E-27 E-26
Before yo u use your A V950/A VR750/450/380 it is
essential that yo u enter so me informa tion into the Setu p
menus a bout your s peaker conguration. is allo ws the
A V950/A VR750/450/380 to process an y surroun d sound
digital source to exactly ma tch your sys tem and give yo u
the ultimate s urround sound experience.
ere ar e three pieces of vi tal information which a re
outlined in the sections: ‘ Speaker T yp es ’ , ‘ Speaker
Dist ances ’ and ‘Spe aker Le vels ’ .
e way yo u enter this inf ormatio n manually in to the
A V950/A VR750/450/380 is given later in the ‘ Setup
Men us ’ section on page E-28. e settings ca n also be
established a utom atically using the Arca m A uto Speaker
Setup function. H owever it i s important to un derstand
why these speaker settings mus t be entered, which i s
why this section is pre sented rst.
Speaker types
Y ou n eed to set the typ e o f speakers that yo u have
connected to your A V950/A VR750/450/380:
Large capable of full frequency range r eproduction
Small n ot ca pable of full frequency range
repr oduction at the low frequency end
Non e sp eaker no t presen t in your configura tion
e terms ‘Larg e ’ and ‘ Small ’ do not necessarily r elate to
the physi cal size of your speakers. A s a rule of thumb ,
ifaspeakercannotrep roduceaa tfrequencyresponse
down to abou t 40Hz (and v er y f ew can!) it is oen bett er
to consider them a s ‘Small ’ for setu p purposes of home
cinema.
When a speaker is set to ‘ Small’ , very low frequency
sounds ar e redirected awa y from that s peaker to a ‘Large ’
speaker or a sub woofer , w hic h are far better s uited to
repr oducing these low frequen cy s o unds.
No te that it i s not possible to set all speakers to
‘S mall’ unless there is a s ubwoof er in your speaker
congura tion. If yo u do not ha ve a subw oofer , y ou will
be forced to set yo ur front s peakers to ‘Large ’ .
(Ad vanced users may wish t o auto matically ov erride the
‘S mall’ speaker setting fo r purely s tereo musi c listening
when not wa tching mo vies. is can be achieved in the
‘In pu t Cong. ’ men u – see page E-29.
esse ntial
se tup
Crossover frequency
If yo u have set an y speakers as being Small, then yo u will
be required to set a value f or the crossov er frequency .
is is the frequency below which signals ar e ltered
awa y from these Small speakers and redir ected to Large
speakers or the sub woofer (if pr esent). A frequency of
80Hz is oe n a good starting point, how ever you will
proba bly hav e to experiment with dier ent values t o nd
the best value for y our system or co nsult yo ur speaker
handbook.
Use Channels 6+7 for
If not u sed in the main zone, it is possib le to assign the
Surro und Back channels t o bi-amp the F ron t Le/Right
channels o r to pr ovide an am plied out put to Zone2.
Speaker Distanc es
I t is essential for the dis tance from each speaker to the
listening positio n to be accurately meas ured and en tered
into the ‘ Setup ’ menu. is ens ures that the soun ds from
the various speakers arrive a t the listening posi tion at
the correct time to recrea te a realistic surro und eect.
e distance can be en tered in centimetr es or inches.
Speaker L evels
Finally the levels of all the speakers in the system need
to be adjust ed to match eac h other at the list ening
position, again t o create a p roper surro und eect. T o
help with this the A V950/A VR750/450/380 can genera te
a test noi se for each speaker which should be measured
with a sound pr essure level (S PL) meter . e meter
should be set to ‘ C’ weighting and sl ow respon se. e
level of no ise measured at the list ening position fro m
each speaker should be adjus ted on the Speaker T rims
page of the Setup men u so that the meter r eads 75dB
SPL. I t does not ma tter wha t the system vol ume setting
of the A V950/A VR750/450/380 is before t urning the
test noi se on as the volume settin g is over -ridden for the
duratio n of the speaker noise test.
ere ar e several basic SPL meters o n the market a t
reasonab le prices aimed at h ome cinema en thusiasts.
Check your local technology stor e, search online o r ask
your dealer .
If yo u do not ha ve an SPL met er , yo u can tr y t o adjust
the noise level of each s peaker by ear . I n this case it is
not possible t o adjust the speakers to the a bsolute 75dB
SPL vo lume level, bu t you sho uld aim for all speakers
sounding equally loud . Setting speaker test noise levels
byearisno trecommendedasi tisverydiculttodo
accurately , but is o en better than doin g nothing a t all!
auto spe ak er
se tup
ere is a p roprietary aut omatic lo udspeaker setup
function built in to your A V950/A VR750/450/380. e
Arcam A u to Speaker Setup function at temp ts to set
all the essential speaker settings for all the speakers in
your syst em. I t also calc ula tes room equalisa tion (Room
EQ) lter values to r emov e some of the wor st eects of
resonan t frequencies in the lis tening room.
Y our A V950/A VR750/450/380 packag e is supplied wi th
a calibratio n microph one, which sho uld be inserted into
the AU X jack socket on the fron t panel and posi tioned
at the main li stening position. i s micropho ne picks
up the special calibration t ones genera ted by the
speakers when A uto S peaker S et up is run. e A V950/
A VR750/450/380 then analyses the signal and com putes:
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w hic h speakers are presen t,
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spe aker type,
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sp eaker distance,
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spe aker level,
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crossover frequency to the sub woofer (or la rge fron t
speakers if no subw oofer is pr esent),
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problem reso nant freq uencies in the room which
need contr ol by ltering.
T o help the system be as accura te as possible when
performing A uto S peaker Setup, ther e are a f ew
guidance rules that sho uld be followed:
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Minimise any backgro und sounds in the listenin g
room and o ther nearby r ooms.
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Clos e all windo ws and doors in the listenin g room.
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T urn o all fans includin g air-co nditioning sy stems.
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If holding the micro phone in the ha nd rather than
moun ting on a tripod or similar , k eep your hand a nd
ngers still to a void gene rating ‘handlin g noise ’ .
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Position the set u p micropho ne pointing u pwar ds at
roughly head heigh t in the normal listenin g position.
I t is not necessary to point the micr ophon e directly
at the speaker genera ting the test to ne. (I t helps if
you ar e able to positio n the microph one exactly
where your h ead would normally be for lis tening,
with the microp hone in direct unobstructed view of
all speakers.)
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If your system inc ludes an active su bwoofer , start
by setting i ts outp ut level / gain co ntrol to a val ue
halfway between maximum and minim um.
When activa ted, a calibratio n tone is pla yed through
each channel o f the A V950/A VR750/450/380 in turn,
including the s ubwoof er channel. e calibration t one
cycles round each o f the speakers multi ple times as the
dieren t parameter s are calculated. I f you do not h ave
a full 7.1 speaker conguration ther e will be p eriods
of silence between some speaker chann els. Follo w the
‘ progre ss ’ informa tion on-screen.
Aer all the channels h ave been measured, a sum mary
of the speaker congura tion will be displayed on-scr een.
Y ou ca n then choose to accept the settings, re-measur e
your syst em again or cance l A uto Speaker Setup wi thout
storing the settings.
e A uto S peaker Setup function is found within the
Setup men us, see page E-30. By default, Room EQ is
not app lied to any of the source inp uts. Y ou sh ould
enable Room EQ o n inpu ts you think benet from this
feat ure, as req uired, by list ening when playing typ ical
source ma terial through each inp ut. is is enab led from
within the In put Cong men u.
While room equalisa tion can hel p to reduce pr oblems
with listening r oom acoustics, i t is usually far better
to try to solve these problems wi th the room directly .
Proper louds peaker p osi tioning, acoustic wall
treatmen ts and mo ving the listening positio n away fr om
walls should pr oduce far better resul ts overall. H owever
itma ybediculttodothisinahomeen vironmen t,so
Room EQ is your next best ch oice.
Problems
W e advise you to look o ver the reported measurem ents
on the screen follo wing A uto S peaker Setup for an y
obviou sly incorrect res ults, in particular to ensure the
reported speakers mat ch your co nguration an d that the
speaker distances to the listen ing position a ppear look
roughly corr ect. If the results a re not wha t you expected
re-run A uto S peaker Setup.
e A uto S peaker Setup function is normally quit e
accurate bu t occasionally false results can be gen erated.
Prob lems may be as a r esult of:
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external s o unds or rumbling / h andling noises
picked u p by the micro phone
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s o undreectionso hardsurfaces(e.g.windo wsor
walls) close to the listening positio n,
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ver y stro ng acoustic r esonances within the r oom,
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obstacles (such as a sofa) between speakers and the
microphone.
Ifyo uarestillexperiencingdicultiesoryo uwishto
have the mo st accurate res ults for ultima te surro und
performance, we r ecommend usin g the manual method
of establis hing speaker distances and leve ls.
Using a subw oofer
If yo ur system inclu des an active sub woofer yo u may
need to re-run A uto S peaker Setup with the subwoof er
out put level / ga in contro l set to a higher or lowe r value,
if the summary screen reports prob lems setting the
subwo ofer up.
A uto S peaker S et up will att empt to c hoose a crossover
frequency that allows the smoothest low frequency
transitio n from the main speakers to the su bwoofer .
Ho wever if this does not pr oduce pleasing r esults we
recommend m anually trying other crossove r frequencies
to nd something mo re to yo ur prefer ence.
See the next sec tio ns for inf ormation o f how to en ter or
chang e speaker settings manually .
NO TE
A uto calibra tion is possible o nly for a 7.x, 5.x o r 4.x
speaker conguratio n. Other speaker conguration s,
such as a 2.1 setup (le, righ t and sub woofer),
must be cong ured manually usin g the speaker
congura tion menus (see page E-31), r eferring
to the guidelines on pag e E-26 for speaker types,
speaker distance and speaker levels.