Volume Level on Sub with Denon 2808CI

[thsmith]

I have a 3.3 Turbo and soon to receive a Denon 2808CI AVR. The instruction for this receiver say to set the volume on the sub amp at half way before running the auto calibration.

Any concerns setting the volume on the sub this high?

Today I have a Pioneer VSX-817 and when I run the auto calibration on it I have the volume on the sub turned up about 25%(9 o'clock) and the receiver sets the DB level to -10. sounds good for music but I raise the DB on the receiver to about -6 db on the receiver for movies.

When I do a manual SPL the settings are about the same.

Thanks,

[kmitchell]

Hi thsmith,

I have a 2.3 and a Denon 4806CI and I ended up using a hybrid (mix of HSU manual and Audyssey) approach. At first I just used Audyssey but found that I didn't like the sound and also the fact that the very low LFE output setting made the auto ON function not work.

I started by setting the sub volume to 10 o'clock and running Audyssey. It set the LFE to -8 which was too low for me. I then turned the volume on the sub down to 9 o'clock and ran auto setup again. This time it set the LFE output to -2 which was much better but still wasn't exactly what I liked.

I then ran the HSU manual setup using an SPL and Pete's spreadsheet and that indicated that I needed to increase the LFE output by 2 dB so I ended up with the LFE output at 0dB.

I ended up just leaving the LFE output set to 0dB and made very minor adjustments to the sub volume to get what I wanted. Once I completed the manual setup I set the SPL directly in front of the main listening position on a tripod. I then played "Stereo Pink Noise" and set the volume to get 70dB at the SPL. Finally I played a 50Hz tone and adjusted the sub volume to get the exact value from the spreadsheet, in this case 76dB.

BTW, I'm a network engineer so I'm really on thin ice when it comes to audio theory. If I've done anything completely wrong please let me know so I can learn from it.

Ken

[Pete_Hsu]

Hi Tracy,

I would try to avoid setting the volume knob on the subwoofer much higher than 9 or 10 o'clock. The gain is very sensitive on the VTF amps. One can always bump up the subwoofer channel level on their receiver to fit their tastes/preferences. Note that many people prefer to run their sub a bit "hot" when playing movies, so that is perfectly fine.

Sincerely,

[thsmith]

Thanks, thats is what I thought but wanted to make sure.