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Marantz Cinema 30
- Thread starter Descartes
- Start date
Audyssey, YPAO, ARCG don't cost as much nowadays because they have been around for a long time and they have the costs build in with their projected sales of the devices. Dirac Live (much more so for Trinnov) have not sold as many. Nothing is free, it's build into the cost of the device, and REW is free to the users but it is in a different category, not really comparable to Audyssey, YPAO, DL, and Trinnov. DL, even with a $1,000 price adder, installed on the AV10, still cost the end users much less than Trinnov's users.
As it it now, DL's works even without any manual tweaking post calibration, and they have been improving via many FW updates in the last few years. It cost a lot more than Microsoft Office, but again, volume is king, there are probably more than a billion MS Office users world wide, how many DL users, many be thousands, or even 10's of thousands, I don't think it would reach a million.
I agree DL should get more aggressive on their pricing policy, now that they have gained a lot of users in the last several years, with more and more popular AVRs/AVPs such as Arcam, NAD, Monolith, and most recently Onkyo/Integra/Pioneer, Denon/Marantz joining. With a much increased user base, I would predict price may eventually drop a little. The fact that they have been offering the 30% sales (such as the Black Friday sale) a couple times last year already, is a good indicator that it will offer some price relieve sooner than later. At that point, early adopters may not be too happy, but that's how it works.
Sorry your argument makes zero sense. You don't use the Dirac software one time to perform the room correction - you use it every time your receiver is powered on!
The filters and phase corrections, which were applied, run all the time, that's what you are paying for not the experience while setting it up.
I can only say what my experience has been over past 7 years. Nothing is perfect, but it's interesting your experience seems to be such a polar opposite of mine.
Dirac is not inexpensive, even for AV-10 owners. It crosses the 4 digit mark that is when I start seriously thinking about the value proposition. Looking at the official ART page, their current pitch for $1k product is poor at best.
www.dirac.com
The opening line is endorsement from certain EW (initials) that might be a bit odd to a lot of people that were following his (particular line of) work. Then there are some links to media coverage and some videos. I would really like to see some case studies there for the price they require. Like measurements and analysis (even if done by their staff) for some typical and atypical systems - for now obviously they would need to be Storm driven systems.
Also, I find it very interesting that Gene, the chief Audioholic, after his initial rave about the ART, has actually not reviewed it yet in any level of derail. Just ran a search again, always room for error but does not seem that way. Gene has a pretty darn good HT setup (although nothing is perfect - if you can't put FWs on the floor IMO best to ditch them - except perhaps for Trinnov setup), including Sorm 24 (so including ART) and monster LR towers (4x12" active woofers each), and he was dazzled with Storm's own bass management module and abilities to route bass between speakers pretty much however one wants (but this does not work with ART). I can't seem to reconcile the above as I would love to have Gene's review of ART vs Storm bass management system (which would need REW filters as base). The fact such review is not out might raise the question is Gene being diplomatic because of Storm or because of ART?
Dirac Live Active Room Treatment (ART) - Dirac
Active Room Treatment calibrates your speakers as a unified system and uses each speaker’s strengths for unmatched clarity.
www.dirac.com
The opening line is endorsement from certain EW (initials) that might be a bit odd to a lot of people that were following his (particular line of) work. Then there are some links to media coverage and some videos. I would really like to see some case studies there for the price they require. Like measurements and analysis (even if done by their staff) for some typical and atypical systems - for now obviously they would need to be Storm driven systems.
Also, I find it very interesting that Gene, the chief Audioholic, after his initial rave about the ART, has actually not reviewed it yet in any level of derail. Just ran a search again, always room for error but does not seem that way. Gene has a pretty darn good HT setup (although nothing is perfect - if you can't put FWs on the floor IMO best to ditch them - except perhaps for Trinnov setup), including Sorm 24 (so including ART) and monster LR towers (4x12" active woofers each), and he was dazzled with Storm's own bass management module and abilities to route bass between speakers pretty much however one wants (but this does not work with ART). I can't seem to reconcile the above as I would love to have Gene's review of ART vs Storm bass management system (which would need REW filters as base). The fact such review is not out might raise the question is Gene being diplomatic because of Storm or because of ART?
Shimrra Jamaane
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Dirac is not inexpensive, even for AV-10 owners. It crosses the 4 digit mark that is when I start seriously thinking about the value proposition. Looking at the official ART page, their current pitch for $1k product is poor at best.
Dirac Live Active Room Treatment (ART) - Dirac
Active Room Treatment calibrates your speakers as a unified system and uses each speaker’s strengths for unmatched clarity.
The opening line is endorsement from certain EW (initials) that might be a bit odd to a lot of people that were following his (particular line of) work. Then there are some links to media coverage and some videos. I would really like to see some case studies there for the price they require. Like measurements and analysis (even if done by their staff) for some typical and atypical systems - for now obviously they would need to be Storm driven systems.
Also, I find it very interesting that Gene, the chief Audioholic, after his initial rave about the ART, has actually not reviewed it yet in any level of derail. Just ran a search again, always room for error but does not seem that way. Gene has a pretty darn good HT setup (although nothing is perfect - if you can't put FWs on the floor IMO best to ditch them - except perhaps for Trinnov setup), including Sorm 24 (so including ART) and monster LR towers (4x12" active woofers each), and he was dazzled with Storm's own bass management module and abilities to route bass between speakers pretty much however one wants (but this does not work with ART). I can't seem to reconcile the above as I would love to have Gene's review of ART vs Storm bass management system (which would need REW filters as base). The fact such review is not out might raise the question is Gene being diplomatic because of Storm or because of ART?
I would imagine that thorough testing and reviewing a room correction software to the standards that Audioholics is known for is a much more lengthy and involved process than reviewing a speaker, and prone to be more based on subjectivity, so considering ART is still pretty new and going through further revisions I doubt they think it's worth doing for now.
Comparing apples to apples, Audyssey does have a cost, albeit its $200 desktop application is much lower cost than Diracs desktop software.
Also, if you like the results of Audyssey "free", there is always that option. It's great having the choices.
I look at the cost of Dirac and compare it to the cost of other software that I've upgraded year over year, paying for new features or bug fixes, and it really adds up. I pay Dirac once and I have lifetime support and upgrades.
Do I wish Dirac was cheaper? Of course
True that sometimes they do apply high standards, but often (especially previews) sometimes look more along the lines of EW's work. Audio is still pretty opaque field and us mere consumers don't really know what is going on behind the scenes. That's why I would want Gene's full review as he usually is relatively/pretty fair in those.
If you were following Gene/ART story, first time he wanted to review was really long time ago, when it was all beta even for Storm. Based on his enthusiasm, seems that Dirac was not up for it. What happened later seems to be between them. ART was around for a year now in official release and Storm exclusivity expired 6 mos ago. It is really great that they keep developing the algos as they should. But trying to sell me $1k worth of software endorsed by EW on the official page without any further details will be tough. I would not actually mind paying 20% more for 100% more transparency what it does and some case studies rather than web links.
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Regarding the soundstage please take into account that a wider distance among the measurement points implies a less aggressive correction which means that the room reflections will be less attenuated.
Those reflections can be pleasant though, even if artificial as they are not present in the recording, since they can give a wider sound stage.
Tighter mic positions instead will provide a more focused correction and imaging but the measurement points should have a distance of at least 30 cm (12 in) between one another.
Too small a space will result in over-compensation, which can sound dry and dull.
Flavio
@CCCC , I just ran DLBC, PC windows standalone version, on my new AVR-X1800H and am happy with the results. I got discounts for my DLBC license, don't remember the exact total cost but it is not much less than the cost of the Denon AVR, even with the discount. So, if I were as lucky as you are, having spend 4 to 4.5X on the beautiful Cinema 30, I would at least purchase the DL full range license, and may be add the BC only if you manage to get better audible results.
Just check it with REW, and the results do not disappoint, and it certainly tighten up the bass, that is quite audible. I could compare on/off quickly using a long HDMI cable so I could press the button on my Macbook Pro right on my lap.
You can see the significantly smoother bass from 30-300 Hz, anyone should be able to hear the difference.
The point I would like to emphasize is that while I had gotten similar, even better results (on paper) with Audyssey, using the $20 app and the freeware Ratbuddyssey, I never got as good results as with Dirac Live (again, just the PC version) post calibration with no manual tweaks.
My graph shows the results with DLBC, with just one small 8 inch sub, so the range below 25 Hz is not that great.
If anyone (likely from AVM90 owners I assume...) has smoother graphs to show for their ARC Genesis, again no tweaking please, I would love to see it as that would give me incentive to spend a few more days to explore what I could do myself.
Note: I will run REW for a few more mic positions, time permitting, based on past experience, I expect those to be acceptably good.
Edit:
Below is a tweaked one, with a bass tilt of a few dB rise towards 20 Hz, took about 15 minutes and now I have audible bass from the BMR-small sub down to 20 Hz!!
Still need to be done: check mic positions a few inches away from the MMP.
I use the Psy smoothing to see how audible that room mode at between 65-80 Hz would be, according to REW.
Just check it with REW, and the results do not disappoint, and it certainly tighten up the bass, that is quite audible. I could compare on/off quickly using a long HDMI cable so I could press the button on my Macbook Pro right on my lap.
You can see the significantly smoother bass from 30-300 Hz, anyone should be able to hear the difference.
The point I would like to emphasize is that while I had gotten similar, even better results (on paper) with Audyssey, using the $20 app and the freeware Ratbuddyssey, I never got as good results as with Dirac Live (again, just the PC version) post calibration with no manual tweaks.
My graph shows the results with DLBC, with just one small 8 inch sub, so the range below 25 Hz is not that great.
If anyone (likely from AVM90 owners I assume...) has smoother graphs to show for their ARC Genesis, again no tweaking please, I would love to see it as that would give me incentive to spend a few more days to explore what I could do myself.
Note: I will run REW for a few more mic positions, time permitting, based on past experience, I expect those to be acceptably good.
Edit:
Below is a tweaked one, with a bass tilt of a few dB rise towards 20 Hz, took about 15 minutes and now I have audible bass from the BMR-small sub down to 20 Hz!!
Still need to be done: check mic positions a few inches away from the MMP.
I use the Psy smoothing to see how audible that room mode at between 65-80 Hz would be, according to REW.
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I meant to say 11S3, that did not do as good ss the 11S3.
Actually, even the 11S2 may not beat the 107 dB SINAD in an apples to apples comparison, likely about equal, based on that graph.
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Dirac is not running every time I use the AVR. Dirac calculated once the adjustments and transferred to the AVR
Following your logic: if I make a calculation of (e.g.) a price mark-up in MS Excel for a product I want to sell, every time I invoice a customer using that price calculated in Excel... am I using Excel? Nope
There are two software components, first of which is on the desktop and creates the filter. The second Dirac component is installed on the AVR and that is required to process the filter.
The 107 dB SINAD is a DAC output from the Cinema 30 versus the 5W in ~4 ohm amplifier output I was showing with the PM-11s2. That’s better than the Amp10’s 95 dB SINAD for 5W into 4…
Yes, I was comparing that only. I know the 11S2 did well but the S3 was worse, measured by Gene iirc.
I don't want to beat the dead horse, it is always iffy to compare results done by two test benches especially when we don't know the details of the test conditions and the instrument used, just want to be clear what my basis was. So below is one done by Gene, who used a similar (different model but similar performance specs) AP to do his measurements:
Marantz PM-11S3 Integrated Amplifier Review
Review: The Marantz PM-11S3 Integrated Amplifier is rated at 100 watts/channel. It exceeds its specifications and sounds and looks great doing it. A true audiophile product with prideful ownership.
Gene did not show all his measurements on the 11S2 that he used for comparison, but I remember it performed better in the pre out SINAD as he did say the following:
So, I would think that the PM-11S2's pre out SINAD would best its AVR cousins, may even beat the AV10 at 2V, though the AV10 would be better at higher voltages. On the speaker output SINAD, the slides only mentioned the Cinema 30 did better than the SR8015 based on Marantz own measurements, other than that, the single number, 5 W SINAD of 90 dB, would indicate that it would do better than the 11S3 for sure but I can't be sure, wouldn't even guess how it would compare with your 11S2. I know your own measurements show excellent results but I am not confident in the comparison results based on using different instruments and likely different test protocols.
Anyway, given the choice, for two channel use I would definitely take the 11S2 or 11S3, over the C30 regardless of their test results that imo are academic, any claimed differences are not provable without DBTs with large enough size of participants, so all moot point in that sense. My point was more to do with, the OP asked about if sound quality is the consideration, would it be better with the C40+M50, and in that case, I would take the C30 as the C40 preout has much THD+N than the C30 and the M50 is not even going to be comparable the PM 11SX series that are what Marantz called, their "reference" class integrated.
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Is there any trick to fixing audio sync issues in Apple TV 4K (3rd gen) connected directly to Cinema 30? I've tried just about everything on the TV (Philips OLED908), including enabling Multichannel Bypass on the TV and disabling frame rate match on the ATV, but the audio is still off.
Connecting the Apple TV directly to the TV solves the issue, but then I lose OSD, and to be honest, I would very much prefer to have all devices connected to the AVR.
Connecting the Apple TV directly to the TV solves the issue, but then I lose OSD, and to be honest, I would very much prefer to have all devices connected to the AVR.
Do you have all eARC/HDMI CEC stuff enabled? Auto lip sync *should* avoid these issues.
Is the video lagging behind the sound or is the sound lagging behind the video?
Everything is enabled in TV settings:
Auto lip sync is also enabled.
I've recorded this video playing in slowmo with my phone, and it appears that the video is late.
sask15
Member
I have the Cinema 40, if I am using external amplification would I notice any difference changing to the Cinema 30? Would the new/better DACs be noticeable to the average person? I just don’t understand how they effect the sound overall or is it just output using an external amp? Would be quite a bit of money to upgrade. Thanks
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