Professional calibrator brought up a good point

[darien87]

A while ago I had my Samsung plasma calibrated and as a side service the guy offered home theater calibration. I do my set-ups myself but it came with the cost of the TV calibration so I figured what the hell. When he saw my speaker distance settings he told me that it would be better to just set all speakers at the same distance. His argument was that movie theaters don't do this so why should you?

When I thought about it he did have a point. Setting your system up so that only one position has optimum sound may be a bit short sighted. I admit that when I'm watching a movie I move around a bit, (scoot to the side, lay down, etc.)

What do the rest of the Audioholics think?

 

[ImcLoud]

I set it for the center seating position.. I honestly can not tell much if nay difference from the far left to the center or far right seating position, it sounds good everywhere...

 

[shadyJ]

Movie theaters don't set for distance because they can't. The listening positions in a theater are far too spread out for that to make any sense. But in a home situation where you have a comparatively small area of listening positions, why not, it's easy to do. I don't think the difference is major if it is even audible, but I can't see how it would hurt.

 

[XEagleDriver]

Apples to Oranges

A while ago I had my Samsung plasma calibrated and as a side service the guy offered home theater calibration. I do my set-ups myself but it came with the cost of the TV calibration so I figured what the hell. When he saw my speaker distance settings he told me that it would be better to just set all speakers at the same distance. His argument was that movie theaters don't do this so why should you?

When I thought about it he did have a point. Setting your system up so that only one position has optimum sound may be a bit short sighted. I admit that when I'm watching a movie I move around a bit, (scoot to the side, lay down, etc.)

Interesting idea, but upon some reflection I disagree.
a) SEAT DISTANCE DELTAS: The room sizes are too different; the movie theater has such a larger seating distance delta (i.e. very front row vs. very last row) that setting speaker distance settings is impracticle. Compare this to the to even a fairly large HT (2-3 rows) where the speaker distance deltas from the front right seat to left back seat are pretty small (5-10').
Therefore, in a HT nearly every one is sitting pretty close to the sweet spot, this is not so for a movie theater (if they did put in distance settings).
- Average movie theater is 60' wide by 80' long, therefore the distance from the front row, right most seat (20' from screen) to back row, left most seat is ~85' (good old trig)
- Typical home theater is ~15' wide by 20' long, therefore the distance from the front row, right most seat (10' from screen) to back row, left most seat is at most ~15 feet

b) FRONT SOUND STAGE: In the movie theater the distance to the front 3 speakers is pretty far (>20' to as much as 80'), so the difference in distance from a particular seat to the FR speaker vs. the distance to the C or FL speaker is very small % wise in comparison to the % differences found in a HT with its smaller overall dimensions.

c) SURROUNDS: The movie theater normally has several sets of surround speakers (spaced about 20' apart), so the ones closest to you will dominate what you hear.

My two bits

Cheers,
XEagleDriver

 

[j_garcia]

Movie theaters have large, semi treated rooms that are geared more toward sound than the average HT. My rear speakers are FAR closers than my fronts, so in some cases it might work, but not in my setup. Theaters use more speakers to sort of make up for having less calibration options, so the sound is more dispersed over a wider area. Notice they may have 6-8 side surrounds that are very high up, as opposed to what most people have at home.

 

[Alex2507]

What do the rest of the Audioholics think?

I think you should have beat him up and taken his wallet.

 

[Irvrobinson]

I think you should have beat him up and taken his wallet.

You are so weird! I like it. Do you work at a Comedy Club?

 

[PENG]

I think you should have beat him up and taken his wallet.

+ ∞...................

 

[darien87]

I think you should have beat him up and taken his wallet.

This same guy did end up blowing up my XPA-5 and the tweeters in 2 of my speakers in trying to calibrate my speakers. For some reason he had to crank my system ridiculously loud to reach 75db on his calibration mic. Emotiva fixed my amp for free but I had to buy new tweeters.

After I posted a bad review of him on Yelp he ended up refunding my money and giving me a couple hundred bucks to fix my speakers so I did get some money out of him.

 

[slipperybidness]

This same guy did end up blowing up my XPA-5 and the tweeters in 2 of my speakers in trying to calibrate my speakers. For some reason he had to crank my system ridiculously loud to reach 75db on his calibration mic. Emotiva fixed my amp for free but I had to buy new tweeters.

After I posted a bad review of him on Yelp he ended up refunding my money and giving me a couple hundred bucks to fix my speakers so I did get some money out of him.

Well, that was your first clue that this guy didn't know as much as he likes you to think.

Hmmm, you break my gear, you pay for my gear. Did the couple hundred bucks cover the costs of all the repairs? If not, then I would be taking him to small claims court.

 

[Alex2507]

This same guy did end up blowing up my XPA-5 and the tweeters in 2 of my speakers ...

How come you didn't cut him up into little pieces with one of those swords? It's not too late to bring honor back to your gear. You could still burn his house down.

Every so often my mistrust of 'professionals' makes me look stupid and I appreciate those instances. It just doesn't happen often enough. I can't wait for the next time I get taken to school but there are sooooo many idiots out there that I'm afraid to trust people ... especially with audio gear.

 

[slipperybidness]

How come you didn't cut him up into little pieces with one of those swords? It's not too late to bring honor back to your gear. You could still burn his house down.

Every so often my mistrust of 'professionals' makes me look stupid and I appreciate those instances. It just doesn't happen often enough. I can't wait for the next time I get taken to school but there are sooooo many idiots out there that I'm afraid to trust people ... especially with audio gear.

Man, aint that the truth.

And it's not just audio gear. I'm responsible for several $150K ++ lab instrumentation tools (XRay, Mass Spec, GC, Electrochem, etc). I am not a maintenance tech, but I tear these things apart when I need to for repairs because I am highly skilled and an expert in these areas.

Many, many times, I have found that I am more knowledgeable about this hardware than the vendor "experts" that they have. When I do find a true expert from any company, that is the only person I deal with. I get their direct # and cut out all the bozos in between.

Few things p1ss me off more than paying to have a field service tech come out, waiting several days for them to get here, then teaching them how to fix the problem that they are here to fix. It has happened, and I have fired said company for such behavior.

 

[darien87]

Well, that was your first clue that this guy didn't know as much as he likes you to think.

Hmmm, you break my gear, you pay for my gear. Did the couple hundred bucks cover the costs of all the repairs? If not, then I would be taking him to small claims court.

I ended up getting replacement tweeters off eBay so I actually made a little money. But the aggravation was a real bear.

 

[JohnnieB]

What so called expert can't hear when you got a speaker breaking up. That's why I rarely let people have control of the volume knob.

 

[j_garcia]

This same guy did end up blowing up my XPA-5 and the tweeters in 2 of my speakers in trying to calibrate my speakers. For some reason he had to crank my system ridiculously loud to reach 75db on his calibration mic. Emotiva fixed my amp for free but I had to buy new tweeters.

After I posted a bad review of him on Yelp he ended up refunding my money and giving me a couple hundred bucks to fix my speakers so I did get some money out of him.

I could have told you he wasn't a "professional" as soon as you asked your first question. Next time call me. I am NOT a professional, and I won't blow your stuff up either.

 

[mtrycrafts]

This same guy did end up blowing up my XPA-5 and the tweeters in 2 of my speakers in trying to calibrate my speakers. For some reason he had to crank my system ridiculously loud to reach 75db on his calibration mic. Emotiva fixed my amp for free but I had to buy new tweeters.

After I posted a bad review of him on Yelp he ended up refunding my money and giving me a couple hundred bucks to fix my speakers so I did get some money out of him.

After you posted??? He didn't do anything at the time things went up in smoke???
Wow, that is far from being a professional.

 

[darien87]

I could have told you he wasn't a "professional" as soon as you asked your first question. Next time call me. I am NOT a professional, and I won't blow your stuff up either.

Yeah but would you be willing to make the drive all the way to Gilroy???

 

[darien87]

After you posted??? He didn't do anything at the time things went up in smoke???
Wow, that is far from being a professional.

When I asked him about it afterwards his argument was that my processor at the time, (The UMC-1) was the problem. He pointed out that many people had complained that the UMC's test tones were loud. But he had it cranked up so loud that I took my parrot out of the room and went upstairs. I should have stopped him right then. I'm not sure why I didn't.

 

[j_garcia]

Yeah but would you be willing to make the drive all the way to Gilroy???

I have plenty of other friends in Gilroy actually Just on a weekend probably, not evening with that commute traffic.

 

[ParadigmDawg]

I am more knowledgeable about this hardware than the vendor "experts" that they have.

Vendor experts are probably just medical salesman that know how to talk doctor talk and sound like they know what they are saying.

I can talk in detail about the medical devices I sell but honestly, I haven't even touched any of it in years if at all.

I might be able to plug something into an outlet...