THX....just what you guy's love to talk about.

mantis

hello everyone,
I just returned from Cedia.It was pretty good this year for training.I took a bunch of classes but the best 2 were from THX.
I gotta tell you,I was a believer in THX before,but now I'm die hard.My first THX class went over the history of film, how it is recorded, and how the film calls on the audio.Sony's SDDS and Dolby track's are on the film,DTS just has time mark's to sync a seperate cd for audio.Very interesting.They also went over basic home theater speaker design and placement.Basic room accustic's
and subwoofer placement.At the end we went over the way product's get certified and why.I alway's felt with THX certified product's that you were getting a good peice of gear.I personally like the fact they were tested with demanding spec's to follow.
for the final , they went over all the different THX select,ulta,ultra2,surround ex etc.
It was a great learning class.But there was more to come.
The second day I was there I took a acoustic innovations class.They also follow THX standard's to the T.They have many different theater's they spec out.There product's a very nice, they are a serious about what they do.
The best class of cedia was the Room acoustic's taught by John Dahl of THX.I learned so much in his class, he make's practical judgement on every level.He also justified my belief that there is no one single component thats worth more than the whole.
The room has every bit as much effect as the very best amp's in the world.Without the room, no real good sound can be acomplished.
The cool thing about his class is he addressed the goal's of a multichannel audio system.
I can give you the goal's as I remember all of them,They are my goal's in every system I put in.
1)Dialoge clarity
2)Highly localizable front soundstage
3)smooth frequency response
4)Wide dynamic range
5)Smooth sound movenent
6)System Transparencey
7)Every seat a good seat.
Now these goal's are not easy to reach.I find them very difficult.
But with the right Improvement's made to your room,you can start tackleing them.
THX earned my respect more now that I have met 2 of there top trainer's.They are so serious about what they do.They leave no rock unturned.
I can go on and on about THX.
My new Theater in the basement just went for a whole new twist.I had it pretty much spec'd out, but now I plan to introduce all my new knowledge into my thinking and planning of my new theater room.There are some thing's I didn't consider addressing untill THX woke my up on them.I have alway's put speaker's,wire,gear on my top of my list, then room, and finally placement lower on the list.I have alway's believed that they all need to work together, but not as serious as I am now.
I plan on going to the THX Skywalker ranch to further my training .They have a awesome class there open only to installer's.

hoosier21

Sounds like a cool class to go to, did thet fill your bag with goodies when you left?

mark g. nelson

I read a article in Home Theater on Ultra 2. The new specs should improve a system. I like how you can hook up a mic to the receivers and have it set your system paramiters and limits with the feed back it sends out into the room.
Like THX or not is does wonders for the industry and compitition between company's for our $$$.

TroyD

I still maintain that for most folks, they need not get all wrapped around the axle about THX certification. Hell, most newbies are overwhelmed with hooking up a sub. I also think you will find that there is a lot of gear out there, non-THX certified that is better than a lot of THX cert'ed gear.

I'm not saying THX is inherently bad or anything.....I'm just saying that it's not something that MOST folks need to be all wierded out over because thier gear isn't THX.

Troy

mantis

THX certified equipment,
It's not a bad thing to own it....it's a good thing to own it.Don't defend what you own if it's not ThX...there are like you said good product's out there that meet or exceed THX.
But owning the gear isn't the whole thing.Having wire thx isn't the whole thing.Speaker's sources etc isn't the whole thing.
You need to spec out your room correctly to insure proper playback.
Think about this.......I normal theater seat's about 100 + people.It's in a huge room.No window's.Home theater is much smaller with less seats.And lot of the time's with window's.The movie soundtrack was recorded for that large room.At home you don't have a full scale theater(unless your filthy rich)and you need to get all these speaker's/screen working in that inviroment.ThX help's you accomplish this objective.With a set of standard's they assure you buy a peice a gear that can play flat and at the volume level that is required to optain the nessary experience that the theater can give you.
I know most of you dissagree with THX and that ok,most of you might be miss informed about what THX really is or why they do what they do.
And if you simply dissagree with it and are properly informed, that s cool 2.
I however completely agree with what they do and firmly believe they can help you get the most out of the nice system yoput together.

TroyD

I'm not knocking it per se....my big concern (other than that this certification comes for an additional cost) is that most folks need to walk before they run. We have had folks come to the forum in a twist and pissed because they bought stuff that wasn't THX when they don't even know what it was in the first place. Many think it is a surround format. The also need to understand that they can have a perfectly satisfying HT experience that is not THX certified. If that is your bag, no worries, I have no doubt it is a good thing. I just cringe when I hear some people say that your rig is crap because it isn't THX cert'ed.

Big Dumb Troy

mantis

I agree with you,
but that 's an uneducated statement.People who bash non THX gear........well it say's it all.I pisses me off as well but hey thats what people like to do.
And yes you can build a awesome NoN ThX certified theater.But......................................
Remember it's not just the gear,that will help but no wee the beall end all.It's the room.............I will say it again IT'S THE ROOM.
This hold's so true........I have installed system's in room's , the gear cost 2x's what mine does.But because the room was so horrible,not treated,no testing or thought went into these room's for sound,interior decorator DICKtating every speaker placement,and so on and so on,the system sounded like hell.God stuff,bad room,not a good experience.Waste of money and effort.
ThX can help you adress any problem's in a poor or less than ideal room for theater and now multichannel music.
Room accoustic's are the BE ALL END ALL if you want the best sound out of your gear.
I alway's knew that in the back of my mind,but I tried tricky placement to achive the goal's I wanted to meet,but alway's came up short .You can get system's sounding good in poor room's, but you can make them so much better with a treated room.

Aaron

Alright, I just don't get it. You're going on and on about how critical the room is (and I agree), but what does that have to do with THX? The only correlation I'm seeing is that the THX trainers are pretty wicked installers with extensive room acoustics knowledge. How does this translate into buying a THX-certified product? I'm confused.

Aaron

mantis

I can answer that question,
If you buy the very best speakers, amp's, sources and stick them in a room with bad acoustic's, you get bad sound, all your money is wasted and sucked out by the room.
THX gear is a good place to start, they test the hell out of the product's that get's certified.
let me back up some......
THX ULTRA 2.......
the system(meaning everything)need's to perform at there best with both movies and music.
You should be able to use one setup for both music and movie's.
Enable a better sound experience over the widest listening area.
Are less ROOM dependant( to perform,lot's of speaker's really fall ff in less then idea room, but so do just about all speakers)
in the past thx speaker's where optimized for multichannel sound which,untill recently meant film track's.Dipoles in the rears and tighly verticial directional controlled front's.
I hate more than anything to quote tech **** but it might help.
Focused verticial directivity has worked well for movie soundtrack's particulary in the acoustically well dampened enviroment typical of mant home theater rooms.For listening to music however, many listener's perfer the increased sense of spaciousness that occur's naturally due to the more prominent lateral reflection's found in a livelie enviroment.Significant reflections from the floor and ceiling do not enhance the sound.On the contrary, they have the opposite effect and can often be the source of unwanted and unnatural tonal coloration's.It is for this reason that speaker's that sound best with music have a well-defined,smoothly varying frequency response at angles well away from the normal listening axis,making them equally suitable for both moviesoundtracks and music.
Nowadays digitallt recorded soundtracts and music often contain very loud and very low frequency signals that are well below the frquency range of naturally occuring sound.THX Ultra 2 sub's have been provided with an extended low frequency responce and greater output capility to meet these demands.

mantis

I posted when I wasn't finished sorry..............
But back to THX ultra sub's now play flat down to 20 hz.Not many sub's can claim that(no current polk sub can, they should make another psw1200 type sub, come one Polk I'm waiting...)
That doesn't include layout of speaker's thats another post.
But if you do your research well, you will find in more depth than I'm going to write(I have to breath........to much tech babble).
It's not for the inexperienced to try to understand.But after years of placement,live room's,swapping out gear to find the right one that work's.It really help's narrow it down and get to the movie or music than worry about the gear(but if your twisted up like me, thats real hard to swallow)
I will finish with this and try to answer anyones question the best I can.............THX Isn't just gear, it's the whole experience.It's not a sound format.It is a true cinematic experience.
I have been searching for theater excellence.music excellence,THX is going to help me accomplish that goal.I believe in EVERTHING they do.It's hard not to when everything they say makes practial sense.

jmierzur

Mantis,

I am in the process of 'tuning' my room and would be very interested in your technical knowledge and recent training on this subject.

If you have not read this thread, please review.

Upgrade thread

Would it be possible to contact you directly with details on my room and the treatments I have constructed to get your opinion. I am at the stage where I am just experiementing with placement and any guidance would be appreciated.

John

mantis

yes you can.........Dmantis20@cs.com.
If you pic's that alway's help's,but I can walk you threw a series of test's you can perform that would really help you tune your room.

RuSsMaN

Walk us all through it, would ya?

Cheers,
Russ

rnoseworthy

RuSsMaN

Have you taken the drive to Granbury to see the only place around Dallas with the Lsi line?

mantis

Russman,
I think to answer your question is tuning your room right??Going over some test's that will really help any size or problem room.
If you want to improve the acoustic's performance of any room, you need to address the following

1)Identify and control reflections
2)Identify and control slap echoes
3)Choose and place absorptive and diffusive materials knowledgeby
4)Place seating and subs appropriately
5)Control the noise.
OK that being said,the first on my list is reflections.Here's a simple usefull technic that will help.
Take the height of your main speaker's and trace down the side wall with a mirror,have someone sit on the seating or sweatspot of your room ,run the mirror down the side wall untill you can see the speaker.Now this is going to be the point of first reflection.You don't want it, treat this area with sound absorptive material like panels if you can afford, real big soft chair not for theater watching or music listening,Drapes heavy if a window so happens to be in that area,etc.Dont treat to the floor or to the ceiling,about 3 feet up the wall works just fine and about 3 to 4 feet from there.Repeat this on the other side wall.
that is a good way to improve your room and you will hear a big difference on how your main left and right speakers perform.If the point is reflective there now, listen to some music before you treat and then listen afterwards.
For placement of your mains and I should of went over this before I told you about the reflection points,make sure you use unequal distances from the back wall and side wall.You want to try to reduce the comb filter effect as much as possible before you treat your room.To give you a simple idea about what a comb filter effect for those you i just lost.....ok.......You have direct sound and indirect sound arriving to your ears at different times.This sound is the same sound,now when you hear it, it sounds like an echo.This will blur the image and imbalance your sound.Also make it seem louder by sometimes as much as 6db.Here's a cool way to here the comb filter effect...........play pink noise threw the left main speaker,use it in manual so it stays in left main,sit on your seat and move your head from side to side.If you hear a higher pitch on one side and a lower pitch on the other, that is a good way to detect comb filtering as I understand it.(I will be going deeper into my studies and willpost back with any corrections to my new found technics).Now treating it as I explained above you also can use dense foam as a absortion material.
Now if I hurt your brain with all this tech stuff(I hurt mine telling you all this)Don't worry,room acoustics are very hard to understand and even harder to perform.Play with this as I will stop here.If you have access to ant add on help you can find, please do.I would love to talk some theory with people who studied acoustics deeply and have experience in it.
THX really opened my eyes on how inportant they are to getting the best performance out of all that expensive gear you bought.You will not believe what a difference it makes.It will be like upgrading into a new level of performance.
Have fun guy's and after you all play with that for awhile, we can continue further.