Crossover points selected by Audyssey setup

This is very common. Speakers are greatly influenced by the placement in the room. A small speaker often extends lower if it is placed near a wall, for example. Similarly, a center speaker placed in a cabinet will suffer from resonances that can cause a peak at a higher point and push the roll off there. It all depends on what is happening to the speakers in your room and that's why it is so important to measure and not go by the theoretical specifications.

Having said that, there are also benefits in pushing the crossover points higher than the measured roll off point. This sends more content to the subwoofer where the MultEQ filters have 8x more resolution and will produce a flatter bass response. So, in your case I would recommend setting your front L and R to 80 Hz.

Regarding the subwoofer level, there are a few things to check to make sure that the settings on the back of the sub are not interfering with the measurement and proper bass management. Please take a look here: 

http://ask.audyssey.com/forums/84181/entries/76175.html

Also, keep in mind that Audyssey sets the subwoofer level to reference. That means that it is the same as the other speakers as is required for film content. However, personal preference may be different and there is no problem with making a manual change to the level of the sub. Sometimes this preference is actually due to human perception. At lower listening volumes (master volume below 0) our perception of bass drops faster. For this reason we developed Audyssey Dynamic EQ. It restores the bass balance that is normally heard at reference listening volumes. I highly recommend using Dynamic EQ together with MultEQ. Your receiver also has Dynamic Volume from Audyssey. That is intended to constrain the dynamic range for late night listening or for avoiding loud commercials. It should only be turned on in those situations.

Hi,

I have small satellites as well (Focal Sib XL) that don't do much below 90 hz and Audyssey set the crossover at 40hz.  I went in and changed in manually after that up to 80 hz.  My problem is that when I do that the bass is ridiculously overwhelming.  Is there a way to tell Audyssey what crossover setting to use and then run the auto setup for all the other settings?  It seems like if I just go change the crossover frequency up to a higher frequency after setup then the higher resolution filters of the Audyssey MultEQ for the sub channel won't be applied to that critical octave from 40 to 80 hz at all.  Am I correct?  Any way around this on a Denon 1911?

The roll off point of the speakers is greatly influenced by how close you have them to the wall.  So, it's not unusual to see extension below the theoretical spec.  Moving the xover up higher is fine if your system is properly calibrated.  If, on the other hand, the subwoofer level is set too high and now you are feeding more content to the sub then the bass won't sound right.  An indication of this problem is that the Audyssey reported trim level for the sub is -12 dB.  That's the max limit of adjustment allowed in the AVR, but your sub may need to be turned down more.

The Audyssey filters in the subwoofer have been precalculated up to 250 Hz (the highest xover allowed in the AVR) so you are not losing anything by moving from 40 Hz to 80Hz.

Chris, Thanks. I understand about the placement affecting LF corner. My speakers are in a semi-flushmounted situation so I am sure that pushes the LF extension down a lot.

You answered my main question though. Since Audyssey sets filters for the sub channels all the way up to 250 hz I can go ahead and raise the crossover frequency up without losing the filtering on the frequencies between the auto-setup crossover freq (40hz) and the crossover freq I select.

Anyway, I moved the sub out of the corner to a position on the front wall near the right main speaker and ran Audyssey again.  I then moved the crossover up to 80 hz.  It sounds amazing.  Spot on.  Great product and great support.  Thanks very much.

Hi Chris from Cyprus.

I purchased the new MArantz 7005. After reading all your articles and the comments from fellow users I am still confused about one thing (I know it seems stupid) but please help me out. I followed everything according to your suggestions including the subs volume/phase knob/frequency knob. The results I got are

fronts (large) - 40hz

centre (small) - 40hz

rears (small) - 40hz

surround rears (small) 60hz

I turned the fronts to small as you suggested but what shall I do with the crossover.? In some cases I read I understood I shall leave them as given by audyssey because it takes into account position/walls etc but in other comments I understood to raise them. Shall they be left like this? make them all 80hz? raise them by 20? to 60Hz f/c/r and 80surround rear?

One more question. even if I listen to a lot of music shall I still leave the fronts as small or make them large but raise the frequency.

thanks and please help me out because I read so many comments and did so many tests that I I just cant figure it out anymore.

Kalimera apo tin iliolousti Kipro

Γεια σου Θοδωρε,

If your fronts are set to Large then it's not possible to have a crossover.  Large means: no crossover and so no content from those speakers is sent to the subwoofer.

If you have set a crossover then the speaker are set to Small.  That's a good thing.  Moving the crossover up to 80 Hz is also good because that means that more content (everything below 80 Hz) will be sent to the subwoofer where the Audyssey filters have higher resolution and will result in smoother bass response.

It doesn't matter if you listen to music or movies.  The Audyssey correction is for acoustical problems.  These problems are due to where your speakers are placed and what the room is doing to the sound.  It makes no difference if the content is music or movies.  The acoustical problems are the same!

Thanks Chris for your quick reply. I must say that I have been listening in the last few days to the best sound ever from my equipment. I think a large part is also the way I fixed the knobs of the sub. Before I used to have the crossover to 80 and played around with the phase. Now that I turned it all the way up the crossover and the phase to 0, adjusted to just LFE everything sounds awesome. No more delay, no more double bass, quick response. I even hear a difference when it comes to ps3 games. Gunshots never sounded as good. :) I also made my rears and surround rears to 80Hz but raised the front and centre to 60 from 40. Still playing around trying to hear the difference. Thanks vewry much and so glad I found your site and your articles.

I understand that the sub woofer channel has higher filter resolution.  Therefore, raising the crossover point to 80Hz can theoretically improve sound quality vs leaving crossovers at 40Hz or 60Hz.

I also understand that Audussey often times chooses a seemingly "too low" crossover frequency because the algorithm determines that this is the best way to achieve reference quality sound under the given room conditions.

I have seen you recommend here that people raise the crossover point to 80Hz in order to take advantage of the higher filter resolution on the subwoofer channel.  This begs the questions:

1. Why wouldn't the algorithm set the crossover points to 80Hz to begin with if doing so would result in better sound?  

2. Why change a setting that the Audussey algorithm has determined to be best?

Can you please clarify?