Having it clear out all of the settings is what I was looking for and yes there is an option to do that. That way I could adjust the eq without any other settings set.
This is always a frustrating exercise for me. What I did that makes sense to me ends up not sounding good. Using the Rives Test CD 2, I had to narrow it down to just the 8 frequencies used by MCACC, which was, 125, 250, 500, 1k, 2k, 4k, 8k, 16k. This was tracks 40, 43, 46, 49, 52, 55, 58, 59 on the CD.
When I go back to listening distance, about 8 feet, the meter readings varied widely, depending on where I was standing, or by just moving the meter an inch or so. Getting an accurate reading this way is impossible. The best I could do is to hold the meter out in front of me at about 2 to 2 1/2 feet from the speakers. This way I get a more unvarying reading and the numbers didn't swing as far from each other as before.
For Mains I got
125hz = 82db = -2 in MCACC (80 was average)
250hz = 90db = -10
500hz = 81db = -1
1k = 76db = +4
2k = 72db = +8
4k = 82db = -2
8k = 78db = +2
16k = 80db = 0
Not the same, but similar for Center. This ended up sounding like crap.
I tried taking a current MCACC auto reading on all settings, then set the EQ to Zero like Henry66 suggested, but that was the worst sounding of all. The sound was absolutely drained of life. With the settings retained it sounded marginally better.
I had an old saved setting from a year or so ago and this is the best sounding one over all. I've done some tweaking with it, and it could stand some more, but so far, it's the best. Right now a little too much bass. Listening to a Sting concert in TrueHD. Good stuff.
