RTi A7 in HT setup perfomance problems

jbooker82

apoteker wrote: »

I notice that many have recommended setting the speakers to small but I see no such option in the menus for the 709. Can anyone tell me where that setting might be? Thanks!

There is no Large / Small setting with the new Onkyo's. What the Large / Small setting is a very general setting. It assumes that a Large speaker is full range, and the Small setting would set the crossover frequency to a certian frequency. Usually around 80hz. Your Onkyo lets you set the actuall frequency instead of going by a rough setting of ethire full range or 80hz.

Like I said up the frequency of the L&R channel and center channel a little and see how you like it. It will reroute bass from the towers and center channel to the sub wich will free up power to the mains. I run my RTi A7's at full range but I also have a Carver A-753x 250watt x 3 channel amp.

pearsall001

Here's a great article that should clear things up a bit. http://www.ecoustics.com/articles/set-speakers-small-receiver-setup/

EndersShadow

@apoteker

So here are some thoughts for you.

1. Set your fronts and center to 80 hz. Your sub can handle all the frequencies below that with ease.

2. As suggested move the A7's in and dont toe them in as much. Abouy 80% of your special effects come from your left and right so their placement is a big deal. Also see if you can move them out farther from the wall at the back.

3. Put your center on something, even if its just a couple boxes so its right below the screen and if possible a little bit forward (so its flush with the A7's) or flip it so its pointing up toward the listening postion. Your center is providing about 80% of the dialog and the sound is nowhere near your ears so its going to sound like crap.

4. The measured distances look a bit off to me honestly given what you told me about your room setup. Where did you measure from, the couch that is there, or behind it? I would pull out a tape measure and actually measure the distances yourself from each speaker to the main listening position in the room and modify them accordingly.

5. I would also check the level calibration for each speaker by using a SPL meter (availible at radio shack if you dont have one) to ensure that each speaker has the same SPL level at the main listening position.

6. What settings is your sub set at on the back of the physical unit? and what crossover for your sub did Audyssey set? I am not sure that its correct there either as it set your sub hot a couple db's which I dont think it would need to. Check and post that info for us please.

Hope this helps!

Dan.

P.S. I sent you a PM with my phone number if you wanna talk (sometimes its easier than waiting for responses here).

htrdln

i second the jealous! lol

gce

Are the jumpers on the back of the speakers there and tight?

pdxfj

One question I didn't see asked..

Are you using a tripod to hold the Audyssey mic? Also make sure you use all six measurement locations. Place the tripod in the center of the couch pressed up on the back cushion. This is your primary listening position. Next, move it to the left side of the couch, then the far right.

On the fourth position move it back to the left side but on the front side of the cushion. Then to the middle, and finally to the far right.

Make sure the tip of the mic is at ear level, and pointed at the ceiling.

As others have said get the center off the floor and I would try and get the A7's out of the corners a bit.

-9db on the left and right.. that seems a bit much.. I also have A7's being pushed with 200w/ch and I only see about -4/-5db.

apoteker

-9db on the left and right.. that seems a bit much.. I also have A7's being pushed with 200w/ch and I only see about -4/-5db.[/QUOTE]

I think that was for the surrounds if I remember correctly. I think the L and R were -6.5db. Do you think that is still out of line?

apoteker

Thanks to everyone for the input. I will make changes late tonight and let everyone know how it goes. One quick question...should I set all of the speakers to 80Hz and leave the rear surrounds at 100Hz as Audyssey set or just go 80Hz for all speakers?

apoteker

Are the jumpers on the back of the speakers there and tight?

Yes to both questions.

tommyt21

80 hz all the way around and bump up those trim levels. So far from what you have posted u have all sorts of wrong going on. You should invite enders over for a beer and have him tweak some stuff.

rebuy

Ditch the Onkyo, I have the 608 and it sucks for music. I will be changing to a H-K or better with in a month or so.
This is the second Onkyo I have had and will never buy another one. I have RTI bookies and can't get them to sound right because of the Onkyo quality. My last set of R50's sounded better with a H-K than the Onkyo-RTI setup.

pdxfj

As far as Audyssey, you can go higher than what it finds but not lower. If it says 100hz for your back surrounds, then leave them at 100hz. Set everything else to 80hz and see what you think.

I went back and looked at the pictures and realized I was remembering the distance and not the trim level..

EndersShadow

rebuy wrote: »

Ditch the Onkyo, I have the 608 and it sucks for music. I will be changing to a H-K or better with in a month or so.
This is the second Onkyo I have had and will never buy another one. I have RTI bookies and can't get them to sound right because of the Onkyo quality. My last set of R50's sounded better with a H-K than the Onkyo-RTI setup.

The Onkyo he's got is a BIG leap over your 608 so its not a fair comparison. For instance he's got pre-outs, you dont so if it does end up being a power issue (still not convinced it is) he can augment it easy.

Given your comment about the HK v. Onkyo my thought would be you may be commenting more on the amp section and less on the AVR's features as HK's are known to be more realistic about their wattage listings.

To the OP, I PM'd you my info, give me a call if you want, I might be able to swing by and take a looksee myself or walk you through things over the phone. I'm local so its not that big a deal and it would be nice to see the 709 since I am still debating picking one up myself.

Heck if you really wanted, I might be willing to bring my Carver AV-705x amp over just for giggles....

gfong

I'm not Audyssey, but try these manual settings and see if you are still underwhelmed!

Center, left and right levels at 0, back and surrounds at -3, sub volume just a tick before half way and make sure the crossover is set all the way to the right and leave the sub setting in Audyssey where it is at. Set all speakers to 80 hz except the OWMs. Your 7's and 6's can handle the 80 and do not need more then 80 going to them (Let the sub do its work as running the fronts at 40 will stress that amp out in 7.1), set the OWM 3 at 100 or 120hz.

Now, put in a blu ray and if the surrounds and rears are too hot or too overpowering then reduce them equally in the speaker level settings. Next step would be to get a meter and set them properly, I would not doubt that the settings I gave you should be close. Let us know how it worked out for you. Oh yea, and do tow the fronts in but not as much as you have them in the pic.

selkec

Im also from Indy and have polks. Im in the process of changing out all my speakers right now. I have rtia9's as the mains and an x-voce center flipped upside down to help close up the OB part. To my surprise they blend great together. I also run a mfw-15 and eD A5-350 subs in each front corner. Definately set your speakers to small and 80hz to start. Then play with it from there. I actually went from 80 to 100 to 150hz and stuck with 150hz since my elite has no 120hz setting. I also run an emotiva xpa5 to all speakers. I found without an amp it didnt sound as good. SOme say 150hz is too high but it sounds amazing in my 14x23 room. The bass is not localizable to my surprise at that high. We Indy guys should have a get together sometime and check out each others systems.

PubFiction

Are your subs taking the same signal or are they doing separate left right signals>?

selkec

PubFiction wrote: »

Are your subs taking the same signal or are they doing separate left right signals>?

same signal. I got a good deal on a gloss mfw-15 so I picked it up. Took me a while to get them sounding good together but now its insane. I immediately gained 6db which i expected. But after playing with the phase I ended up with one 180 degrees and one at 0 and gained 4 more db. I then moved the a5-350 about 3 feet from the corner and away went the boomy sound. I will get a new avr soon with xt32 to help flatten out my response. I hate rew, tried it, didnt like it. lol

PubFiction

Well I wondered because the main reason people push against higher than 80hz is because you can start to localize the sound, so you could get around that by running the subs with stereo then having 2 subs in corners would be like running a pair of full range speakers and crossover wouldn't be as much of an issue. But if they are both the same then ya you can increase how loud they are but you should start hearing sounds from the wrong direction.

selkec

PubFiction wrote: »

Well I wondered because the main reason people push against higher than 80hz is because you can start to localize the sound, so you could get around that by running the subs with stereo then having 2 subs in corners would be like running a pair of full range speakers and crossover wouldn't be as much of an issue. But if they are both the same then ya you can increase how loud they are but you should start hearing sounds from the wrong direction.

With one sub even at 80hz I could localize the sub. once the second was added even with the higher xover it is impossible to localize either. Go figure, I talked against this high of a setting for years. lol

apoteker

Well, I made the changes suggested and changed L,C,R, and surrounds to 80Hz but left the rear surrounds at 100Hz. LFE was set at 120Hz so I left that as is and......still underwhelmed. I'm now beginning to think that a big part (or all) of the problem is caution on my part. I believe that reference level is 0db and the loudest that I have turned the volume to is -20db because I don't want to damage the speakers. I believe that someone had mentioned in an earlier post that you risk clipping by playing at too high a volume without adequate power to drive the speakers. That being said, is -20db a reasonable volume for watching movies? Could/should I go louder without fear of damaging the speakers? How loud do you listen to movies? Others have said to tweak the trim levels but doesn't increasing the master volume give the same result as tweaking each speaker the same amount? Thanks again to everyone for helping me try to sort this out!

ravaneli

-20 db is a little low for me for action movies.

get one of these power meters from amazon and plug your receiver into it to see how much power it uses. Then turn up the volume and see where you get close to the max of the power supply of the AVR and then back some.

Remember, even a couple of db is a huge difference in power. 3 db less, and your avr may consume only half the power. It is good to know where the border is.

By the way, your speakers have very high power handling. Way higher than your avr is capable. It is really unlikely you will damage your speakers, more likely you will smoke the avr, but that's hardly any better.

play with all the settings. My settings sometimes magically change and i get some EQ on or some other changing of the signal that just messes things up. I like it best with everything turned off, and XO at 120 or 150. For movies I prefer 150 cos efects are nicer. But for music must be lower, because the human voices enter the subwoofer instead of the speakers and sound distorted..

F1nut

That being said, is -20db a reasonable volume for watching movies?

Not really. When watching Blu-rays I usually run between -15dB and -12dB on my SC-37 (which is putting out twice the power your AVR is) to a 5.1 RTi A set of speakers. It's pretty loud at that point and I get the full impact of the sound track.

Your toe-in is too extreme, but the suggestion to not toe-in your speakers is not what is recommended. You want the toe-in adjusted so that you can just see the inside panel of each A7 from your sweet spot.

Contrary to the comment that you won't damage your speakers because they can handle more power than you're feeding them.....BS! The most common cause of speaker damage is from trying to drive them to high SPL's with too little power resulting in clipping and when a clipped signal hits the speakers, bad things always happen.

tonyb

F1nut wrote: »

Contrary to the comment that you won't damage your speakers because they can handle more power than you're feeding them.....BS! The most common cause of speaker damage is from trying to drive them to high SPL's with too little power resulting in clipping and when a clipped signal hits the speakers, bad things always happen.

Absolutely....a point we try to drive home constantly around here.

apoteker

Contrary to the comment that you won't damage your speakers because they can handle more power than you're feeding them.....BS! The most common cause of speaker damage is from trying to drive them to high SPL's with too little power resulting in clipping and when a clipped signal hits the speakers, bad things always happen.

So, should I try to up the volume to around -15db to see if that makes a difference? Also, would you recommend leaving the speaker trim levels where Audyssey set them or adjusting those as well? They remained the same after I reran Audyssey yesterday.

rebuy

EndersShadow wrote: »

The Onkyo he's got is a BIG leap over your 608 so its not a fair comparison. For instance he's got pre-outs, you dont so if it does end up being a power issue (still not convinced it is) he can augment it easy.

Given your comment about the HK v. Onkyo my thought would be you may be commenting more on the amp section and less on the AVR's features as HK's are known to be more realistic about their wattage listings.

To the OP, I PM'd you my info, give me a call if you want, I might be able to swing by and take a looksee myself or walk you through things over the phone. I'm local so its not that big a deal and it would be nice to see the 709 since I am still debating picking one up myself.

Heck if you really wanted, I might be willing to bring my Carver AV-705x amp over just for giggles....

Thanks for telling me what a POS I have for a receiver. I think I already said that.
Yes my comments were about the amp section and not a power issue.
IMHO H-K amps sound better than Onkyo and I made a mistake in buying an "inferior product" which does not have pre-outs. Features don't mean a thing if the amps suck. I didn't buy the cheapest Onkyo with their cheapest amps
and expected better sound from this unit than what it delivers.
I do find it difficult post here only to be told my chosen equipment doesn't meet others standards.
My 50 watt H-K did sound better than my 100 watt Onkyo so it's not a power issue, it's an amplification issue.

I also do not believe that a 709 is that big of a leap over a 608 since the power ratings are very close to each other.

While I know Onkyo/Integra products do have much more expensive products than my lowly 608, mine is supposed to have the amplification qualities found in the "better" Onkyo units, that is why I bought it.
It just does not meet My Standards to what good amplification should sound like.
Thanks for your input.

tonyb

apoteker wrote: »

Contrary to the comment that you won't damage your speakers because they can handle more power than you're feeding them.....BS! The most common cause of speaker damage is from trying to drive them to high SPL's with too little power resulting in clipping and when a clipped signal hits the speakers, bad things always happen.

So, should I try to up the volume to around -15db to see if that makes a difference? Also, would you recommend leaving the speaker trim levels where Audyssey set them or adjusting those as well? They remained the same after I reran Audyssey yesterday.

Sometimes my friend it is better to do these things by your ears. The speaker level trim try putting at 0 and adjust up or down to balance out the sound. A good rule of thumb to keep you safe is to stay below -5--10 on the volume dial. Thats what I tell the wife because she would bury the damn thing if I let her.

EndersShadow

rebuy wrote: »

Thanks for telling me what a POS I have for a receiver. I think I already said that.

I also do not believe that a 709 is that big of a leap over a 608 since the power ratings are very close to each other.

While I know Onkyo/Integra products do have much more expensive products than my lowly 608, mine is supposed to have the amplification qualities found in the "better" Onkyo units, that is why I bought it.
It just does not meet My Standards to what good amplification should sound like.
Thanks for your input.

Was not trying to knock your gear, but more commenting it wasnt a apple's to apple's comparison.

rebuy

Hey, I'm sorry to tell you, that it is the Onkyo that is the problem. They just do not sound that good.
Heck I can turn mine up real loud but it does not have that tactile, live sound that I like.
My Onkyo does not have that sizzle to make music come alive.
You might be in the same boat.
I am going to change mine to a different brand.
You know what they say, synergy. Some speakers brands sound better with certain products.
Onkyo, while being a decent product does not have the synergy with my polks to make them live up to their full poential.
Could be......

rebuy

EndersShadow wrote: »

Was not trying to knock your gear, but more commenting it wasnt a apple's to apple's comparison.

Then please enlighten me why his Onkyo is far superior to mine as far as the amps go.

Geoff4rfc

rebuy wrote: »

Then please enlighten me why his Onkyo is far superior to mine as far as the amps go.

Hey brother, your onk is actually a really good avr, I was considering it myself. As far as the big differences between yours and the 709, there's upgraded video, mic calibration which is pretty huge in itself and of course the little bit of power, but the deal breaker option is the pre-outs, it's the power from the external amp that can get the speakers a-rocking, not the AVR.

I know for a fact that enders meant no disrespect or offense, please don't take any.