reference is prior to the EQ, you may not like it…and there’s nothing wrong with that. Have you ever seen a monitor that had adjustable color temps? While 6500K is the broadcast reference standard, it probably looked much less engaging than the higher temps at first glance. Same thing used to be pretty common when people first moved up to real subwoofers like SVS or Hsu…with their flat frequency responses, people didn’t feel like they had as much bass as the CC/BB one note wonders with big 35-40hz tuning peaks and then nothing below that.

In short, after making reasonable adjustments to the crossovers and adjusting the levels to taste, give yourself some time to acclimate to the EQ. The guys behind the math aren’t exactly dumb. If, after giving it an honest evaluation, you still don’t like the EQ, don’t use it…nothing wrong with that.

BTW, I wouldn’t start tweaking the EQ manually, if the 705 allows it. My understanding is once you do that, you wipe out the Audyssey calcuations. The manual EQ doesn’t give you time domain adjustments and also doesn’t have as much EQ flexibility as the auto routine. Only resort to manual EQ after you’ve given Audyssey a fair shake, IMO.

-Brent

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I ended up turning my EQ off, and I have had email conversations with SVS that sound similar. They recommend setting my speakers at 80Hz, and the LPF of LFE for my SVS sub at 100Hz – using an Onkyo TX-SR705.

I had another strange issue. I have had an audible and annoying hum sound coming from my sub, and I thought I had the dreaded ground loop issue – and I still may. When I switched my Onkyo’s EQ setting from “Audyssey” to “Off”, the hum sound decreased dramatically! I’ve had enough problems, so I set my distances manually, and used a SPL meter to set my levels. Sounds good to me! Now about that darn, now faint hum….

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Hi everyone,

I thought I could jump in and offer some explanations about Audyssey MultEQ and the crossover issue that is being discussed here.

First, some background. The Large and Small differentiation can be attributed on Audyssey’s co-founder and Chief Science Office, Tomlinson Holman. When he started the THX program many years ago he proposed the use of these terms to describe whether a speaker should be bass managed or not. When discussing speakers designed to the THX spec that meant that if a speaker has a -3 dB cutoff point of 80 Hz or above it should be called Small and if it can go below 80 Hz it should be called Large.

This terminology is now widely used by manufacturers even if the speakers are not THX. This is the case in the Onkyo receiver. Onkyo specified that the decision for Large or Small will be based on 80 Hz. So, when Audyssey MultEQ runs it measures each speaker’s response and reports the -3 dB point to the Onkyo bass management system.

The problem is that when a speaker has a -3 dB point of, say, 79 Hz, MultEQ will call it “Large” to follow the rules. The Onkyo bass management system then sets it to Large and bass below 79 Hz is not sent to the sub because it is assumed that the speaker will handle it.

We are working hard to convince manufacturers to change their thinking about the default settings of their bass management. Some have already done so and have lowered the criterion to 40 Hz.

The 705 doesn’t do that automatically, so the simple solution is to manually set the speakers to Small after the calibration is finished. When you do that, the crossover values that were found by MultEQ will be applied to all speakers and the bass will be properly redirected to the subwoofer. This manual step is a small inconvenience, but it doesn’t have any negative effect on the performance of the room correction filters produced by MultEQ.

I hope this helps clear up things. Please let me know if I can answer any other questions about Audyssey.

Best regards,

Chris Kyriakakis

Founder and CTO

Audyssey Laboratories

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Chris,

Thanks so much for your explanation on the Audyssey settings. I have an Integra DTR 7.8 AVR with Audyssey MultiEQ. After running the Audyssey setup, my Snell speakers were also set to full. Snell recommends setting them to small or 80 HZ.

My question is, are you saying that after I run the Audyssey and change just the speaker settings to small or 80 HZ all of the other settings will remain the same [speaker distance, etc.]? If so, that works out pretty well as that’s an easy adjustment to make.

Thanks for the great information!

Mitch

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Hi Mitch,

That’s right. All the other settings remain unchanged when you manually switch to Small.

Regards,

Chris

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Chris:

Thanks for your presence and expertise. I’m not an Audyssey owner, but I’m avidly following its early appearances, although I haven’t yet heard it in action.

I do have a question about one of your comments: “Onkyo specified that the decision for Large or Small will be based on 80 Hz. So, when Audyssey MultEQ runs it measures each speaker’s response and reports the -3 dB point to the Onkyo bass management system.”

This suggests to me that the Audyssey implementation can be different from piece to piece, from manufacturer to manufacturer. If that is the case, how does Audyssey maintain brand/performance consistency? To acquire a device that represents the optimum Audyssey performance, do consumers need to have another level of knowledge about the specific hardware implementation? I’ve already noticed (perhaps incorrectly) that some Audyssey-licensed devices support the pro level features and some do not. Some support Dynamic EQ and some do not.

How can we know what we’re really getting when we purchase an Audyssey-enabled receiver or pre/pro?

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Hi Bob,

Individual manufacturers decide on how to implement bass management in their products. This is not a function performed by Audyssey. Some of the better products provide the ability to have individual crossover frequencies between each satellite and the subwoofer(s). Others only provide a single crossover choice for all speakers.

The Audyssey MultEQ XT algorithms are the same in every product that bears the MultEQ XT logo. They are responsible for: checking speaker polarity; finding the distance to each speaker and sub; finding the trims to make the speakers play at the same level; finding the crossover frequencies for each speaker and reporting them to the bass management system; and creating room correction filters for each speaker including the sub.

We work closely with our licensees to make sure our algorithms are implemented exactly as required by our specs. However, we can not control the implementation of processes such as bass management that are implemented by them. So, depending on the method used by the manufacturer we provide them with the best possible information about crossovers that fits within their implementation.

Regarding our other technologies. The way you know what you are getting is by looking at the logo or on our website. A product that enabled for a MultEQ Pro calibration will have that listed on the box. A product that runs Audyssey Dynamic EQ will have a front panel logo to indicate that.

Regards,

Chris

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Chiris:

In the above thread you wrote: ” When discussing speakers designed to the THX spec that meant that if a speaker has a -3 dB cutoff point of 80 Hz or above it should be called Large and if it can go below 80 Hz it should be called Small.”

I believe you wrote the opposite of what you intended. Speakers with a -3 dB of 80 Hz or below are usually called Large while speakers with a -3 dB above 80 Hz are called small.

Best regards,

Jeff

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oops. Thanks Jeff. I will edit the post to fix that. It’s good to see that someone was paying attention!

Best

Chris

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Chris- Thanks for your informative posts. Robert Fowkes (RAF) and I attended an Audyssey demo at CEDIA this year and were amazed by the Audyssey Dynamic EQ portion of the demo. So much so that we both bought Denon AVR-3808s and plan on having the Audyssey Pro upgrade done. Can you briefly explain how Dynamic EQ works because I don’t think that many people are aware of it.

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When the Audyssey EQ setting is activated on my Onkyo 705, why would it produce a humming sound from my (SVS) subwoofer? When I set the EQ to “Off”, the hum goes away. Any ideas why? I thought it was a ground loop issue, but I only hear it when “Audyssey” is selected in the EQ settings on the 705.

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Chris, let me add my welcome to you here at the HTF. I know that we have a lot of insiders who lurk here and it’s nice to be able to get information directly from the horse’s mouth, so to speak, insofar as specifics are concerned. We appreciate any insight that you can provide regarding the truth and the myths regarding audyssey, as your busy schedule permits. We offer an environment that has really only three major guidelines – no politics, no religion, no personal attacks. In a civil environment a lot can be learned through dialogue. Our moderators do an excellent job keeping things from degenerating into less than civil exchanges. That’s what we feel differentiates us from a lot of “other” sites. One can come here to ask questions and, hopefully, get knowledgeable answers.

Incidentally, Adam and I recently returned from a conference. As we walked out the door (almost literally!) of our respective houses on opposite coasts our Audyssey Pro installation kits were being delivered. I hope to get to a full 32 point Audyssey Pro calibration (with dynamic EQ) on my 3808 some time next week. I have to say that the Audyssey classes and demos that I attended at CEDIA were truly ear-opening. I knew about Audyssey from my Denon 3806 but Dynamic EQ was new to me and the demonstration of it in action blew me away.

Thanks for participating.

(Administrative Note: I have taken the liberty of changing the title of this thread to more correctly reflect the nature of the contents now being discussed. Not only will it steer members to it but it also takes away the confrontational tone that I mentioned previously. This is in no way meant to disrespect the starter of the thread, Joe Puck.)

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Originally Posted by Joe Pick When the Audyssey EQ setting is activated on my Onkyo 705, why would it produce a humming sound from my (SVS) subwoofer? When I set the EQ to “Off”, the hum goes away. Any ideas why? I thought it was a ground loop issue, but I only hear it when “Audyssey” is selected in the EQ settings on the 705.