My second attempt at measurements

[thewire]

I unchecked the smoothing and tried the "find peaks" with an older measurement I did with version 4.10 using a 75dB target the other night. This had been before I realized however not to be using the left channel for sound card calibration. The response was slightly shifted to the right where 25Hz was at 75dB instead of 20Hz and bellow 15Hz it was climbing. REW recommended one filter at near 33Hz where the subwoofer is at right now and it was not more than -15. I think I may be alright, but I will at least experiment with other locations, and I definitely want to try moving it left and right slightly. The measurements for the back of the room have the same peak at 33Hz, with some ringing around 80 etc where I need to finish room treatments. I also might like my subwoofer there because according to the manufacture of my subwoofer, THX says I should put it there. They themselves recommend placing it at the side of the seating. There are two large ports on the back that fire so heavy from the long through driver that it moves quite a bit of air, and placing it next to a bare wall one can hear the air moving off of it. I placed a 2" ATS Acoustics panel behind it for the time being.

Thank you for the recommendation. I will certainly have to see what results look like at different locations in REW. I will try using DVE again after I setup a new location if one works and see what happens.

I'm ordering the BFD sometime later this week and maybe some room treatments.

[JohnM]

RT60 results are not meaningful in domestic sized rooms below about 200Hz, and even then are only meaningful when running a main speaker with the sub. For low frequencies use the waterfall and decay plots to see what the room is doing.

[DrWho]

Looks to me like you've got your sub set about 15dB too hot...

I think that correlates to about 23x too loud.

[thewire]

JohnM wrote:

RT60 results are not meaningful in domestic sized rooms below about 200Hz, and even then are only meaningful when running a main speaker with the sub. For low frequencies use the waterfall and decay plots to see what the room is doing.

Okay

Looks to me like you've got your sub set about 15dB too hot...

I think that correlates to about 23x too loud.

My receiver keeps telling me to turn up the volume during the setup with my RS meter, so I have been turning up the volume on the back of the subwoofer trying to match it's suggestion.

When I setup the subwoofer using DVE on my XA2 and the analog out, I set the back of the subwoofer to THX, and turn the volume down in the menu for the 5.1 setup. That gives me an option of calibrating the subwoofer to 70, 75, 80, etc. Right now I have it sitting at -8dB and the mains are around -2dB. Then I can calibrate the mains to 60, 65, or 67. I run a pair of 14 gauge wires twisted together at the ends to each of the speakers. This is because I did not buy the speaker wire and it was all I could find in-wall locally. If I turn up the volume on my receiver (+4 I think) I would be able to do a 70dB calibration although I thought this was against some kind of general rule of setup to boost the signal. I use the mode on the AVR called "multi-channel in". I could try setting the subwoofer calibration to 65 and the mains to 65 also, then turn up the volume, but I think this would be causing me to run gear kind of hot for the subwoofer. I think part of my problem is I cannot set the distance for the subwoofer on the player and the only thing that the input on my AVR seems to do is adjust trim.

Then I go into REW and interpret results for what problems I have been hearing using the receiver but not "multi channel in". This is why I thought it would be beneficial to me using the new feature for looping the left channel somehow.

At the image at the top of the thread, I ran my subwoofer +5dB hot, and then turned up the volume of my mains and it +5 to see exactly what may be going on. It was probably closer to +10 hot. I just set the subwoofer and mains as close possible to pink noise 75dB as possible without turning up my AVR.

[thewire]

I have not tried turning down the subwoofer on the back yet bellow the THX setting output level I get with readings. Should I try that?

[thewire]

I was reading some information about setting up the subwoofer and I came across this statement.

In a THX® system, Front Left, Centre, Front Right and Rear Total should each give an SPL of 85dB with a 0dB input using pink noise.

I think that I will look into Johns observation.

[thewire]

The reason it may have looked +5 hot was since after calibrating the subwoofer to 85dB and then setting the mains to 75dB, I raised the volume on my receiver +5 and then checked the SPL on the meter in REW that it said 80dB with the pink noise generator, knowing this is where the speakers and my sub crossover close at.

In DVE I would like to set both my mains and my subwoofer to 75dB. Will I be able to do this after setting up REW with a 75dB target for both?

[brucek]

In DVE I would like to set both my mains and my subwoofer to 75dB. Will I be able to do this after setting up REW with a 75dB target for both?

I feel you're somewhat confused about the role of REW. It's intent is to provide filter recommendations for equalizers to smooth the subwoofers response. It also allows you to obtain a smoother transition between the mains and sub by revealing a better sub phase adjustment.

Any levels that are used during the course of REW testing have little if nothing to do with the setting of system levels once you're finished using REW. They're completetly arbitrary and only adjusted as a means to an end - which is setting EQ filters.

Once you're finished with REW and equalization of a BFD, then use the receivers test tones or DVE or whatever you like to set the actual system levels.

brucek

[thewire]

brucek wrote:

Once you're finished with REW and equalization of a BFD, then use the receivers test tones or DVE or whatever you like to set the actual system levels.

I am using the XA2 player directly to my amplifiers with the levels set to 75dB using DVE. My speaker settings are set to small, PCM, and the "Digital Out HDMI" is set to "AUTO".

Can I use REW directly to my amplifiers to determine speaker distance settings?

[thewire]

I tried a search here and appears that it may be an acceptable practice, even although my amplifiers as a single solid state amplifier (not sure about bridged) are not appropriate for running a full range sweep. I could at least get an idea by using a cutoff frequency at the XO, and do the subwoofer separate for setting filters.

I had one comment about the volume last night. While the previews are playing my father says "loud enough for you?". We watched b movie. I will do another test later today to be sure my AVR was not causing a problem with the measurements.