Why does my music start sounding crappier once I go past 70db on my AVR ?

[Tom C]

His amp likely has plenty of power combined with the right speakers:

View attachment 281675

Who’s the blonde in the front?

 

[Tom C]

Dear Mr. @Seany ,
please know that every respondent here is sincere and is trying to help you . My own take:
1.). We have established that there is no fault in your choice of equipment. On the contrary, you show good judgement in selection.
2.). There is no established fault in your signal chain, i.e., things are working properly. Nothing appears to be broken.
3.). You like to listen loud. By that I mean, you have taken your equipment to its limit, and when you turn it up to where it starts to bother you, you wish for more. More louder, that is. Now, people have said, at this level of loudness , most folks are happy. And yet, you wish for more. You are not alone.
4.). Please listen to advice from @ROOSKIE . Get sub. Times 2. It was made for you and your setup. Easy Peasy upgrade. It will sound better. You will like it. It will be worth the money. There will be some effort required from you to get things set up right, but from day one, you will smile big smiles. And invite your friends for good times at your place.
Many thanks to @AdamG247 , who provided the breakthrough moment. You saw through the trees, and found the forest.

 

[CDMC]

Who’s the blonde in the front?

My ex wife. Worse yet, she took the speakers in the divorce.

 

[CDMC]

Dear Mr. @Seany ,
please know that every respondent here is sincere and is trying to help you . My own take:
1.). We have established that there is no fault in your choice of equipment. On the contrary, you show good judgement in selection.
2.). There is no established fault in your signal chain, i.e., things are working properly. Nothing appears to be broken.
3.). You like to listen loud. By that I mean, you have taken your equipment to its limit, and when you turn it up to where it starts to bother you, you wish for more. More louder, that is. Now, people have said, at this level of loudness , most folks are happy. And yet, you wish for more. You are not alone.
4.). Please listen to advice from @ROOSKIE . Get sub. Times 2. It was made for you and your setup. Easy Peasy upgrade. It will sound better. You will like it. It will be worth the money. There will be some effort required from you to get things set up right, but from day one, you will smile big smiles. And invite your friends for good times at your place.
Many thanks to @AdamG247 , who provided the breakthrough moment. You saw through the trees, and found the forest.

I agree, a pair of subs, properly crossed over (so high pass those mains at 80hz 24db/oct) will increase the dynamic range significantly and take away what is likely the main cause of the distortion, overdriving the speakers in the bass. If the OP budgeted $2,000 for a pair of subs, and spent the time to properly integrate them, I think he would be ecstatic with the difference. I would look at the choices from Rythmik, Hsu, SVS and monoprice monolith subs. This would also leave money for down the road if the OP decided to upgrade speakers or his amp. For less than $2000 the op could buy a Minidsp Flex and a Buckeye NCx500 amp for gobs of clean power and Dirac.

I can tell you that I was curious one day and pushed my setup to 110 db peaks (measured with REW). At that level, with the Revels high passed at 80hz 24db/oct, the woofers (2 8” per speaker) were getting close to their excursion limits with some bass material. I wouldn’t ever normally listen near that loud. My normal critical listening is calibrated at 78db at -20LUFS, so average volume is 78 db with max peaks of 98 db (rare).

A good read: https://www.masteringthemix.com/blogs/learn/the-perfect-monitoring-levels-for-your-home-studio

 

[ZolaIII]

@Seany ouch! That's not even 80 dB program but close to reference 86~87 dB, 103~105 dB bass peak. App is rather precise for what it is (on my Sony phone at least) that's why I recommend it in a first place and room is actually rather on the medium bigger side. I am begging to like that entry level Onkyo AVR that it endured all of that and didn't hard clip or shut down.
You definitely need at least two stronger 12" subwoofer's. Like for example SVS SB-2000 and mat one's can be found for about 600$ a peace. Luckily that AVR has two sub outputs and not bad (including high/low pass and volume) menagement. Advice is to go with front/LFE 100 Hz with two sub's.
A peace of advice try to make your self listening on lower volume levels, 74~76 dB AVG (average) is enough and eventually boost bass a bit (with sub's) when listening on such leave or a bit more on lower levels than that. Please study the manual carefully and do the calibration (room correction) when you connect sub's.

 

[tmuikku]

Before buying anything it would be good to test a high pass filter.

The amplifier very likely has one, so high pass the speakers, play with the frequency if its variable. This reduces bass woofer excursion dramatically, which reduces distortion. Bass could be gone but more importantly you can check out how much louder you can get before bad sound. If it works out, then your amplifier is fine, and your speakers are fine for that bandwidth and you could restore the lows with bigger bass system, like some subs. If it still sounds nasty, the speakers just aren't up to expectations. If the amplifier is not broken, its hard to believe it was the bottle neck.

edit.
Ah yes, there is variable high pass if I'm looking correct amplifier manual, its called "crossover" on this instance. Put it on and to 40Hz and it already should give you more headroom without actually taking away too much bass. It would cut out frequencies below the speaker port tuning frequency which is just extra excursion without much actual output (because out of phase), good riddance. If it is not enough, adjust the high pass frequency (crossover frequency) up and up until you have your volume level. If you now lost too much lows, you can add a sub or few, and/or get bigger speakers.

While you are at it make sure you do not have any bass boosts or loudness or anything applied in the amplifier. If there is not enough bass, you might have boosted it but this simultaneously cuts the SPL before distortion.

 

[Tom C]

I agree, a pair of subs, properly crossed over (so high pass those mains at 80hz 24db/oct) will increase the dynamic range significantly and take away what is likely the main cause of the distortion, overdriving the speakers in the bass. If the OP budgeted $2,000 for a pair of subs, and spent the time to properly integrate them, I think he would be ecstatic with the difference. I would look at the choices from Rythmik, Hsu, SVS and monoprice monolith subs. This would also leave money for down the road if the OP decided to upgrade speakers or his amp. For less than $2000 the op could buy a Minidsp Flex and a Buckeye NCx500 amp for gobs of clean power and Dirac.

I can tell you that I was curious one day and pushed my setup to 110 db peaks (measured with REW). At that level, with the Revels high passed at 80hz 24db/oct, the woofers (2 8” per speaker) were getting close to their excursion limits with some bass material. I wouldn’t ever normally listen near that loud. My normal critical listening is calibrated at 78db at -20LUFS, so average volume is 78 db with max peaks of 98 db (rare).

A good read: https://www.masteringthemix.com/blogs/learn/the-perfect-monitoring-levels-for-your-home-studio

Well, with my foot in my mouth, it’s so hard to reply. Really, I had no idea…
If I could move on to audio, personally, and I realize few may be with me on this, I would cross Revel F208 to sub at 100Hz. Please refer to Amir’s measurements. And don’t be discouraged at 100Hz. It’s still a phenomenal speaker, one I hope to acquire myself some day. But physics dictates rising distortion starting at 100Hz and below. Based on the limitations of the gear. Not based on a theory about where a crossover is “audible.”

 

[krabapple]

I thought I would provide some input, from someone who has the almost identical Integra DRX 3.4 (the Integra clone of the Onkyo NR7100).

I too have some "difficult" to drive speakers - mine are Gallo Nucleus Reference 3.2's - they go to 3 ohm on the crossover between Woofer/Midrange, and the tweeter is 1.6 ohm (!!)

So basically a torture test for many amps.

The amp section of my 3.4, is pretty much identical to the amp section of your NR6100.

When I got this AVR, it was replacing a much more powerful (and heavy!) older generation flagship Onkyo TX-SR876 (capable of putting out 165W@8ohm -and with a massive transformer onboard, weighing almost 50lbs - so lots of current too)

My first test was to disable all EQ, and just listen to it straight, comparing to the old Onkyo.

To put it simply - it did not sound great - I was not driving it hard, listening levels were around 70db (measured with a vintage Radio Shack SPL meter).... it just did not sound clear, it sounded congested, the imaging was confused....

[further experiments snipped']

alternate explanation: you bought a new amp that was smaller, lighter and less powerful than your previous one. You compared them sighted, and perhaps not level matched, and found fault with the smaller, lighter, less powerful amp. You thought of ways to 'fix' that, and lo and behold the ways you thought of did 'fix' that....in sighted , perhaps not level matched comparisons.

This sounds like it was a lot of work...but it wasn't audio science. Unless you are leaving out crucial details of your method?

 

[gnarly]

Quoting you from #73.

"So, i should have said speaker is good for 76-77dB, totally clean at listening position."

Your right at 76 (front display of unit) all the time the music plays clear. So this means that my display I need to adjust it to add +6 to 70. 70 probably really means 76 give or take 1-2. This makes my setup working normally then, nothing is wrong. Hopefully I'm understanding this correctly.

Yes, you are understanding me correctly.

I do think everything is aok, and i personally wouldn't concern myself with analyzing the room, or amp, or anything further.....
if what you are trying to achieve is simply higher clean SPL.

Like a number of us have said, get a sub or two with amp(s), Definitely high-pass (crossover) the Elacs.
Try to get a xover frequency between 100-150Hz ...whatever sounds best.
You'll defintely get a major boost in clean SPL.

With live-sound systems, there's an old saying about having enough 'rig for the gig'.
This saying holds true for home audio too.
Speaker/amp selection needs a starting consideration of how loud, and how low, do you want to go.

Like said earlier, given your issue of sound crapping out at higher SPL, you need more rig. That simple ime/imo.

After you get your subs running......
Then ! I'd recommend going to work with measurements to fine tune your system

 

[Deleted member 48726]

 

[CDMC]

Before buying anything it would be good to test a high pass filter.

The amplifier very likely has one, so high pass the speakers, play with the frequency if its variable. This reduces bass woofer excursion dramatically, which reduces distortion. Bass could be gone but more importantly you can check out how much louder you can get before bad sound. If it works out, then your amplifier is fine, and your speakers are fine for that bandwidth and you could restore the lows with bigger bass system, like some subs. If it still sounds nasty, the speakers just aren't up to expectations. If the amplifier is not broken, its hard to believe it was the bottle neck.

edit.
Ah yes, there is variable high pass if I'm looking correct amplifier manual, its called "crossover" on this instance. Put it on and to 40Hz and it already should give you more headroom without actually taking away too much bass. It would cut out frequencies below the speaker port tuning frequency which is just extra excursion without much actual output (because out of phase), good riddance. If it is not enough, adjust the high pass frequency (crossover frequency) up and up until you have your volume level. If you now lost too much lows, you can add a sub or few, and/or get bigger speakers.

While you are at it make sure you do not have any bass boosts or loudness or anything applied in the amplifier. If there is not enough bass, you might have boosted it but this simultaneously cuts the SPL before distortion.

excellent suggestion. He could even do at 80hz to see if that fully eliminates it and gives the extra headroom. This would help establish if high passing plus subs would be a good fix.

 

[CDMC]

Well, with my foot in my mouth, it’s so hard to reply. Really, I had no idea…
If I could move on to audio, personally, and I realize few may be with me on this, I would cross Revel F208 to sub at 100Hz. Please refer to Amir’s measurements. And don’t be discouraged at 100Hz. It’s still a phenomenal speaker, one I hope to acquire myself some day. But physics dictates rising distortion starting at 100Hz and below. Based on the limitations of the gear. Not based on a theory about where a crossover is “audible.”

Given my average listening levels are much lower and the lack of ear sensitivity to distortion in the bass, in my application it makes no difference. If I regularly listened at those ear splitting levels, it would be worth exploring.

 

[gnarly]

excellent suggestion. He could even do at 80hz to see if that fully eliminates it and gives the extra headroom. This would help establish if high passing plus subs would be a good fix.

That's one of those good on paper ideas, that doesn't really work.
Problem is, that without a proper bass foundation, even clean SPL usually sounds harsh.

If you have the capability, turn your system up to a loud, but still comfortable level.
Then turn off the subs, or high-pass your system.
You'll most likely then think it sounds uncomfortably loud.

If you have a three-way, do the same thing, and then cut both sub and mid sections off.
You'll probably be covering your ears, as you reach to turn the system down.

 

[ZolaIII]

Given my average listening levels are much lower and the lack of ear sensitivity to distortion in the bass, in my application it makes no difference. If I regularly listened at those ear splitting levels, it would be worth exploring.

Believe me you are sensitive to 13~15% THD. I use equal loudness normalisation (ISO 226 2003) so I don't miss bass on moderate listening levels (60~65 dB average) and that helped me to go down from 75~80 dB levels I did before to 65~75 dB regularly now. It helps of course and with quiet late night listening but then you don't receive all of the bottom end but still enough to be plesent (at least compared to none which whose no go for me in any way).

 

[Deleted member 48726]

Given my average listening levels are much lower and the lack of ear sensitivity to distortion in the bass, in my application it makes no difference. If I regularly listened at those ear splitting levels, it would be worth exploring.

I wouldn't consider 85 dB as "ear splitting level". That's considered safe level for 8-10 hours/day.

 

[ZolaIII]

I wouldn't consider 85 dB as "ear splitting level". That's considered safe level for 8-10 hours/day.

That's average and bass peaks go over 100 dB with it which is a bit too much especially if you are in the bass heavy gernes.

 

[CDMC]

Believe me you are sensitive to 13~15% THD. I use equal loudness normalisation (ISO 226 2003) so I don't miss bass on moderate listening levels (60~65 dB average) and that helped me to go down from 75~80 dB levels I did before to 65~75 dB regularly now. It helps of course and with quiet late night listening but then you don't receive all of the bottom end but still enough to be plesent (at least compared to none which whose no go for me in any way).
View attachment 281848

Not sure where you are getting your numbers from. Run full range at 96 db, the F208 has 1.0 THD at 80hz. It peaks at about 5% at 50hz at 96db (which is almost all 2nd harmonic). I am running mine at an average level of 78db with up to 98db on peaks, high passed at 80hz (so the knee is slightly higher, as the 80hz is the -3db point of the crossover).

Revel F208 Tower Speaker Review

This is a review and detailed measurements of the Revel F208 speaker. It was kindly purchased by a member and drop shipped to me for measurements. Revel F208 costs $2,500 each or US $5,000 for a pair. Note: our company, Madrona Digital is a dealer for Revel speakers. Feel free to read as...

www.audiosciencereview.com

 

[ZolaIII]

Not sure where you are getting your numbers from. Run full range at 96 db, the F208 has 1.0 THD at 80hz. It peaks at about 5% at 50hz at 96db (which is almost all 2nd harmonic). I am running mine at an average level of 78db with up to 98db on peaks, high passed at 80hz (so the knee is slightly higher, as the 80hz is the -3db point of the crossover).

Revel F208 Tower Speaker Review

This is a review and detailed measurements of the Revel F208 speaker. It was kindly purchased by a member and drop shipped to me for measurements. Revel F208 costs $2,500 each or US $5,000 for a pair. Note: our company, Madrona Digital is a dealer for Revel speakers. Feel free to read as...

www.audiosciencereview.com

Not from your system but lose amplifier close to clipping with THD of 10% and overdriven speakers but not too much with let's say 5% THD in lower bass region or if you wish this thread case.

 

[CDMC]

I wouldn't consider 85 dB as "ear splitting level". That's considered safe level for 8-10 hours/day.

When I referenced ear splitting, I was referencing when I cranked it up and was recording 110db peaks which put the average level in the mid 90 db range. I am sure that there are those that find that comfortable, I can't take it. I had some explosives go off very close to me when I was younger and as a result have had tinnitus since I was 12, which unfortunately has gotten significantly louder in the last 2-3 years (I am going on 50). I am also sensitive to loud volume levels, if I go to a bar with live music or concert, I have to wear earplugs, or it is painful. Even listening at my reference level of 78db average, if I do for more than about 30 minutes, I pay for it with loud ringing the rest of the day. Getting older sucks!!!!!

 

[Deleted member 48726]

That's average and bass peaks go over 100 dB with it which is a bit too much especially if you are in the bass heavy gernes.

Yeah, but I wouldn't worry too much about the bass levels as it's a rare phenomenon to have hearing loss in low frequencies anyway.