Sound Levels in Home Theater

Mike5906

About 1 year ago I setup my home theater. My issue is that I have never been really satisfied with the way the system sounds. It just doesn't sound crisp, bright, and full. Everyone who comes to my home says it sounds awesome. So I kept telling myself it was just me. Then last week I was in a home theater store. The room was about the same size as mine and it sounded 10x better than my system. Then I started to notice. It was a Marantz receiver and Polk speakers!!! I never could get a salesman and my wife made me leave because we were late to get the kids. But the only thing I could visually see different from my setup was the addition of a Marantz MM7055. Could it be that my system is simply lacking enough power? When I bought the equipment at Crutchfield the salesman told me the SR7005 at 125w per channel was more than enough to power the Polks.

One other slightly annoying issue is the Subwoofer does not seem tight seems to rumble too much during high action scenes such as car crashes. Would the addition of a smaller subwoofer (and turning them both down) even out the rumbling and give me tight pops while retaining the large bass also? Thanks.


The room is roughly 22' long by 15' wide. Two rows of seating, with a bar area at the back.

The equipment consists of :
1) Marantz SR7005
2) Polk 255c-RT Center
3) Polk 265-RT Fronts (2)
4) Polk 65-RT Surrounds (2) and Rears (2)
5) Polk DSW Pro660wi (wired)
6) A variety of receivers and players (Samsung BR, Apple TV, FiOS TV, Mac-Mini, Xbox360)

BlueFox

I wish I had a room that large for my HT.



The 125w/channel is only for two channel. Here are the 5 and 7 chanel measurements.

Five channels driven continuously into 8-ohm loads:
0.1% distortion at 91.2 watts
1% distortion at 112.1 watts

Seven channels driven continuously into 8-ohm loads:
0.1% distortion at 74.6 watts
1% distortion at 89.6 watts

http://www.hometheater.com/content/marantz-sr7005-av-receiver-ht-labs-measures

I'm not familiar with those Polks, but as a general rule for HT, the more power the better. For example, I have a Sunfire TGA-5400 which is rated at 800W/channel @ 4 ohm. When I first got the Sunfire I was using 4 LSi15s and an LSiC, along with the powered PSW1000. Going from an AVR (175w/ch) to the Sunfire was a night and day imrovement in regard to clarity and bass.

Mike5906

What about the subs? Would it be a good idea to have one 10" and one 12" or should they both be the same size?

SugarmillMan

Mike5906 wrote: »

What about the subs? Would it be a good idea to have one 10" and one 12" or should they both be the same size?

I'm sure most of the experts here would advise you to get both subs the same size AND the same brand. Personally, I'm not sure if I could hear any difference.

tonyb

Have you tweeked any of your settings in the AVR ? Thats the obvious question. Also what is the crossover set at ? Is the one in the sub turned all the way up ? Channel levels at or near 0 ? Whats the source and how is it hooked up ? HDMI, toslink ? Lots of questions before you should subscribe to needing more subwoofers.

SugarmillMan

Can we assume your receiver has some type of room correction software (Audyssey or ARC or similar) and that you have run that according to the exact protocol? (Personally, I'm not familiar with your receiver.)

Mike5906

OK. I got some feedback from Polk support and made the following changes:

All Speakers (including the sub) are set to a frequency of 80hz. That made a noticeable difference. Before they were all over the board from 60 to 120. This was all done by the Audessy auto configuration. I can assure you it got those wrong, because it sounds quite a bit better now.

Here are my settings for db per speaker:

CENTER: 0.0 db
FRONT L: -3.0 db
FRONT R: -3.0 db
SUR L: -2.0 db
SUR R: -2.0 db
SUR B L: -2.0 db
SUR B R: -2.0 db
SUB: -1.5 db

Again. It sounds quite a bit better. I'd say a 3x improvement. But still not as good as the one at the home theater store. But I'm getting there!

yeahbuddy

Mike5906 wrote: »

One other slightly annoying issue is the Subwoofer does not seem tight seems to rumble too much during high action scenes such as car crashes. Would the addition of a smaller subwoofer (and turning them both down) even out the rumbling and give me tight pops while retaining the large bass also? Thanks.

I had a good amount of bass rumble from my PSW1000 when I first set it up. It took a fair amount of dancing it around the room to find where the bass response tightened up. It's possible that where you've placed your sub hits a resonant zone due to your room's acoustic properties, they can be finnicky. Before looking into anything drastic like purchasing another sub which might only add to the setup difficulty, I'd suggest meandering through a few subwoofer setup threads and articles to make sure that you've got it optimally placed and setup. It took me some work and a few hours time, but I've been reaping the benefits ever since.

SugarmillMan

Some folks actually get down and crawl around the room to hear the spot where is bass is the loudest. I've never tried this but a corner placement seemed to work well for my application.

chris23120

Mike5906 wrote: »

OK. I got some feedback from Polk support and made the following changes:

All Speakers (including the sub) are set to a frequency of 80hz. That made a noticeable difference. Before they were all over the board from 60 to 120. This was all done by the Audessy auto configuration. I can assure you it got those wrong, because it sounds quite a bit better now.

Here are my settings for db per speaker:

CENTER: 0.0 db
FRONT L: -3.0 db
FRONT R: -3.0 db
SUR L: -2.0 db
SUR R: -2.0 db
SUR B L: -2.0 db
SUR B R: -2.0 db
SUB: -1.5 db

Again. It sounds quite a bit better. I'd say a 3x improvement. But still not as good as the one at the home theater store. But I'm getting there!

How did you run the Audessy? Use a tripod and set it to ear height in your 3 best listening positions. Do it at night when their are few outside noises, shut off your ac fan, refrig, anything that Audessy might pick up, try not to breath loue like Tony Soprano....

SugarmillMan

chris23120 wrote: »

How did you run the Audessy? Use a tripod and set it to ear height in your 3 best listening positions. Do it at night when their are few outside noises, shut off your ac fan, refrig, anything that Audessy might pick up, try not to breath loue like Tony Soprano....

The Audyssy web site has some frequently asked questions posted there. I learn a lot and GREATLY improved my sound. Pay attention to the microphone placement chart and follow it to the letter. It speaks volumes.

rpf65

I had a similar problem with my DSWpro 440-wi, but using ypao. After calibrating, I set all the speakers to small, and started playing with the cross-over settings. Found that the A5's and 440 liked the 110 Hz setting the best. Just a suggestion. I'm convinced that not everybody has optimal ears.

gce

Also Mike, check to see that all your speakers are set to Small and the bass is set between 60-80hz. If your speakers are set to Large it will take away the job of the Sub.

SugarmillMan

And using that tripod is excellent advice. I got an inexpensive on from an online store (Am) and improved my results giving more consistency in my measurements.

mdaudioguy

SugarmillMan wrote: »

Some folks actually get down and crawl around the room to hear the spot where is bass is the loudest. I've never tried this but a corner placement seemed to work well for my application.

You left out an important detail... Crawling around for best sub placement involves placing the sub in the listening position. Once you've crawled around the room and found the place where the bass is most pleasing, that's where you place the sub. Then put yourself in the listening position...

SugarmillMan

That is certainly one technique that works. Other posters here seem to think that you place the sub in the area where there is the LEAST amoount of bass.
Personally, just use Audyssey and set the bass response higher from there should work.