Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Advice from Axiom Owners HK AVR-525 & Axiom Settings?

I was wondering if y'all could offer some different settings for my setup which includes:
2 M22ti's (fronts)
1 VP 100
3 QS8's (Surrounds)
1 EP 350
The room is about 20x14 and has a concrete floor (ahg! I know!)
The reason I'm asking is because while the setup is nice and loud, I feel like it lacks a hard "hit" on the low & mid-bass. Mind you, there IS bass, it just sounds a bit too soft and not as tight as I'd like. Also, even though I have the center cranked to 10 and all others to 7, I sometimes have a hard time hearing speach in a movie, not much mind you but I have to turn it up and then down before a loud action sequence if I catch it in time. My fronts are set to "small", all crossover on all speakers to 60hz, and the physical crossover on the back of the ep350 is as far right as i could turn the knob. I'd appreciate any other settings y'all could give me to try out. Thanks!

Well, there's no magic answer. The first question is whether or not you have calibrated your system with a sound level meter and a test disc like Avia. All of the speakers, including the subwoofer, should be outputting the same sound level.

I find it strange that your center is set to 10, and all others to 7. In my system (HK AVR520, M22, VP150, QS8 and SVS sub), the center channel has always been calibrated a couple of db lower than the fronts. Again, I have calibrated all speakers with a sound level meter and Avia, and the center is set lower to match the mains. From there, I might bump it up one db higher to increase dialogue.

There's also no real reason to have the levels set up so high. You can do the same matching by starting at 0 in your HK setup, and then moving a couple of db up or down. This will give you more leeway and will be easier to work with.

Finally, I think you need to raise the crossover settings in the HK. Keep the speakers set to "small", but 60Hz is too low for that system. You can do it simple, by setting everything to 80Hz, or you can set the fronts to 80Hz, and then the center and surrounds to 100Hz. This should give you a more balanced system, and give you more low end by sending more bass to the sub, which will handle it better than the other speakers.

There are other issues such as placement, but I won't get into that. Good luck.

Thanks Gem. I'll buy a meter today. Where is a good site to find AVIA disk? Originaly a frined and I calibrated it with a meter he had. What we did for tone was record about 5 tones from a Keyboard player ranging from high to low. Somehow we got it to play on all speakers but i think the reciever might have sent it out at different levels to the speakers, Pro-logic II i think. It worked ok for a while, but then again, I was upgrading from severely unmatched speakers and an inexpensive sony reciever. To give you an idea of what I used to listen too, my subwoofer was a Fender Amplifier that had two 12" in it, my surrounds where; left a Pignose (it's a small guitar amp) and right an old 8"Peavy amp (yeah i played guitar, i much rather listen to it now!), my fronts came off a bookshelf Sanyo system and my center was a 6x9 car speaker that was close to the celling to protect my tv from the magnetic feild! Hmm..gives me an idea to post a thread and ask what was the wildest makeshift HT people had. Anyway, I'm gonna go home and re-calibrate my system using your advice gem. Thanks.

Here is my setup:
HK 525 (Receiver)
M22ti's (fronts) 2db
VP 150 (Center) -4db
QS8's (Surrounds) 1db
SVS 20-39 PCI (Sub) -5db

Like Gem said, I have all my crossover set at 80Hz. All speakers set to small. You really need a Sound Level Meter (Radio Shack sells them under $40) for a proper calibration. Once you calibrated with a sound meter the difference is like night and day, atleast in my case. Good luck.

Halenstone,
I would definitely take gems' advice and use a disk like the Avia or the Sound and Vision HT tuneup. I believe both can be found at Amazon.com
Tune your receiver up to 80Hz for the cutoff and use the pink noise (speaker calibration level) setup supplied by your receiver. I'm assuming here you have a relatively new a/v receiver with such an option (you never mentioned what hardware you had). Most often each channel is no more than +/- 1 or 2dB unless the speaker is located further away than the others.

Short of doing all that, you might be a candidate for tower speakers otherwise. They would fill in the larger sound you feel you are missing at the present time.

Hi,
I'm new to th board. I just purchased a pair of M80Ti's.
I don't know about purchasing all this meter equipent and such. You ears should be able to do the job. I do have to admit I have had my surround system for a year and I am just getting it dialed in. As soon as you do that you will want to upgrade heh. Here is some of what I learned. Don't turn the sub up too loud. Turn the sub all the way down. Set your crossover at 80 hz. If you set the cross over on your reciever or preamp turn the crossover on your sub all the way up (150hz on my sub). Now turn the bass up on your speakers untill you can hear them start to push the bass some. If a drummer does a drum roll you want to hear it good from your speakers. Then start turning up the sub until it fills up the the bottom end. this worked great for me. I think the biggest mistake people make with subs is turn them up way to loud. It mucks up the works. Now set up your reciever for all channel stereo and put in a cd or record. Turn the center channel all the way down. Turn the rear speakers all the way down. Adjust the balance on the front speakers. Now remember those settings and turn the front speakers all the way down. Turn the rear speakers up and adjust the balance. Turn the front speakers back up and adjust the ballance front and rear. Now readjust you bass and sub. Your system should be starting to sound pretty sweet now. Now put in a movie. Turn the center channel as loud as it takes to hear conversations clearly or turn the rest of the speakers down some. This is not an exact science. Room sizes are all different. Some speakers might be in a corner and others not. Your speakers are probobly different sized. No one will write you a ticket if all you settings are kinda whacky. Do what sounds good. By the way I highly recomend leaving the center channel off when listening o music. It messes up seperation. Godd luck.

In reply to:

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I don't know about purchasing all this meter equipent and such. You ears should be able to do the job. I do have to admit I have had my surround system for a year and I am just getting it dialed in.

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Dear Sir,

With an inexpensive SPL meter and a decent test disk it would have only taken about 15 minutes to do ("getting it dialed in") what it took you a year to do by ear.

Well said. And not only would it only have taken about 15 minutes with a test disk and spl meter, but it also would have been accurate. Not to say you can't do it by ear, but the test disk/spl meter is the way to go. Considering what we all spent on our systems, an additional ~$60 to make it all come together is a small price to pay.

Actually it only took a year because I had vever had a sub before. I thought the system sounded good but there was always somthing off. Muddy bass. I finally experimented and got it right. But if you want to use a meter. More power to ya. Personaly I dont think a meter ca acomplish the task as well as an experienced ear. Dear Sir.

One last point. Most peoples hearing is not perfect. So the sound you get with a meter may not be ballanced to your ears.