Audyssey

[Lee H]

Morning all,

I tried turning Audyssey off last night and everything seemed to go flat, almost like I'd put the speakers in a cardboard box. It all felt quite muted and lacking space. I was watching the football on Sky HD so had a Dolby Digital signal coming in. Should it sound this way? I was always under the impression that the normal advice was to turn it off, but it does seem to be making quite a difference.

Is there a tweak to the AVR that I need to make?

 

[ric71]

Hi Lee,

I used to be in the camp of turn everthing off including Audyssey.

Now that i have calibrated Audyssey correctly it works.

My advice is set up Audyssey with the supplied mic and do all of the listening positions!!!

I turn dynamic Eq off as it is too much.

Make sure you set the LFE to 120 hz on your receiver as per Audyssey instructions.

Ric

 

[Lee H]

I did all the listening positions a few months back, and pretty much left it at that TBH. What effect did turning dynamic eq off have?

 

[Anonymous]

I have messed arround with the settings on my denon 1911 and turning the dynamic eq off seems to make the subwoofer sound dead so i leave it on

 

[Anonymous]

I have Audyssey turned off for Blu Ray and use Audyssey for Sky, PS3 & 360.

 

[Jammoe]

ric71:
Hi Lee,

I used to be in the camp of turn everthing off including Audyssey.

Now that i have calibrated Audyssey correctly it works.

My advice is set up Audyssey with the supplied mic and do all of the listening positions!!!

I turn dynamic Eq off as it is too much.

Make sure you set the LFE to 120 hz on your receiver as per Audyssey instructions.

Ric

Ric,

Any further tips? Always found it too bass-heavy and couldn't turn the sub down enough to compensate.

 

[ric71]

Hi,

Audyssey Dynamic Eq increases the bass and surround as the volume is lowered to maintain reference level as recorded in the studio.As you increase volume it does not add as much bass and surround info as it keeps it all relative.

I find it all too much and over the top and i assume you are experiencing the same as me ie too bass heavy.

Audyssey itself works a treat as a room correction tool and the results i have had really improved things. My advice is run it, check cross over settings as it doesnt always get these right and double check the db settings with an spl meter .

When it s callibrating your sub and if it sets the level at say -12db turn down the gain control on your sub and re run it as the subs volume too high and Audyssey will not have calibrated it properly .

Ric

 

[wireman]

ric71:Make sure you set the LFE to 120 hz on your receiver as per Audyssey instructions.
Hi ric71

Do Audyssey say to set LFE to 120hz? I thought Chris at Audyssey suggests leaving the setting at whatever Audyssey sets it to?

 

[Lee H]

More tinkering last night. I've left Audyssey on, but taken off Dynamic Eq. I actually had to turn the sub up a touch for "normal" listening volumes. It does sound less "boomy" now though and a little more controlled. So it's off for Sky and HD channels with Dolby Digital do sound better, although SD content isn't as impressive. Turned it off for Sonos and it improves with volume. Yet to chuck a BD in the PS3 and try that, but I'm guessing it'll end up off there too.

I think the next step is to try and scrounge a sound pressure meter and make sure everything is set up correctly. I've got crossovers set to 120 (including the LFE) but I find it really hard to judge the channel levels by ear - especially the sub

 

[ric71]

Audyssey will not set the low pass filter for your subwoofer this has to be done manually. It needs to be set at 120 hz as there is bass in the .1 channel upto 120hz according to Audyssey.

 

[Tom Moreno]

I find that audyssey with Dynamic EQ on works very well, though it does take a little bit of tweaking- especially as it can give the sub channel a bit of a lift. I do the full Audyssey calibration as normal on my AVR and when done I get out a disc with tones on it. Pixar BDs are good as the newer ones have tones in 7.1 (and I'm using a 7.1 setup).

After Audyssey cal is complete I go into the AVR's manual setup and reset all my main channels to large (so that you aren't measuring the sub in addition to your channel with your SPL meter) and make sure that audyssey EQ and Dynamic EQ are on but Dynamic Volume is off.

Play tones off disc through the system with the processing engaged. I usually start with the left channel tone and set the volume control on the AVR at the appropriate level to get a 75dB reading from that channel, then make adjustments to the levels of the individual channels until everything is levelled.

Once you're done with that, go back into manual setup and set all the channels back to small with 80Hz x-over (if you like the reference THX sound) and now you should be able to enjoy the AVR with Dynamic EQ engaged at all sorts of lower than reference volumes with the system sounding as responsive as when it's played loud but without all that far-too-aggressive subness.

 

[Lee H]

Is 80Hz not a bit low for satellite speakers?

 

[roger06]

Is Audyssey a Denon thing?

 

[Tom Moreno]

Lee H:Is 80Hz not a bit low for satellite speakers?

Depends on the speaker, most good sub/sat sets should do the 80Hz setting fine. I would imagine as it's a bit of an industry standard that many sub/sat sets are engineered with the 80Hz crossover as the target setting.

 

[Tom Moreno]

roger06:
Is Audyssey a Denon thing?

Denon is quite a proponent of Audyssey with quite expansive implementation of Audyssey technologies throughout its range, but Audyssey is an independent company that specialises in room correction technologies for settings varying from car audio to full size theatres. Marantz and Onkyo also employ Audyssey tech in their products.