Whenever someone comes onto these forums trying to resolve issues I see many gems of information that come out as people give suggestions based on their experiences.
How about a thread of changes that you have made to your systems big or small, whether it is equipment, placements, room dressing, etc. that has made a real difference in the improvement of the sound.
An example is the advice that was recently given to Cam by Zimm to place the center speaker a little past the edge of the shelf that he was going to have built to eliminate reflections. This resolves muddiness and hard to understand dialog.

The biggest change in my system was when I put in EQ for the sub and ran REW. It seemed like a subtle change at the time, but now when I turn off the EQ I really notice it.

While I am still moving stuff around and adjusting things here and there, these things helped to improve the experience in my room:

1) Moving the sub around until I found a good position. Did the crawl, moved some furniture, and ended up with a good spot right next to the couch. While the sound is only marginally better with a tad less boominess in music, the impact from having the sub so close to the couch adds to my movie watching experience.

2) Tweaking the toe-in on my LR channels. They are not directly facing me, but would intersect behind me somewhere. Stereo maging is better defined. I'm still playing with this one.

3) Getting a more level soundstage by keeping the LCR speakers around the same height. I used to have the LR speakers below ear level firing up, and the center above ear level firing down. Now all are above ear level firing down. This evened out sound effects that sweep across the front. I'm less aware of where the speakers are.

4) After every set of tweaks (aside from toe-in tweaks) I run Audyssey (MultEq). Until I can learn how to calibrate my system using an SPL meter and other EQ software, Audyssey just plain works for my room. Noticeable diffrence with it on vs. off. I'll lump in DynamicEQ and DynamicVol in here as well. Not perfect, but works pretty damn good!

Next up, I'm going to try and decouple my speakers in the entertainment center from the shelves they sit on. I'm sure at higher volumes, the contents on the shelves are adding some noise.

I am a new owner of M80s, VP150,QS8s and an EP500. I set the sub up per the instructions that came with it that said if you have m80's to set the crossover on the sub at 40 HZ. I then ran the Audyssey setup routine, but was not satisified with the results. It was weak on the low end.

After taking advice from another member here (thanks sirquack!) I turned the crossover switch on the sub all the way up and re-ran the Audyssey setup to let the receiver do all of the base management. Wow what a difference.

I am like you BigHonu, Maybe someday I will learn to tweek my system manually to perfection, but in the meantime Audyssey, DynamicEQ and DynamicVol offer the quick fix thats hard to beat!

For future reference, that comment in the manual applies only when using the speaker terminals and you connect with your mains in paralel (and thus do not have an external cross-over to separate the bass). I wish they would update the manual as it is a very frequent question.

For echo filled large rooms with many hard surfaces, add soft couches, area rugs, books in shelves, heavy drapes or even a 'decorated' ceiling feature to cut down the sound reflections.

Source material is very important, of course. You can't improve a poor recording too much.

Great input guys.

Removing the stuffed bear from the sub woofer port.

+1 on all those, except Audy as I don't have it, and lean towards the 'direct' paths when possible. Moving the speakers out "far" into the room helped a bunch; even in my small room it was worth the layout pains. I think Alan has said too much is made of first reflections, but in my small room reducing the first reflections really cleared up the detail and ease of the sound.

Experimenting (A LOT) with speaker positioning is the cheapest and by far the best way I've found to improve my audio system's performance.

Good one! I very much agree on this.

Its all about context. I probably have an issue with first reflections that is squishing up my soundstage. I also have a narrow (11') and very reflective room (plaster over conctete).

So far, I've been to lazy to play around with moving the fronts or treating the first reflection points. Maybe now that I am back on nights and have a little time each day before work...

I've found this to be very true. It does require a lot of patience, but it is well worth it. Also, try experimenting with listening position. Move the chair forward and back. Also, try slouching and sitting up straight and see if that changes the way the music sounds.

I would try just laying (pin, tape, hold) some pillows at the first reflection points and see what happens. You don't' have to go full bore with sound traps and foam just to test the concept.

Get a nice "squishy" song segment and replay it over and over making changes until you notice improvement. Worked for me, but now I hate that song!

I do have 2 2'x4' 6" traps doing corner duty that I could move for testing.

I found that stack of old legal books loosely placed in the corner behind the speakers did wonders.

Very nice, Charles.

Internet killed the library star.

Charles, I'm glad to see all this legal training is producing results!!

Indeed. Books are seldom used in law anymore. These simply list every attorney in the world. Kill one whole tree each year to get me this information which floats on the net for free. Trust me, they are doing more good now than ever before.

Yeah, it would have gotten kind of expensive to pile up a bunch of laptops in the corner.

Ah, a good use for Martindale-Hubbell finally discovered.

Exactly.

A Blu-ray player has made a dramatic improvement in both picture and sound quality. I watched Snow White on Blu-ray yesterday and there was a big difference in any version I have seen previously especially in the picture quality. Sound was improved as well but only so much can be done with the remaster of such an old soundtrack.

Telling the in-laws to shut the hell up during a movie also works wonders for sound quality.

+1

LOL!!!!!

Brilliant Pebbles

Amazing difference!
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(not)

But they come in handy if you want to know if somebody is a witch...............or a duck.

What's really impressive is the amount of scientific research which must have been necessary to determine that zip lock bags "are more linear in their response than glass".

I am almost sure that I would outweigh the smallest bag.

Magic pebbles? I wonder what a cubic yard of gravel from the local aggregates would do for my system(besides bury it).