Marantz AV7706 Poor Surround

[LGSkier]

I was wondering if anyone could point me in the right direction on a new AV7706. The surround has never sounded right, particularly on Atmos. It is set up correctly and tests welI with Audessey. I have tested it with a Roku Ultra(Netflix/Prime/Disney) as well as a Tivo and Panasonic Blu-ray. The 7706 seems to correctly identify the mode (Atmos/DTS-HD-MSTR/ DD+) etc. But most of the time the 11.2 setup never seems to utilize even the rear surround speakers. When I bring up the information screen it (almost) always displays an audio sampling rate of 48KHz. Shouldn't this mirror the rate of the incoming stream? On rare occasions, I have seen that number bump up and the sound improve.

 

[Trebdp83]

Just about everything other than music in hi-res will come over at 48khz. Without applying an upmix mode, the speakers corresponding to the channels in the track will be utilized. So, a Dolby Digital 5.1 track will play that way unless an upmixer is applied to send audio to the surround back and atmos speakers and so on up the codec ladder. Remember when Denon included channel input boxes on the left side of the display panel and channel output boxes on the right side of the display panel? It made it quick and easy to see what was coming in AND what was going out.

 

[Leemix]

Make sure you dont use direct/pure direct.
What Audyssey show as after is what its trying to achieve, not what it actually does, it can differ drastically.
48KHz is the standard sampling rate for TV/movies multichannel. CD is 44.1 and both are perfectly fine, what makes the difference in quality is how heavily compressed the sound is and if its a lossy compression (DD+) or lossless(D TrueHD)

What in particular is it you find “poor” with the sound, too little bass, too much, boomy, too bright?

Have you tried with audyssey turned off or parts of it off?
Make sure you do not use dynamic volume unless you want to watch late at night and not bother people much.
Try dynamic EQ both on and off and see what you think.

Are you sure you did a good job measuring, did you do it multiple times or only ran it once while unfamiliar with it. Did you measure too large an area, each measurement shouldnt be more than max a foot apart.(its not seats you measure even if many of the drawings indicate it is)


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[LGSkier]

Make sure you dont use direct/pure direct.
What Audyssey show as after is what its trying to achieve, not what it actually does, it can differ drastically.
48KHz is the standard sampling rate for TV/movies multichannel. CD is 44.1 and both are perfectly fine, what makes the difference in quality is how heavily compressed the sound is and if its a lossy compression (DD+) or lossless(D TrueHD)

What in particular is it you find “poor” with the sound, too little bass, too much, boomy, too bright?

Have you tried with audyssey turned off or parts of it off?
Make sure you do not use dynamic volume unless you want to watch late at night and not bother people much.
Try dynamic EQ both on and off and see what you think.

Are you sure you did a good job measuring, did you do it multiple times or only ran it once while unfamiliar with it. Did you measure too large an area, each measurement shouldnt be more than max a foot apart.(its not seats you measure even if many of the drawings indicate it is)


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

I did run the Audessey several times. I used the 8 positions as indicated. All within 2' of position 1. Using both the internal software on the AV7706 as well as Audessey on an iPad and uploading the information for Preset 1 and 2 to the AV7706. DTS-HD sounds ok, but Atmos is horrible. And I swear there was one instance under Atmos where the sampling rate changed from 48KHz to 192Khz and the sound improved considerably for a few minutes.

Just about everything other than music in hi-res will come over at 48khz. Without applying an upmix mode, the speakers corresponding to the channels in the track will be utilized. So, a Dolby Digital 5.1 track will play that way unless an upmixer is applied to send audio to the surround back and atmos speakers and so on up the codec ladder. Remember when Denon included channel input boxes on the left side of the display panel and channel output boxes on the right side of the display panel? It made it quick and easy to see what was coming in AND what was going out.

Make sure you dont use direct/pure direct.
What Audyssey show as after is what its trying to achieve, not what it actually does, it can differ drastically.
48KHz is the standard sampling rate for TV/movies multichannel. CD is 44.1 and both are perfectly fine, what makes the difference in quality is how heavily compressed the sound is and if its a lossy compression (DD+) or lossless(D TrueHD)

What in particular is it you find “poor” with the sound, too little bass, too much, boomy, too bright?

Have you tried with audyssey turned off or parts of it off?
Make sure you do not use dynamic volume unless you want to watch late at night and not bother people much.
Try dynamic EQ both on and off and see what you think.

Are you sure you did a good job measuring, did you do it multiple times or only ran it once while unfamiliar with it. Did you measure too large an area, each measurement shouldnt be more than max a foot apart.(its not seats you measure even if many of the drawings indicate it is)


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

I tried with both Audessey on/off as well as the Dynamic EQ on/off. I will give that a try again to see.

 

[Leemix]

I did run the Audessey several times. I used the 8 positions as indicated. All within 2' of position 1. Using both the internal software on the AV7706 as well as Audessey on an iPad and uploading the information for Preset 1 and 2 to the AV7706. DTS-HD sounds ok, but Atmos is horrible. And I swear there was one instance under Atmos where the sampling rate changed from 48KHz to 192Khz and the sound improved considerably for a few minutes.


I tried with both Audessey on/off as well as the Dynamic EQ on/off. I will give that a try again to see.

Are you sure it wasnt Kbps and not KHz because the sampling rate is constant and at 48KHz for all streaming afaik, also on blurays.

Was the bluray sound good and is it directly connected to the AVP and not the TV?

If you have a bad internet connection the picture and sound quality can be downgraded and sound and look bad.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[PENG]

And I swear there was one instance under Atmos where the sampling rate changed from 48KHz to 192Khz and the sound improved considerably for a few minutes.


I tried with both Audessey on/off as well as the Dynamic EQ on/off. I will give that a try again to see.

As long as Audyssey is on, sampling rated will be 48 kHz. Even if Audyssey is off and you are using direct mode, you still won't get 192 kHz for Atmos movies. And if it did (but it really didn't..), if you heard improved sound, you were just thinking you heard it, that you really didn't, sorry.. but that's the truth.

How loud do you listen? What's the volume setting and what's the level trim settings for the main channels post Audyssey? Unless you listen to near reference level, that is too loud for most people, you should turn dynamic EQ on and dynamic volume off. Audyssey typically would level off /flatten the bass from 20 to 200 Hz and most people don't it flat from 20 to 200 hz. You can compensate for that by increasing the subwoofer level (via the speaker/level menu) by 2 to 5 dB, though a better way to do it is by using the editor app that allows you to customize your own "house curve" for the 20-200 Hz range.

 

[LGSkier]

As long as Audyssey is on, sampling rated will be 48 kHz. Even if Audyssey is off and you are using direct mode, you still won't get 192 kHz for Atmos movies. And if it did (but it really didn't..), if you heard improved sound, you were just thinking you heard it, that you really didn't, sorry.. but that's the truth.

How loud do you listen? What's the volume setting and what's the level trim settings for the main channels post Audyssey? Unless you listen to near reference level, that is too loud for most people, you should turn dynamic EQ on and dynamic volume off. Audyssey typically would level off /flatten the bass from 20 to 200 Hz and most people don't it flat from 20 to 200 hz. You can compensate for that by increasing the subwoofer level (via the speaker/level menu) by 2 to 5 dB, though a better way to do it is by using the editor app that allows you to customize your own "house curve" for the 20-200 Hz range.

Got it thanks.

 

[LGSkier]

I did run the Audessey several times. I used the 8 positions as indicated. All within 2' of position 1. Using both the internal software on the AV7706 as well as Audessey on an iPad and uploading the information for Preset 1 and 2 to the AV7706. DTS-HD sounds ok, but Atmos is horrible. And I swear there was one instance under Atmos where the sampling rate changed from 48KHz to 192Khz and the sound improved considerably for a few minutes.


I tried with both Audessey on/off as well as the Dynamic EQ on/off. I will give that a try again to see.

So with some more testing and the suggestions from you guys, I narrowed it down. Using an Atmos Blu-ray and DTS-HD Disc, the sound is awesome. It looks to be related to streaming. UHD from a Roku Ultra is horrible. I wish the 7706 would provide a little better detail. Displaying 48KHz for everything is not that helpful. My old Integra did a better job than that (Mbits at least). I am going to try an AppleTV next to see if it does better.

 

[LGSkier]

Are you sure it wasnt Kbps and not KHz because the sampling rate is constant and at 48KHz for all streaming afaik, also on blurays.

Was the bluray sound good and is it directly connected to the AVP and not the TV?

If you have a bad internet connection the picture and sound quality can be downgraded and sound and look bad.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

220Mbit tested speed at the switch interface. 65Mbit reported by the Ultra. Blu-ray is good.

 

[Leemix]

Check that you have your streaming services and apps set to max quality, no data saving or anything like that.

 

[Trebdp83]

Keep in mind the Apple TV will send EVERYTHING out at 48khz. The Apple will also convert everything to LPCM unless set to convert, at which point the audio is down converted to Dolby Digital 5.1. You want it set to Auto for Audio with Atmos set to ON. This means a displayed codec of Atmos/PCM or just Atmos. For non atmos tracks, MULTI IN will be displayed indicating multichannel PCM signal. The upside to LPCM is that one can apply Dolby Surround AND DTS Neural:X upmixing to the track since it does not trigger a Dolby Flag. Some models allow DTS upmixing to an atmos track while others are not allowed to do so.

 

[Leemix]

DTS-HD is usually mastered with quite a lot more bass than Dolby digital/trueHD so check a trueHD disc also to compare.
Is it the bass thats the problem or mid and upper range also?


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[PENG]

So with some more testing and the suggestions from you guys, I narrowed it down. Using an Atmos Blu-ray and DTS-HD Disc, the sound is awesome. It looks to be related to streaming. UHD from a Roku Ultra is horrible. I wish the 7706 would provide a little better detail. Displaying 48KHz for everything is not that helpful. My old Integra did a better job than that (Mbits at least). I am going to try an AppleTV next to see if it does better.

Keep in mind there is no audible advantage of sampling rate higher than 48 kHz. Audyssey did not set the limit, Denon/Marantz do, as they don't want to waste processing power.

For music listening using DACs, I do always want to have capability to play source contents of the highest bit depth/sampling rate but its only because I believe there are more high quality recordings available in high resolution music files in the 24b/192 kHz or higher and DSD128 or higher buckets. It is all about recording/mastering quality, not the bit depth/sampling rate.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Even when it shows “ATMOS” or “DTS-HD MA”, it’s what we call FAKEMOS and FakeSurround.

 

[lovinthehd]

Shoulda gone for the Denon avr?

 

[Leemix]

Even when it shows “ATMOS” or “DTS-HD MA”, it’s what we call FAKEMOS and FakeSurround.

Um what? Atmos can be DD+ based or trueHD based but both are still atmos i guess even though it would have been nice if they differentiated the name,
DTS-HD MA is lossless “normal” surround

 

[PENG]

Shoulda gone for the Denon avr?

Especially with the price increases on the 2020 models. Last I checked, the 7706 is now $1,000 more than the Denon AVR-X4700H!! Unless someone needs the XLRs, it is a no brainer to save $1,000 and get much better performance (based on bench test results of the 8805A and 7705, ie., on paper at least/only), and potentially save a lot more on external amplification. I used to think its okay if I like the Marantz look, for the same money or even $300 more back in the days of my first AVP, the AV7705, what the heck I went for it, but not $1,000 more now, no way.

Marantz's marketing teams deserve a big award for their success..

 

[Trebdp83]

I keep going back to the original post and the statement about the Marantz correctly identifying the mode. It actually identifies a signal and can apply a mode of processing to it. Direct mode bypasses processing and plays the signal back as it comes in. So, a Dolby TrueHD 5.1 track gets played over 5.1 speakers.

The next mode is that of the signal and adds bass management and such but still producing 5.1 channels of sound. Anyone wanting sound produced from additional speakers needs to apply more processing. So, for 11.2(7.1.4), one needs to change to an upmixing mode. Apply Dolby Surround and one gets a display of Dolby TrueHD + Dolby Surround. Use DTS processing and one gets Dolby TrueHD + Neural:X. These modes expand sound output to all of the speakers in the system.

Atmos mode can only be selected if the Dolby Digital Plus or Dolby TrueHD tracks contain atmos metadata and I believe all atmos tracks, DD+ or TrueHD based, are 7.1 so no need for additional processing which is why there is no Atmos + Dolby Surround mode to fill in the back surround channels.

DTS processing gets trickier and especially so with IMAX. So, not gonna’ go there. I did find some things of interest regard Dolby vs DTS in the settings. One needs to make sure certain settings are off for BOTH of the codecs as it is not just a set it and forget it situation. I found the Dynamic Compression setting might have something to do with unsatisfactory sound from streamed Dolby tracks that are already lossy and highly compressed. Anyway, best of luck getting it all dialed in.

 

[MasterApex]

So with some more testing and the suggestions from you guys, I narrowed it down. Using an Atmos Blu-ray and DTS-HD Disc, the sound is awesome. It looks to be related to streaming. UHD from a Roku Ultra is horrible. I wish the 7706 would provide a little better detail. Displaying 48KHz for everything is not that helpful. My old Integra did a better job than that (Mbits at least). I am going to try an AppleTV next to see if it does better.

what was horrible ?
I went thru 3 av7706 (long story , unrelated )
Playing atmos from Apple Music is not impressive (I blame the source or the song engineers on how they mix the sound )
Playing atmos from Dolby atmos disc or streaming hbo / Disney atmos contents from Apple TV 4K sounds fine to me.

I think there is potential in atmos but a lot depends on how the content is recorded and mixed to various channel …. I have many songs in CDs than sound better than other songs in SACD.
Only with the same good recording (e.g John Williams in Vienna) , you can appreciate the improved fidelity in SACD … assuming you have a good resolving speakers (not a Sonos or Bose grade level speakers )

 

[Pogre]

This looks to me like maybe you're expecting more than what's really there. Surround speakers, atmos even moreso, don't receive a ton of info in your typical *.1.* mix. They're effect speakers that get the least amount of play and sometimes aren't doing anything at all. Unless there's extreme distortion or clipping I'm not even sure how one could judge the quality from the occasional sound effect or background sounds.