Help with receivers (and value of multieq over xt)

J

jorill

Audiophyte
I have a relatively modest budget (1-1.5k) to buy a home theater setup and have been trying to make the most use of what I could, but I am stuck as to what receiver would make the most sense for me. Over black friday sale I bought a set of 7 speakers in Sony Core series (2xfloor standing @$100/each, center @$100, bookshelf speakers $75/pair, atmos up firing $100/pair). I then spent $500 on a sub (pb12-nsd). For a receiver I went with the Denon AVRS740 ($350).

The room I am in is shaped like an L, with my setup facing the bottom _ of the L with the subwoofer in the corner (if that makes sense). I am sure I need to mess around in positioning the sub, but I am finding that either the volume of the whole setup is either too loud or not loud enough. Given the shape of the room, my listening position is fairly close to speakers (~8ft from front, ~5ft from rears, ~11ft from sub). I just can't seem to get the settings where I can clearly hear the full soundstage without it being uncomfortably loud and the bass booming/shaking or too quiet to not get a full experience. Crossovers at 80hz, Front L/R are full signal, subset to LFE+main. I have messed around with the various MultiEQ settings available on the S740.

My question is whether some of the difficulty I am having in getting everything setup could be solved with a different receiver (since I can't fix the room shape/size)? The DenonX2400 is about the same cost had as the stepped up Audessy MultiEQ - but I just don't know how much of a difference the extra satellite filters will make (the sub filters are the same).

Anyone have an idea on whether the MultiXT would make an appreciable difference or whether the X2400 would otherwise perform better over the S740? Alternatively, is it possible (at least for the sub issue) that I just bought too much sub and should switch to a sealed box instead (sb-12 maybe?).

I am using this setup connected to PC and PS4 for both for video games/movies but not really for music.

Thank you!
 
KEW

KEW

Audioholic Overlord
I believe it is likely that the sub may have too much boom for your room!
Try moving the sub to the center of the room where it will not have as much cabin gain as a simple test to see if things improve by much. If so the sealed sub may work better for you.
Also, be sure you turned Dynamic Volume off and Dynamic EQ on!
Hard to tell, but the problem you describe does not sound like the kind of thing that upgrading from multiEQ to MultiEQ XT would resolve.
 
lovinthehd

lovinthehd

Audioholic Jedi
Why are you running your speakers as large and with LFE+Main? Try small and just LFE....
 
KEW

KEW

Audioholic Overlord
Why are you running your speakers as large and with LFE+Main? Try small and just LFE....
I think I can answer that - because setup set speakers to large!

I missed that!
Definitely the first adjustment to make.
Unfortunately Audyssey/Denon does not use good judgement in determining small vs large.
This is a known problem and you just need to manually switch speakers to small (you don't need to run Audyssey after the switch as it would switch it back to large)!

These are things I think 95% of us know to do after going thropugh the setup routine:
Turn Dynamic EQ on
Turn Dynamic Volume off
Set main speakers to small

I'm not at home where I can double check the menu. However, I think you want to leave it set to LFE + Main as in the sub will play both LFE and main signal below the crossover frequency.
Changing the mains to small will prevent them from attempting the bass that is best left to the subwoofer.
@lovinthehd , please check me on that to make sure I got it straight!
Thanks!
 
Last edited:
lovinthehd

lovinthehd

Audioholic Jedi
I think I can answer that - because setup set speakers to large!

I missed that!
Definitely the first adjustment to make.
Unfortunately Audyssey/Denon does not use good judgement in determining small vs large.
This is a known problem and you just need to manually switch speakers to small (you don't need to run Audyssey after the switch as it would switch it back to large)!

These are things I think 95% of us know to do after going thropugh the setup routine:
Turn Dynamic EQ on
Turn Dynamic Volume off
Set main speakers to small

I'm not at home where I can double check the menu. However, I think you want to leave it set to LFE + Main as in the sub will play both LFE and main signal below the crossover frequency.
Changing the mains to small will prevent them from attempting the bass that is best left to the subwoofer.
@lovinthehd , please check me on that to make sure I got it straight!
Thanks!
That would be Denon overriding Audyssey's position that when a sub is used speakers should be set to use bass management (i.e. set to small). AVR marketing guys not wanting to tell you your junk is "small" :)

Straight otherwise.
 

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