Cinema richness at home

[FunkyMonkey]

My home separates with amp and full size 5.1 speakers can shake my room when explosions occur. However, how do I get that rich, deep character that you get at the cinema?

 

[TheHomeCinemaCentre]

A little more info on what you are running will help but as a general rule bigger and better speakers and electronics should do it. With a large room moving up from 5.1 can be a benefit.

What amp/speakers do you have and at what volume do you listen?

 

[Zarn_Smith]

First things first you need to spend £10 per person before watching whatever film you put on. Ensure your floor is sticky. Make some popcorn and invite a friend round. (Don't forget to spend another £10 on something). Give your friend the popcorn (spend another £5 for the popcorn) and ask him/her to throw it about the room every so often. Ask your friend to turn his/her ringtone on to max volume mode. During the film phone your friend's mobile phone a couple of times.

In all seriousness you will probably have to provide info about your system and a bit more detail as to what you are after.

 

[RobinKidderminster]

Hya Zarn. (Had to do that for a fellow frog).
Cinema sound IMO demands a cinema sized room, acoustics etc.
Anyway, more importantly, hya Zarn. :cheers:

 

[FunkyMonkey]

I have got an Onkyo 805 receiver, Tannoy DCC centre, Tannoy DC2 floorstander fronts, DC1 standmounts for rears, Velodyne VX10 sub. I have no doubt I have enough power for my 3.5m by 6m room. However, that sense of bass only comes through on kick ass scenes. I wan that signature sound. I guess I need a sub per channel!!!????

 

[Zarn_Smith]

There will never be a right answer from the forums as each room is different and it is going to take time for you to play with your equipment before you get it where you want it. You do have some nice shiny equipment to play with however!

It sounds like you want a bit more bass. The things I would try in this situation are to move the floorstanders closer to the walls and perhaps the bookshelves closer to the corners of the room. (Same applies to the subwoofer - closer to the wall or corner for more bass, further away for less).

Next I would check the amp settings. I don't own an Onkyo so you will need to work out the details yourself. Usually if you set your speakers to Large the bass in the 5 channels will not be diverted to the sub. (Only the .1 will go to the sub which means the sub is doing nothing most of the time.) Setting the speakers to small does the opposite. Try setting the rears to small then try it, then the fronts to small and see if that makes a difference. Another option on my amp is a plus setting which means the bass goes to the sub as well as the normal speakers. >)

Tell me if that makes a difference.

 

[RobinKidderminster]

I recon volume plays a part too. Cinema is loud. Larger rooms will allow u to go louder & dare I mention room treatment?

 

[FunkyMonkey]

Been doing some research. The only way to get the sound I want is to increase the power and bass to each channel. So I need a MCH poweramp and sub for at least each front channel!

 

[bigboss]

Set all the speakers to small and crossover at 80Hz. This will allow the speakers to concentrate on higher frequencies, and leave the sub to do what it's best at. Experiment with different crossover settings until you're happy with the results.

 

[Son_of_SJ]

However, how do I get that rich, deep character that you get at the cinema?

Eh??? I've certainly not heard a deep, rich character in several of my local cinemas! In fact last weekend I played my Blu-Ray of Argo in my parlour, and I was thinking that I heard some deep notes that I definitely don't remember when I saw it at the cinema in late October. But memory is fickle, I'll concede that!

In my three rooms, for what it's worth, I have the main front pair of speakers and the surround pair of speakers set to Large, because that's what the room optimiser prodedure of the receivers decided that they were. I have experimented with setting to Small, but I didn't like the result. But, I stress, that's what worked for my ears and my rooms, and I suspect that my various speakers and subwoofers are rather larger than yours. I would certainly suggest that you experiment with setting the speakers to Small, then to Large, or maybe set the front speakers to Large and the surrounds to Small, and see what works best for your room. As bigboss says, 80Hz is a generally accepted default crossover frequency if you have any speakers that are set to Small.

 

[ideal av]

i`d suggest going for a good sub if your sure yours is setup correctly

try setting all your speakers to small 80hz and try the sub at 90hz maybe even 100hz but ultimatley the only way you`ll get bone bending results is with a good subwoofer

regardless of what you may read subwoofers are definately not all the same

I run with 1 sub in a room larger than yours and its been said its better than their local Imax

horses for courses though, good subs cost good money

 

[ellisdj]

you only need 1 sub mate!!!! - chances are you a sitiing in a bass null for the big part of the freq range and all you are hearing is a bass boom when that happens in a film.

Also known as one note bass.

Does your receiver have bass management? Like Audessey?

Its a bit of work but learn to use Room Equlisation Wizard to measure your subs frequency response so you can put it in the best spot in your room.

Its easy to tame peaks - you cannot do anything with a bass null.

 

[ellisdj]

However, how do I get that rich, deep character that you get at the cinema?

Eh??? I've certainly not heard a deep, rich character in several of my local cinemas! In fact last weekend I played my Blu-Ray of Argo in my parlour, and I was thinking that I heard some deep notes that I definitely don't remember when I saw it at the cinema in late October. But memory is fickle, I'll concede that!

In my three rooms, for what it's worth, I have the main front pair of speakers and the surround pair of speakers set to Large, because that's what the room optimiser prodedure of the receivers decided that they were. I have experimented with setting to Small, but I didn't like the result. But, I stress, that's what worked for my ears and my rooms, and I suspect that my various speakers and subwoofers are rather larger than yours. I would certainly suggest that you experiment with setting the speakers to Small, then to Large, or maybe set the front speakers to Large and the surrounds to Small, and see what works best for your room. As bigboss says, 80Hz is a generally accepted default crossover frequency if you have any speakers that are set to Small.

Receivers always set trhe speakers to Large Son of SJ - that doesnt make it the best thing to do.

Unless the speakers arte capable of producing down to 30hz in your room - which is unlikely for several reasons then you want to set them to small.

Just because an av reciever auto does something - doesnt make it 100% right mate......

 

[ear]

You can get a second bigger sub and set it so it give only the lower frequencies... and set it loud..that will work. and can also break some windows.

 

[Son_of_SJ]

Receivers always set trhe speakers to Large Son of SJ - that doesnt make it the best thing to do.

Er no, receivers certainly don't always set the speakers to Large. In my parlour system the centre, front height, front wide and rear surround speakers were correctly identified by the receiver as Small. Likewise the centre, front height and single rear surround in the kitchen, and the centre, front height and single rear surround in the bedroom - all were correctly identified as Small. In all rooms the main front pair and the surround pair were correctly identified as Large.

Unless the speakers arte capable of producing down to 30hz in your room - which is unlikely for several reasons then you want to set them to small.

Particularly in the parlour and kitchen, my main front and rear speakers, not the subwoofer, go quite deep. In fact once I told the receivers that no subwoofer was connected so that it would send the LFE stuff to the main front speakers and the result, while not as good as actually using the subwoofer, was quite passable.

Just because an av reciever auto does something - doesnt make it 100% right mate......

I agree, that's why I have experimented in all the rooms by setting the speakers to Small, and I personally much prefer the sound when the main front and surround speakers are set to Large. But I concede that other rooms, other systems and other ears may prefer otherwise.

 

[Dan Turner]

In my experience (I had a surround sound system in various guises/iterations for many years) it's better to set the speakers to large or small according to what they actually are - i.e. utilise as much of the frequency range that they are capable of producing as you can, and hopefully your amp allows you to set the crossover point per speaker so they can hand off to the sub at the appropriate point in the frequency range (actually given that they probably drop off a fair bit before the lower threshold that the manufacturer quotes I'd allow a good 20hz overlap).

It stands to reason that you are going to get the best sound by doing it this way because the reason that the bass channel is produced by 1 sub is because bass is relatively non-directional (i.e. your ears can't tell which direction low bass is coming from - if it sounds like you can it's because you're hearing cues, like harmonics, higher-up the frequency range), however the higher up the frequency range you go, then your ears can progressively detect the direction more readily, by the time you're in the upper bass then in my experience you can definitely hear where it's coming from. There is a reason that full size speaker packages sound better than satellite ones - if you're going to cut all the bass off below 80hz then you might as well have bought a satellite speaker package for much less money. After all what do the cinemas go for...

i've heard it said that the soundtracks are mixed assuming an 80hz cross-over point and thus it stands to reason to set your speakers to small which will set an 80hz cross-over point for you. With all due respect, I think this is clearly the wrong advice, because if soundtracks are mixed assuming an 80hz cross-over point then all that means is that the content of the dedicated bass (the '.1') channel is going to be 80hz and lower and that's going to be going to the sub regardless of what other speaker sizes and crossover points you set. The other 5,6 or 7 channels are all full-range channels and you determine what your speakers produce vs the sub with your speaker size and cross-over point. For me, and the experience of experimentation bears this out, utilising the full frequency range that your speakers are capable of is a no brainer, and demonstrably better sounding - 'richer' is the main adjective I would apply.

But anyway, even the opposing advice you've received here suggests the same course of action: experiment with your speaker size and cross-over settings.

Also, if your sub is not already in a corner try moving it there and then experiment with moving it into and away from the corner - the boundary reinforcement can boost the bass quite a lot, but may make it sound lumpy (i.e. undue emphasis on some frequencies) - if that's a problem then try the opposite approach - i.e. away from corners but turned up more. There is no substitute for experimentation when it comes to speakers in any application and moving them about even small amounts can have quite dramatic effects on the sound.

Good luck, hope you get it sorted.