643 replies to this topic

[davep]

Got an interesting calibration question.

I upgraded a little while ago to a Denon 3310 & XPA-5 combo.  Sounds great.  However running Audyssey, all my speaker trims are around -10 to -15, including sub.  If it were a sub volume issue, then I would expect the sub volume to be negative and the speaker trims postiive, to try and correct for the volume mismatch.  Before this configuration I had a Denon 1909, which runs the same level of audyssey, which calibrated trims all to within +3 - -3 dB, which would seem about right.

Its got the distances pretty much spot on.  Its a small room maybe 3x4m, with large speakers, so im wondering if this is driving all trims down, however as I indicated, this wasnt the case for the 1909.

Another note.  I added a surround back speaker to the configuration, as I had it spare.  I configured the Denon to recognise it, and it calibrated similarly to the others.  I did find that I had to put in different movies with different audios (one for DTS, one for Dolby and one for PCM), then go into the sound paramaters menu and turn Surround back from Off, to matrix or Pl IIx.  PITA.

[MarkTecher]

davep, on Sep 8 2011, 09:07 AM, said:

Got an interesting calibration question.

I upgraded a little while ago to a Denon 3310 & XPA-5 combo.  Sounds great.  However running Audyssey, all my speaker trims are around -10 to -15, including sub.  If it were a sub volume issue, then I would expect the sub volume to be negative and the speaker trims postiive, to try and correct for the volume mismatch.  Before this configuration I had a Denon 1909, which runs the same level of audyssey, which calibrated trims all to within +3 - -3 dB, which would seem about right.

It does not matter where the trims end up.  They give you at least +/-10dB range to ensure you can actually achieve the correct SPL.  I would be a little concerned that the levels are so low compared to your last figures, so would suggest checking the levels with an SPL meter.

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Its got the distances pretty much spot on.  Its a small room maybe 3x4m, with large speakers, so im wondering if this is driving all trims down, however as I indicated, this wasnt the case for the 1909.

It could be, so another reason for the SLP meter.

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Another note.  I added a surround back speaker to the configuration, as I had it spare.  I configured the Denon to recognise it, and it calibrated similarly to the others.  I did find that I had to put in different movies with different audios (one for DTS, one for Dolby and one for PCM), then go into the sound paramaters menu and turn Surround back from Off, to matrix or Pl IIx.  PITA.

Ever since getting "extended surround" back in 03, I've always forced the back surrounds to be ON.  I do this simply because not all EX/ES soundtracks are flagged and so don't want to miss out on hearing a sound track the way it was intentionally mixed.

[davep]

Cheers for the reply Mark.

I have a cheap DSE SPL that I used to calibrate my old Yamaha avr trims, so I'll recheck values.  It might be a dodgy audyssey microphone, which would also lead to potential issues of equalizer errors.  It might be worthwhile seeing if I can borrow a forum-members mic for comparison.  

The whole having to turn on the rear surround was overly complicated and menu's should be a lot more straight forward, rather than having to insert a disk with each audio type and then manually turning the rear on.  I would like to have seen more of a simplistic flow chart, like "do you want to matrix 6.1 for 5.1 tracks? yes/no", "do you want to apply this for all audio codecs? yes/no"

I will have to do a bit more reading, as the Denon gives two options for mixing types for a rear surround, and im not sure which one is best.

[MarkTecher]

The last Denon I set up had ON OFF AUTO as the options fro Back Surround decoding.  I always choose ON because not all discs encoded with EX/ES are flagged.

[Ilian]

Mark,
I need some clarification and help with the Bass management. I have Yamaha Z7 which I am using as a pre-amp. Under bass, there is an option "Phase" which goes to Normal and Recerse. Can you explain what changes they will make for my sub.
I find that my bass is not very firm and sounds more like a rattle.
ALso I am not sure how to set and DRC. I have the options for Max/ Standard/ Min-Auto. I understand that under MAx the dialog is emphasized but the Bass is pushed down..is this the case?
Thanks for your help.

Ilian

[MACCA350]

Ilian, on Oct 21 2011, 11:23 AM, said:

Mark,
I need some clarification and help with the Bass management. I have Yamaha Z7 which I am using as a pre-amp. Under bass, there is an option "Phase" which goes to Normal and Recerse. Can you explain what changes they will make for my sub.

It's generally used to dial in the sub to the mains by adjusting the phase of the subwoofer(usually on the back of the sub, but some processors are implementing it also for subs without this control). Usually it only affects frequencis around the crossover but may flip phase of the whole subwoofer channel. It's somewhat redundant now as we use delay to correctly timealigh the subwoofer channel to the mains which corrects phase around the crossover.
How we use to use it was to play an 80Hz(if using an 80Hz crossover) test tone and while watching an SPL meter flip the phase. The setting that gave the highest reading is the correct one. Or you could use full range pink noise and an RTA or FFT analyzer and watch the crossover region while flipping phase, whichever gives the highest reading is the correct one.
But as I said we generally don't use it anymore as when delay is correct, phase is also correct. You can use the above methods to adjust sub time delay in a pinch though there are other more complex methods to fine tune this.

Quote

I find that my bass is not very firm and sounds more like a rattle.

Maybe there's something loose in the sub or a rattle somewhere in the room

Quote

ALso I am not sure how to set and DRC. I have the options for Max/ Standard/ Min-Auto. I understand that under MAx the dialog is emphasized but the Bass is pushed down..is this the case?

DRC stands for Dynamic Range Control. When used this setting reduces dynamic range, ie loud sounds are reduced and soft sounds are increased so all sounds play at a more even output level. This is generally useful for late night viewing when you want to hear dialog but don't want the loud scenes to wake the neighborhood(saves us from scrambling for the remote when the dynamics kick in). In normal viewing when you want the full theatre experience you want to make sure this setting is off or inactive. Given the above options the Min would be the setting to use, unless there is an Off setting there also.
The Auto setting checks the metadata of the track that is playing and will follow it's direction, currently this is a TrueHD only feature and has been a bane for consumers as some processors reset this to Auto on power cycle etc. Don't use the Auto setting, make the setting manually depending on your needs.

Cheers

[Ilian]

Thanks for the reply. Appriciated

[raZorTT]

Hey mark

Thanks to you and everyone who has contributed to the thread so far. I'm not quite sure how I hadn't come across it before now, but am glad I finally have

Up until now I had been content with the auto setup of my Z7, but after reading this thread thought I'd check things out with a SPL.

The LCR and surrounds were all pretty close, but the sub was nowhere near it. The speakers were all either -0.5 or -1dB, but to get the sub up to 75-79dB I had to increase the trim to +8! The gain on the sub is probably between 2/3 and 3/4

Would people recommend turning up the gain further and reducing the trims? Or could the polarity of the sub be wrong?

I have played my demo material at this new setting and it sounds fantastic!! I had previously thought it sounded pretty good but in the back of my mind thought there should be a little more punch. I wasn't expecting it to be so much lower than what it turned out to be when I was watching the SPL meter.

Cheers
Simon

Edited by raZorTT, 24 October 2011 - 08:20 AM.

[MarkTecher]

Ilian, on Oct 21 2011, 10:23 AM, said:

Mark,
I need some clarification and help with the Bass management. I have Yamaha Z7 which I am using as a pre-amp. Under bass, there is an option "Phase" which goes to Normal and Recerse. Can you explain what changes they will make for my sub.
I find that my bass is not very firm and sounds more like a rattle.
ALso I am not sure how to set and DRC. I have the options for Max/ Standard/ Min-Auto. I understand that under MAx the dialog is emphasized but the Bass is pushed down..is this the case?
Thanks for your help.

Ilian

If your decoder offers phase option for normal or reverse, I would use normal.  If you do need to reverse the sub's phase, you would do so on the back of the SUB.  The reason for normal in the AVR is that signals are all in phase when decoded, so you don't want to be messing that up.  If you need to reverse the polarity of the aub

raZorTT, on Oct 24 2011, 08:20 AM, said:

Hey mark

Thanks to you and everyone who has contributed to the thread so far. I'm not quite sure how I hadn't come across it before now, but am glad I finally have

Up until now I had been content with the auto setup of my Z7, but after reading this thread thought I'd check things out with a SPL.

The LCR and surrounds were all pretty close, but the sub was nowhere near it. The speakers were all either -0.5 or -1dB, but to get the sub up to 75-79dB I had to increase the trim to +8! The gain on the sub is probably between 2/3 and 3/4

Would people recommend turning up the gain further and reducing the trims? Or could the polarity of the sub be wrong?

I have played my demo material at this new setting and it sounds fantastic!! I had previously thought it sounded pretty good but in the back of my mind thought there should be a little more punch. I wasn't expecting it to be so much lower than what it turned out to be when I was watching the SPL meter.

Cheers
Simon

Hi Simon,

The key point to the +75dB level is to be able to set your max playback level.  So the tones are -30dBFS or 30dB below 105dB per channel.  The trims are designed to move +/-10dB so that you can get all channels to playback at the desired level of +75dB.  Whilst I would prefer all the trims to be below 0 and into the negative, they have don't have to be.  So long as you actually have enough range and are compromising the level you should be fine.  

SUBs pose a few challenges because they have the trim of the AVR as well as the trim on their plate amp.  

In my case, my AVR SW trim is +3 and the plate amp is 9 o'clock (range from 7~5).  There was a time when I was running the AVR trim at -10dB and turning the plate amp up to 11 or 12o'clock.  I just found that I get cleaner bass now with the AVR trim higher than the SW trim.  

This will be different for various equipment, so some experimentation may be in order here.

[raZorTT]

MarkTecher, on Oct 27 2011, 01:29 PM, said:

Hi Simon,

The key point to the +75dB level is to be able to set your max playback level.  So the tones are -30dBFS or 30dB below 105dB per channel.  The trims are designed to move +/-10dB so that you can get all channels to playback at the desired level of +75dB.  Whilst I would prefer all the trims to be below 0 and into the negative, they have don't have to be.  So long as you actually have enough range and are compromising the level you should be fine.  

SUBs pose a few challenges because they have the trim of the AVR as well as the trim on their plate amp.  

In my case, my AVR SW trim is +3 and the plate amp is 9 o'clock (range from 7~5).  There was a time when I was running the AVR trim at -10dB and turning the plate amp up to 11 or 12o'clock.  I just found that I get cleaner bass now with the AVR trim higher than the SW trim.  

This will be different for various equipment, so some experimentation may be in order here.

Thanks Mark,

I was just worried that having it up around +8 or +10 might introduce clipping or similar. So far it's been sounding great!.

I'll do some experimenting and report back if I find anything of interest.

Cheers,
Simon

[MarkTecher]

raZorTT, on Oct 27 2011, 12:39 PM, said:

Thanks Mark,

I was just worried that having it up around +8 or +10 might introduce clipping or similar. So far it's been sounding great!.

I'll do some experimenting and report back if I find anything of interest.

Cheers,
Simon

I don't think the AVR will cause you grief, but not sure about the plate amp on SWs.

[SDL]

Probably worth mentioning, if not mentioned already, the double bass available on newer processors. I have found setting my fronts to large and lfe +main setting seems To give a more rounded sound. In the past this meant you got no bass from the fronts to the sub, but the way I understand it now this is no longer the case?

[MarkTecher]

SDL, on Dec 8 2011, 07:50 PM, said:

Probably worth mentioning, if not mentioned already, the double bass available on newer processors. I have found setting my fronts to large and lfe +main setting seems To give a more rounded sound. In the past this meant you got no bass from the fronts to the sub, but the way I understand it now this is no longer the case?

The challenge with running main front speakers as large + LFE are that your combined bass output must be now set 6dB lower then that of a common bass sub woofer.  The other reasons include but are not limited to dynamic range, frequency response, intermodulation distortion.  One reason you may be finding it sounding better is that most BM is based on the THX 80Hz crossover - a compromise in itself.  How does the system sound when crossed over at say 40Hz or 50Hz?

[TheBluDude]

I used teh disney (goofy) calibration disc.  Worked wonders.

[MarkTecher]

TheBluDude, on 04 January 2012 - 02:22 PM, said:

I used teh disney (goofy) calibration disc.  Worked wonders.

There are two problems with Disney's WOW disc.
1.  The test tomes are -20dBFS, not -30dBFS as they should be so if you have calibrated to +75dB/C/Slow as this thread recommends, you are 10dB too low.  To achieve propper 105dB, you need to be meauring at 85dB which is LOUD.
2.  The test tones are 6.1 and not 7.1 so there is no independant adjustments for back surrounds.
Like THX CALIBTRATOR, the WOW disc is good, but I would only recommend usinng the disc as a test disc, not for actual calibration of the audio.

[tomee]

in the process of setting this up.
does anyone know if there is a test tone generator on a denon 3312 instead of running the audessy setup?

[cooksta]

tomee, on 06 June 2012 - 04:45 PM, said:

in the process of setting this up.
does anyone know if there is a test tone generator on a denon 3312 instead of running the audessy setup?

Yes there would be in the manual speaker set up area

[davep]

Yup, in the 3310 at least it auto-plays the test tones when you go into the menu to adjust speaker trims

[MarkTecher]

If it offers a manual option, you will find it easier as some of the auto runs are too quick for the meter to stabalize and take an accurate reading.