Dathzo
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Helìlo Keith,I will split your question into two answers - recording and playback.
1. For recording sweeps: your Denon X3800 MUST have an ASIO driver and microphone input capable of supporting a calibrated 48V Phantom Power microphone. You could use whatever mic came with your Denon, but it is unlikely to be calibrated, and not of high quality. I checked Denon's website, and it has no ASIO driver. So I don't think you could use your Denon to record sweeps. In this case, you will need a multichannel interface with as many DAC outputs as you need, e.g. a Motu Ultralite Mk.5 or RME Fireface UCX.
Other software (e.g. Audiolense) allows you to use a USB microphone, but there are many reports of inconsistent timing measured with USB microphones. This is because the microphone ADC is not clock synchronized to the DAC. I am starting to take the view that USB mics are good for frequency response sweeps only, and they are too inconsistent for time alignment. This is not based on first-hand experience, I formed this view from reading about complaints of USB mics on other forums.
2. For playback: in this scenario, you measure the sweeps with Acourate and playback via the Denon. In this case, you will need either:
(2a) the Denon is capable of convolution. I checked Denon's website and it does not appear to support this. The online manual suggests that the Denon only supports Audyssey. I don't know how you would even get filters generated by third party software (like Acourate) onto your device. In any case, Acourate only outputs .WAV files, and if you need it in another format, you will need more software to convert it into another format. Your Denon is likely to be incapable of 65536 tap FIR filters given that very low powered DSP chips are usually installed in AVR's. Alternatively:
(2b) you use your Denon as a multichannel DAC, and use a convolver hosted on your PC (like Acourate Convolver, Hang Loose Convolver, JRiver, Roon, etc) to do the processing and send processed signals to the DAC. In this case, your Denon needs to be recognized by Windows as an audio device, preferably via ASIO or WASAPI. Sadly for you, it does not appear to be the case for either. There is a downside to doing this however - all FIR filters introduce latency, which will cause lip sync problems if you use your AVR for video as well. You will need some way to adjust lip sync with your AVR.
Your Denon already has Audyssey built in. You could use it. The advantage of doing this is that your hardware already supports it, and it is likely to produce a "good enough" result. It won't produce ultimate quality - if that is what you want, you will need a major reconfiguration of your system and be prepared to climb the DSP learning curve. You will also lose convenience and may even lose functionality - one example is getting any convolver (not just Acourate) to process HDMI audio. For this you need two additional pieces of equipment - a HDMI splitter, and an interface card capable of internal routing. Audio goes into the HDMI splitter, which extracts the audio and sends it to the interface card. The card then routes audio from the digital input into the convolver input, and the convolver outputs via the DAC on the interface card.
Many thanks for the detailed answer!
The Denon has indeed Audyssey. It also has DLBC, which does a better job than Audyssey. It sounds really good to be fair, but since a while, I have been curious if Audiolense/Acourate can produce a better sound than Dirac… I guess I would need to take a different route than the AVC as you clearly explained.
All the best.-