Surround speakers output level

[PoppaPump]

Okay, so I ran the auto setup on my receiver and everything seems to work fine. It just seems like I cant here the rear surround speakers at all. I know they're producing sound, just compared to the center and L,R speakers, its really hard to tell. Although when I went into the setup again and did the level check manually, the surround speakers seemed very loud at 0db, so im not sure. Would it be a bad idea to increase the level of the rears? They are only 4.5 feet from the sitting position. Here are the rest of the levels if someone wants to take a look at them.

Front Left +2.5dB

Front Right +1.0dB

Center +1.5dB

Subwoofer -6.0dB

Surround Left +0.5dB

Surround Right 0.0dB

[Guest " "]

Before you go crazy on this....try a few different recent DVD's.

Some recivers have settings like THX, DTS, in which the rear channels will kick in vs prologic in which they won't.

Also keep in mind that larger rooms are easyier to HT image correctly than small rooms due. Basiclly the farther you seating(s) are from the walls, the more life like the sound feild.

[TNRabbit]

Before you go crazy on this....try a few different recent DVD's.

Some recivers have settings like THX, DTS, in which the rear channels will kick in vs prologic in which they won't.

Also keep in mind that larger rooms are easyier to HT image correctly than small rooms due. Basiclly the farther you seating(s) are from the walls, the more life like the sound feild.

Good Advice...

[Wrench722]

Okay, so I ran the auto setup on my receiver and everything seems to work fine. It just seems like I cant here the rear surround speakers at all. I know they're producing sound, just compared to the center and L,R speakers, its really hard to tell. Although when I went into the setup again and did the level check manually, the surround speakers seemed very loud at 0db, so im not sure. Would it be a bad idea to increase the level of the rears? They are only 4.5 feet from the sitting position. Here are the rest of the levels if someone wants to take a look at them.

Front Left +2.5dB

Front Right +1.0dB

Center +1.5dB

Subwoofer -6.0dB

I would drop everything a dB at a time till you start hereing them. Or increase them a dB at a time. But you need to find something you know what it sounds like.

Surround Left +0.5dB

Surround Right 0.0dB

[LoudnClear]

I use an analog sound level meter I got a Sears to set all channels to the same level while pointing its mic toward each speaker from the listening position, and playing the receiver's test tones. Love the results on all my surround material following that. I tried the Denon auto setup on my 4806 a couple times but never liked the results. I only used the distance measurment numbers from the auto tuning, all the eqs are flat, levels are set based on my sound level meter. Except I cranked up the sub about 3-5 dB from what the sound level meter said was the same as the other 5 channels, as that sounded better to me. The meter is set to C weighting, slow response.

I recommend trying this manual approach after you try the Denon's auto tuning and find something lacking. I've heard of alot of others using radio shack sound level meters with good results. I think mine was only $15-20 10 years ago.

[DrWho]

Hmmmm.....those numbers look wierd. As long as you're equistant from both mains, then you're going to want them to be set at the same level to maintain good stereo symmetry. It's only with extremely wierd placements that you'll ever have something different. As long as the rears are equidistant then you should set them the same too. Basically it comes down to an argument about psychoacoustics.

Anyways, based on your numbers I would propose something more like this:

L: 0dB

R: 0dB

C: 0dB, -1dB

S: 0dB and turn down the gain on the subwoofer itself - this will lower the noise floor

SL: 0dB, -1.5dB

SR: 0dB, -1.5dB (leaving at 0db will increase their relative output to the mains which you mentioned wanting to do).

I can't guarantee that these numbers will work, but generally speaking I would try to leave the LR mains set at 0dB and tweak everything around them. And at first try your best to maintain stereo symmetry - playing with speaker and listening positions before going to the level adjustment (but certainly use the levels if you need to).