Audyssey set up problem

[finfan1966]

Yesterday my new Onkyo 3008 receiver came in the mail. I was excited to put it together as soon as it came. After unhooking all the wires on my previous Onkyo 807 receiver I ran the Audyssey speaker set up. All my speakers were detected but instead or running the system a few more times and then giving the option to save it, it came back to the first page saying speaker error. The only option it gives you is either cancel or retry. I tried it again a few times and still the same problem.

I was on the phone yesterday with Onkyo technical support for over 4 hours trying to get it to run Audyssey all the way through. The first time I ran it the receiver shut off. I am not sure if I should just send the receiver back and get a new one or keep trying to rewire my speakers.

I hate to send the receiver back and have nothing wrong with it. However I have had 2 Onkyos before this one and never had any problems when I ran the Audyssey speaker calibration.

Anyone else have this problem before?

 

[M Code]

Try a Processor Reset...
Then rerun Audyssey..

Just my $0.02..

 

[finfan1966]

Try a Processor Reset...
Then rerun Audyssey..

Just my $0.02..

I did that already but no luck

 

[TLS Guy]

Yesterday my new Onkyo 3008 receiver came in the mail. I was excited to put it together as soon as it came. After unhooking all the wires on my previous Onkyo 807 receiver I ran the Audyssey speaker set up. All my speakers were detected but instead or running the system a few more times and then giving the option to save it, it came back to the first page saying speaker error. The only option it gives you is either cancel or retry. I tried it again a few times and still the same problem.

I was on the phone yesterday with Onkyo technical support for over 4 hours trying to get it to run Audyssey all the way through. The first time I ran it the receiver shut off. I am not sure if I should just send the receiver back and get a new one or keep trying to rewire my speakers.

I hate to send the receiver back and have nothing wrong with it. However I have had 2 Onkyos before this one and never had any problems when I ran the Audyssey speaker calibration.

Anyone else have this problem before?

Two possibilities: -

1). You wired a speaker or speakers out of phase. Recheck everything carefully.

2). This may be a newer version if Audyssey. It may be you have all or some speakers that have second order crossovers, this can put the tweeter and woofer 180 degrees out of phase at crossover. The manufacturer then reverses the leads the tweeter to avoid a null at crossover. The more sensitive and complete the auto program, the more likely the auto set up will "call" speaker error.

What are all your speakers, and can we get specks on the crossover?

It may well be that you will not be able to use Audyssey with your current speaker set up.

I now design crossovers to avoid this problem. Second order crossover has a symmetric lobing pattern, and are very popular. It is often very difficult to avoid the above problem, but generally I choose my drivers carefully, and use the the baffle step compensation circuitry to help correct phase so the drivers are not out of phase at crossover, but its tricky.

In a lot of commercial speakers not much care is taken.

Before HT and multiple speakers and auto set up programs this was not an issue.

 

[TLS Guy]

I have now had a chance to look at your speakers, They are vintage Polk all of them.

Your mains are three way with the bass active. Polk is a manufacturer that frequently wired drivers out of phase in times past.

There is a good chance that the mids in your mains are wired out of phase and the tweeter in the center out of phase. That would put you mids out of phase with the center and the center tweeter out of phase with the main tweeters. The surrounds may well have out of phase tweeters also.

A sensitive auto calibration system will just give a continuous error in this situation.

 

[finfan1966]

I have now had a chance to look at your speakers, They are vintage Polk all of them.

Your mains are three way with the bass active. Polk is a manufacturer that frequently wired drivers out of phase in times past.

There is a good chance that the mids in your mains are wired out of phase and the tweeter in the center out of phase. That would put you mids out of phase with the center and the center tweeter out of phase with the main tweeters. The surrounds may well have out of phase tweeters also.

A sensitive auto calibration system will just give a continuous error in this situation.

I had no problem doing the Audyssey set up with my Onkyo 807. So I really don't think there is a problem with my speakers.

 

[TLS Guy]

I had no problem doing the Audyssey set up with my Onkyo 807. So I really don't think there is a problem with my speakers.

As I stated before, you need to check the version if Audyssey. It now has numerous iterations, and is constantly improved.

Check and see if you have the same version as before. If not I bet the newer version is more sensitive to phasing.

I find on checking your 807 had Audyssey DSX.

Your new receiver has the much more powerful and comprehensive Audyssey MultEQ XT32.

I would bet that newer version is sensitive to a boat load of phase issues with your Polks. Any speaker from Polk that I have heard has had a boat load of driver integration problems. I would bet playing fast and loose with phase has a lot to do with it, but I have never had one on the bench to test.

I think the powerful Audyssey program you now have confirming suspicions I have held for years.

 

[finfan1966]

As I stated before, you need to check the version if Audyssey. It now has numerous iterations, and is constantly improved.

Check and see if you have the same version as before. If not I bet the newer version is more sensitive to phasing.

So do you think I should do a manual set up instead of using the Audyssey auto set up? I am not that knowledgable with speaker calibrations and distance. Do you think if I called Onkyo techical support tomorrow they could walk me through it?

So you think there is nothing wrong with the receiver?

 

[TLS Guy]

So do you think I should do a manual set up instead of using the Audyssey auto set up? I am not that knowledgable with speaker calibrations and distance. Do you think if I called Onkyo techical support tomorrow they could walk me through it?

So you think there is nothing wrong with the receiver?

Far more likely than not your receiver is fine. To be sure you would have to set the receiver up, using an up to date set of good speakers.

You will have to do a manual set up.

You can set distance with a tape measure. You will need an spl meter to set levels.

I don't think Onkyo support will be any help.

However if Audyssey is showing speaker error, it is time for a new speaker system. I doubt those vintage speakers will get the best out of your receiver in a 5.1 system, in fact far from it.

 

[GranteedEV]

Sounds silly, but make sure the microphone is snugly plugged in.

 

[TLS Guy]

Sounds silly, but make sure the microphone is snugly plugged in.

I bet it would know if the mic was unplugged or faulty. I don't think it would say speaker error. He can see what error information he gets if he unplugs the mic. I checked, if the mic was unplugged it would say Mic set error.

 

[TLS Guy]

From the designer of Audyssey, Kris Kariakarkis: -

MultEQ detects absolute phase for each loudspeaker. Some loudspeakers are designed with intentional phase reversals in the drivers in order to address crossover problems. MultEQ will detect that and report an error. The best course of action is to simply check the wiring and press "Skip" if it is correct. MultEQ simply reports a possible wiring reversal, it does not automatically switch the phase.

As I suspected if a speaker has drivers with phase reversal, you get the message you are getting.

I guess you can press skip and Audyssey will accept the error that can not be corrected and proceed.

However, having speakers with phase reversal of drivers in a HT system is a bad thing, unless all speakers are identical.

The phase reversal is necessary to prevent a null at crossover. However out of the crossover region the drivers are out of phase. If you are using a single set of speakers there is no real problem unless you believe in absolute phase. Although I have a feeling this can't be a good thing in a speaker and have sought to avoid it in my designs for a long time.

It is a bad thing when you have different speakers, as if some speakers have phase reversed drivers and some don't, then there is no way the system can be correctly phased and so this will affect overall sound quality in a significantly negative fashion.

Say you have mains with tweeter phase reversal but not the center, then the tweeters will be 180 degrees out of phase above the crossover region. That is a really bad thing for imaging coherence and blending of speakers.

This probably occurs in systems more than people realize.

In your case this confirms my suspicion that some drivers have phase reversal in your system and all drivers are not in phase.

This is reason enough to update your system, as this will limit performance of your system. Unfortunately you can only correct this with a new set of speakers.

 

[finfan1966]

Far more likely than not your receiver is fine. To be sure you would have to set the receiver up, using an up to date set of good speakers.

You will have to do a manual set up.

You can set distance with a tape measure. You will need an spl meter to set levels.

I don't think Onkyo support will be any help.

However if Audyssey is showing speaker error, it is time for a new speaker system. I doubt those vintage speakers will get the best out of your receiver in a 5.1 system, in fact far from it.

There is nothing wrong with my speakers - they sound great! What the problem is with the Audyssey mic. I replaced the Onkyo 3008 and put back on my Onkyo 807. The Audyssey mic for that system had no problem running the speaker calibration all the way through. Onkyo technical support said most likely it was a bad Audyssey mic and that's why it wouldn't complete the calibration.

You are crazy if you think I am going to replace all my speakers. I will never replace those Polks. They sound great!

I sent the Onkyo 3008 back yesterday to Vann's. They gave me a prepaid shipping label. So now I have to decide whether I want to exchange the receiver with another Onkyo 3008 or just get my money back. I have a week to think about it. The Onkyo 3008 has a much lower THD distortion rate of .05 instead of .08 for the Onkyo 807.

 

[finfan1966]

From the designer of Audyssey, Kris Kariakarkis: -



As I suspected if a speaker has drivers with phase reversal, you get the message you are getting.

I guess you can press skip and Audyssey will accept the error that can not be corrected and proceed.

However, having speakers with phase reversal of drivers in a HT system is a bad thing, unless all speakers are identical.

The phase reversal is necessary to prevent a null at crossover. However out of the crossover region the drivers are out of phase. If you are using a single set of speakers there is no real problem unless you believe in absolute phase. Although I have a feeling this can't be a good thing in a speaker and have sought to avoid it in my designs for a long time.

It is a bad thing when you have different speakers, as if some speakers have phase reversed drivers and some don't, then there is no way the system can be correctly phased and so this will affect overall sound quality in a significantly negative fashion.

Say you have mains with tweeter phase reversal but not the center, then the tweeters will be 180 degrees out of phase above the crossover region. That is a really bad thing for imaging coherence and blending of speakers.

This probably occurs in systems more than people realize.

In your case this confirms my suspicion that some drivers have phase reversal in your system and all drivers are not in phase.

This is reason enough to update your system, as this will limit performance of your system. Unfortunately you can only correct this with a new set of speakers.

Also there is no option for skip! There are only 2 options after the first sequence of Audyssey speaker calibration - Retry or Cancel! If you click cancel and do again - the same menu appears.

The man from Onkyo technical support explained to me that there is an algorithm inside the Audyssey mic that tells the receiver what to do for the next sequence. If there is a problem with the mic it will not proceed and complete the Audyssey process.

 

[TLS Guy]

There is nothing wrong with my speakers - they sound great! What the problem is with the Audyssey mic. I replaced the Onkyo 3008 and put back on my Onkyo 807. The Audyssey mic for that system had no problem running the speaker calibration all the way through. Onkyo technical support said most likely it was a bad Audyssey mic and that's why it wouldn't complete the calibration.

You are crazy if you think I am going to replace all my speakers. I will never replace those Polks. They sound great!

I sent the Onkyo 3008 back yesterday to Vann's. They gave me a prepaid shipping label. So now I have to decide whether I want to exchange the receiver with another Onkyo 3008 or just get my money back. I have a week to think about it. The Onkyo 3008 has a much lower THD distortion rate of .05 instead of .08 for the Onkyo 807.

With modern equipment anything is possible.

However if the mic was faulty, Audyssey should have told you so.

If your speakers do have reversed phased speakers and I can't be sure they do, then you will get the same speaker error with the replacement. On the Audyssey site, the designer says the version of Audyssey in that receiver will do that.

If the designer, who I have met by the way, says that will happen, it will happen.

 

[finfan1966]

With modern equipment anything is possible.

However if the mic was faulty, Audyssey should have told you so.

If your speakers do have reversed phased speakers and I can't be sure they do, then you will get the same speaker error with the replacement. On the Audyssey site, the designer says the version of Audyssey in that receiver will do that.

If the designer, who I have met by the way, says that will happen, it will happen.

There is really not that much of a time gap from Onkyo 807 and Onkyo 3008. I bought my receiver only a year ago before the Onkyo 3008. I have a hard time believing that now my speakers are outdated just because of a Audyssey auto calibration problem.

 

[TLS Guy]

There is really not that much of a time gap from Onkyo 807 and Onkyo 3008. I bought my receiver only a year ago before the Onkyo 3008. I have a hard time believing that now my speakers are outdated just because of a Audyssey auto calibration problem.

I checked Onkyo's site and your two receivers have different versions.

The designer is a a very bright chap and a full professor a the University of Southern California. He does not let the grass grow under his feet.

He is correct, in that a program should detect reverse polarity drivers. The owner should know.

I would check with POLK and ask them if any of your speakers have reversed polarity drivers. That is the easiest way to do this. Their specs as usual are minimal and not forthcoming.

While the speakers may sound good to you, I can assure you a mix of speakers with some having reversed polarity drivers and some not, is far from ideal. It really would preclude an advanced auto Eq program like you have from working correctly.

As I stated, I got my information about getting speaker error from your version of Audyssey straight from the designer, in answer to a similar situation as yours, if in fact you do have reverse polarity drivers in the mix. He could only answer like I did, as he can not know which speakers have reversed polarity drivers and which do not. However, I was glad to have my reasoning validated by Kris Kariakarkis when I did more digging.

This is not the first time for this problem on a post. The Yamaha system has kicked out with reverse polarity drivers for a long time.

 

[finfan1966]

I checked Onkyo's site and your two receivers have different versions.

The designer is a a very bright chap and a full professor a the University of Southern California. He does not let the grass grow under his feet.

He is correct, in that a program should detect reverse polarity drivers. The owner should know.

I would check with POLK and ask them if any of your speakers have reversed polarity drivers. That is the easiest way to do this. Their specs as usual are minimal and not forthcoming.

While the speakers may sound good to you, I can assure you a mix of speakers with some having reversed polarity drivers and some not, is far from ideal. It really would preclude an advanced auto Eq program like you have from working correctly.

As I stated, I got my information about getting speaker error from your version of Audyssey straight from the designer, in answer to a similar situation as yours, if in fact you do have reverse polarity drivers in the mix. He could only answer like I did, as he can not know which speakers have reversed polarity drivers and which do not. However, I was glad to have my reasoning validated by Kris Kariakarkis when I did more digging.

This is not the first time for this problem on a post. The Yamaha system has kicked out with reverse polarity drivers for a long time.

Well either way it doesn't matter now because I sent the Onkyo 3008 back to Vann's for a full refund. Right now I am using my Onkyo 807 and I already ran another Audyssey calibration and everything is cool.

So basically you are saying that even if I upgrade to another receiver such as Denon that I will have the same problem when running the auto Audyssey set up because of a problem with my speakers?

 

[TLS Guy]

Well either way it doesn't matter now because I sent the Onkyo 3008 back to Vann's for a full refund. Right now I am using my Onkyo 807 and I already ran another Audyssey calibration and everything is cool.

So basically you are saying that even if I upgrade to another receiver such as Denon that I will have the same problem when running the auto Audyssey set up because of a problem with my speakers?

If it has the same version of Audyssey you may well.

However, as I said you can find out for certain, by contacting Polk, as long as they still have records on those speakers.

If they don't you can find out, by removing all the drivers and getting a look at the crossovers.

Don't forget you can do manual set up.

Personally, I would want to know if I had reverse polarity drivers in the system.

 

[BoredSysAdmin]

I replaced the Onkyo 3008 and put back on my Onkyo 807. The Audyssey mic for that system had no problem running the speaker calibration all the way through. Onkyo technical support said most likely it was a bad Audyssey mic and that's why it wouldn't complete the calibration.

Did Actually Onkyo Tech rep told you to swap the mics? Everything I know about this process is each avr model gets it's own microphone and it's unique calibration. I doubt two very different receivers with two VERY different Audyssey versions would use exactly same microphone ...