Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater HT in-progress

I agree with you.... Quality of sound is a very subjective thing that's tough to judge. Regardless, I will more than likely buy the Denon 6800 and use it as a pre-pro. Maybe this fall.

Good luck with your journey.

The 6800 seems like a good move … think that and an amp for the front 3 makes a great setup!

Looks like Marantz wants to play. Cinema 30 is about to drop. Not sure what it has over the 6800, but it's $1000 more. Looks cool. Might have more open real estate in the chassis.

I have 2, 5X200 wpc channel amps, and the Axiom ADA 1250 3 channel. I could go full separate with a 13-channel system, but just don't think there is a compelling reason to do that. My room is set up for a 7.4.2 system. I might squeeze a pair of front heights in, but doubt it would help much.

I’m not sure what that extra $1000 dollars gets you … so if I was choosing (without more info) … I’d probably keep the extra thousand in my pocket.

Thinking about doing better on aligning & integrating my 4 subs. After researching and playing around with this a bit I see 4 ways of going …

• Continue to doing what I’m doing … which is level matching front and back sub pairs and letting Audyssey cal front and back pairs as two subs.
• learn the more sophisticated AudioTools tools and/or check out REW to level & time align the subs by hand … all 4 subs by hand or just better align the front and back pairs and continue letting Audyssey cal front to back
• Buy a new prepro which supports 4 subs and let it auto cal them
• Buy a external DSP and use REW/MSO (Multi-Sub Optimizer) to level & time align the subs and then run Audyssey treating them as a single sub

The 1st & 2nd options are fairly time consuming … for my own understanding I plan on learning more about AudioTools and REW but when one considers the number of times you might need to recal …anything that takes more than 30 minutes starts to get old fast. Running an 8 point Audyssey already takes about this … more if you start playing the Audyssey, REW, Audyssey One and/or the MSO game … Buying a new prepro is expensive but considering the cost of your time it might pay for itself … the only prepro on my list at the moment is the AV10 and that would set me back a least $5500 usd if I went refurbished! The last option I’m considering partially because I might have to add an external DSP anyway to drive my shakers. Perhaps I can extend the life of the 8805 and use it to align the 4 subs too. I looked into the mini-DSP but to get balanced inputs and output we’re talking over $600 for 4 channels and $1k for 8. Older and not as high-end is the Behringer DCX2496le (6 channel). At $330 it might be an option.

I figure some of you may have a thought or two on this …

Yes, you should absolutely save up for another 4 or 12 subs AND the latest A/V pre-pro.

You’re in the safety of an enthusiast forum, where no one questions obsessive compulsive behaviors such as seeking vanishly small/non-existent marginal returns or hunting through a long tail distribution for the most esoteric catch.

Who would make fun of the decades I’ve waited for a 1/60 scale MG, RG, or PG RX-139 Hambrabi that’s never received anything better than HG? Practically every Gundam since UC0080 has been released in MG or RG. Even the lowly MS-06 Zaku and misnamed RX-178 “Super” Gundam has a PG available. How can I give my money to Bandai fast enough when they don’t sell what I want?

I can’t figure out why the mainstream are so repulsed by enthusiast subcultures. Maybe its the gobbledegook. Or maybe it’s because it’s dangerous to our wallets.

(BTW, I'm no Gunpla fanboi. My otaku days are long past. Somehow, the Millenials and Gen Z found what I discarded. lol)

Daniel, I have no problem if you’re still into Gundam … think my kids (now 20+) like that stuff … it’s ok … we won’t judge you.

As for “seeking vanishly small/non-existent marginal returns” … getting your bass dialed in is one of the most noticable things one can do to your system. Think it was the Olive score that had bass down as over 1/3 of the quality rating (I’m going by my fault prone memory here …. So feel free to correct me) … in any case good bass rates high in system perception and is something most audiophiles & non-audiophiles appreciate. What I’m trying to do is even out the bass over the seating area … if you have thoughts on how to best achieve that I’d love to hear them …

Try this article, and skip to the last few Powerpoint slides:

“Subwoofers: Optimum Number and Locations”, Todd Welti, Harman International.
https://www.harman.com/documents/multsubs_0.pdf

Being pithy, Todd says that 4 subwoofers are enough.They're in different locations from what you posted in 2021, and maybe it's worth a couple of weekends trying them out.

He modeled 5 and even 5000 subwoofers in the same rectangular room, but 4 effectively gets you there. There have been several loudspeaker designers (including Axiom's Ian) who've rehashed 4 as the magic number for multiple seating positions, but they might all be citing Todd's work.

I don't mind experimenting. I moved the sofa and lounge chair back to the natural layout of the room, which meant everyone sat off-center from the TV. So I switched the location of the sub and the TV+3 front channels for a couple of months. It was an audio step backwards with some undesirable wall reflections and the loss of 6 dB of subwoofer corner gain (effectively requiring 4x the amplifier power to maintain the same listening volume), so I reverted it last week.

My wife and I are watching the Shogun series on Hulu … really enjoying it …

Anyway fired up the HT to watch another episode and discovered that the projector is having issues. It turns on, warms up and then shuts down as soon as it engages the laser … doesn’t even go through shut down … just crashes … not good. Think epson is going to fix/replace it under warranty … Sooooo ….

In the mean time …. we’re watching it upstairs in the family room. It’s. just not the same …
It’s so much more engaging in the HT.

I think my engagement issue with the family room comes down to two issues:

- field of view
- surround sound

The family room’s 77’ LG OLED picture is, at least on paper, better in every way than the projector … better blacks, contrast ratio, color … the projector, as excellent as it is, can best the LG only in size (150”). We sit at about 9’ from the LG and about 12’ from the HT screen … giving a seating to screen width ratio of 1.6 (LG) and 1.1 (HT) … 1.6 is way to far away for me but the room layout, unfortunately, dictates it

On the surround front my current setup in the family room is dictated by the room esthetic… 5.1 with the surrounds on the back wall is the best I can do … that said I’m thinking about trying a db or two boost on the surrounds to see if I like it better. The HT currently has a 7.4.6 setup. It’s more immersive … that said I’m going to try changing it soon (to 9.4.4) as I think the heights are too close to the beds and I might get a better vertical experience with a little more vertical angle separation … we will see …