So last night I was watching The Expanse S01E09 on BluRay DTS 5.1. I thought to myself, "Hey, let's compare Audyssey Dynamic EQ ON vs OFF! Let's pretend like I'm using the ROTEL or ATI Pre-pro that doesn't have DYNAMIC EQ! Could I live without Dynamic EQ?"
I really wanted to say that turning Dynamic EQ OFF didn't make a significant difference. But it was day and night difference. The difference was huge. It's not just the bass being hot. It's more "dynamic" - more "impactful". I believe the audiophile term for this kind of bass is "lightening fast bass".
I mean it's not just louder bass. I turned off Dynamic EQ and boosted the Subwoofer Trim levels to +6dB for all five SX-1010 subwoofers and still didn't have this "slam", "impact", "fast", "gut-wrenching" bass!
It's the EQ itself, not the Bass Volume Level.
So I guess I'm "stuck" with gears, I'm sorry, I mean Pre-pros or AVRs that have Audyssey Dynamic EQ, which means Denon, Marantz, and McIntosh (if I go crazy).
That means no ATI Pre-pros for me, unless ATI somehow decides to use Audyssey on a lower-end model, which doesn't seem probable.
Stuck on Dynamic EQ for life it seems.
EDIT: I forgot to say that except for the significant impactful dynamic bass difference, everything else sounded the same as Direct mode - everything above the bass frequencies like midrange, dialogue, treble sounded the same as Direct.