Mismatched Speaker Efficiencies?

[herbu]

Does anybody have a system where the front L/Rs have a considerably different efficiency than their center and surrounds? Ex: L/Rs are 85dB and Center & Surrounds are 92dB.

I think I remember that Audyssey can do +/- 6dB in its balancing, but you can do more manually.

Has anybody had this situation? Any particular problems or tips?

Thanks

 

[Swerd]

Does anybody have a system where the front L/Rs have a considerably different efficiency than their center and surrounds? Ex: L/Rs are 85dB and Center & Surrounds are 92dB.

I think I remember that Audyssey can do +/- 6dB in its balancing, but you can do more manually.

Has anybody had this situation? Any particular problems or tips?

Yes, I have such a system, Salk SongTowers and SongCenter (about 88 dB) in front, and NHT SuperZeros (about 84-85 dB) in back. In the past, I had an NHT SuperCenter (about 85 dB) instead of the SongCenter. My front & center channel speakers are about 9-10 feet away, and the rear channel speakers are 5-6 feet away.

I don't have a receiver with Audyssey. I use the receiver's test tones and an old Radio Shack SPL meter to balance the loudness in all 5 channels. I had no problems doing that, and the results were far better than what I could do by ear alone.

Audyssey has improved over the years, but before I would trust it, I would first do a manual set up (measure the distance from each speaker to a center seat, enter that into the receiver, and adjust the relative volumes using the test tones and SPL meter) and write it all down. Then I would run Audyssey, and see if the results were similar.

Inexpensive SPL meters are readily available at Amazon and also are available as a smart phone app.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Does anybody have a system where the front L/Rs have a considerably different efficiency than their center and surrounds? Ex: L/Rs are 85dB and Center & Surrounds are 92dB.

I think I remember that Audyssey can do +/- 6dB in its balancing, but you can do more manually.

Has anybody had this situation? Any particular problems or tips?

Thanks

I know for a fact I can do +/-12dB speaker channel level adjustment on my Denon 3312, 5308, & AVP-A1.

 

[j_garcia]

Sensitivity, not efficiency. I always compare with the meter and adjust to my taste regardless of what the auto-EQ said. For movies, I tend to go with its settings unless they sound really wrong, but for music, I use manual settings.

 

[herbu]

Sensitivity, not efficiency.

Right. That's what I said. What? No... you misunderstood what I meant to say. Thanks.

 

[Saturn94]

Previously I had a setup with 90db mains, 87db center, and 86 db surrounds; no issues whatsoever. For reference I do not have any kind of room EQ system.