Emotiva RMC-1+ AV Processor Review

[Pizzaiolo]

Marantz supports ART. The upcoming minidsp Tide 16 comes with ART with no extra charge.

- Rich

Even the new AV 30 supports ART and is just $4K. Impossible to justify the XMC-2+ at that price

 

[RichB]

Even the new AV 30 supports ART and is just $4K. Impossible to justify the XMC-2+ at that price

True, less from a dealer that discounts....

- Rich

 

[Lsc]

Marantz supports ART. The upcoming minidsp Tide 16 comes with ART with no extra charge.

- Rich

He is looking for 11.x.8 for under $10k. Not sure if any manufacturer will be able to produce this let alone Emotiva. Hoping that they will come out with anything are prayers that’ll be never answered.

 

[quantizationTHD]

This is a review and detailed measurements of the RMC-1+ 16 channel Audio/Video Processor for home theater applications. It was kindly drop shipped by a member and costs US $5,499.
View attachment 477928
The design language follows previous generation. I like all the bits/bytes info on the left and large volume display. The center control is actually a fancy, 4-way joystick -- something I figured out after reading the manual (and not being able to navigate the menus without). I guess it was too expensive to redo the labeling on the front panel to indicate it is the "1+" instead of the previous generation. Fortunately the back panel states it so:

View attachment 477929
This is a lot of channels. I like the high quality RCA outputs even though they likely will never get used. What is with that tuner section? Who would listen to radio in a home theater? There is even a phono stage with programmable loading (which I forgot to test).

Speaking of testing, my Intel GPU connected fine to the RMC and produced video and seemingly sound. But it would not gen up an audio interface in Windows as it normally does. After much struggle, I gave up and used Toslink for testing. I am pretty sure it produces near or identical performance to HDMI.

I left the unit in standby mode and was surprised to feel that it was fairly warm with a number of green LEDs on in the back board. Even the back panel was warm when I tried to remove the XLR cables! It is not hot mind you but I expect standby to be a low power state. I suspect they are keeping a lot of systems on for faster turn on.

Emotiva RMC-1+ AVP Measurements
I configured the unit to be in Reference Stereo. The manual says practically everything other than volume control is bypassed. This as you will see later, was not correct. Here is our dashboard with Volume set to 0 dBFS for front left and right channels:

View attachment 477931

That sharply rising low frequency noise was a puzzle. I looked at past Emotiva reviews and found one unit that showed the same behavior. So I continued testing until I got to frequency response. To my surprise, there was a high pass filter in effect! Turns out the default speaker setting is "Small" and setting that, will turn on a crossover, contrary to what the manual says for Reference Stereo. I turned that off and went back and re-ran the dashboard:
View attachment 477932
That hump is gone. But question remains: why would bass management cause that sharp increase in low frequency noise? Seeing how most people would use the unit in that manner, the first measurement is more relevant to its usage. Still, let's give it the benefit of doubt and rank it based on the second measurement:
View attachment 477934
Very disappointing. The issue is rising noise and distortion starting at just 10 kHz.

I thought I ran the dynamic range test but now can't find it. You can see it implicitly in this very poor showing in IMD test:
View attachment 477935
I don't think I have ever tested any DAC with such high level of noise in IMD test!

Here is the output vs distortion:
View attachment 477936

So best not to crank up the volume past 0 dB unless you really need it. You get a couple more volts but give up even more noise performance.

Linearity is not good but this happens in fair number of AV products:

View attachment 477938

Frequency response is fine:
View attachment 477939

But filter attenuation is not:
View attachment 477940

Wideband THD+N vs frequency is horrid:
View attachment 477941

Digging in, we see that the cause is not just ultrasonic, but also in-band as we detected earlier:
View attachment 477942

I tested noise on power on/off and only the former produced such (standby on/off was used):
View attachment 477944

Conclusions
The RMC-1+ is priced well and feels like a substantial unit with good functionality. Alas, when it comes to measured performance it disappoints in almost every department. It seems no care whatsoever was put in to control and reduce noise. We could argue about audibility of distortion but noise, when wailing from 16 channels, could become bothersome. I know the company has measurement gear and has origins in high performance audio. Shame it has lost its roots this way.

I can't recommend the Emotiva RMC-1+.
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As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.

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Please provide a list of the test equipment used with model numbers and pics of calibration stickers, along with cables used, pics of your set setup with test equipment and DUT, etc..
Your review is interesting, but lacks credibility w/o these things.

 

[NicS]

Please provide a list of the test equipment used with model numbers and pics of calibration stickers, along with cables used, pics of your set setup with test equipment and DUT, etc..
Your review is interesting, but lacks credibility w/o these things.

You can read about the equipment and methodology Amir uses to evaluate equipment in this forum. You just need to look.

 

[quantizationTHD]

I searched for "test procedure" and "test equipment" and nothing stood out. If you can provide a URL, it should be standard.

I specifically am looking for the test equipment with model numbers with pictures showing calibration stickers, along with the test methodology.
This should be included with every test.

Can you provide a URL to the information you're referring to?

 

[ryan74701]

I searched for "test procedure" and "test equipment" and nothing stood out. If you can provide a URL, it should be standard.

I specifically am looking for the test equipment with model numbers with pictures showing calibration stickers, along with the test methodology.
This should be included with every test.

Can you provide a URL to the information you're referring to?

Oh geez dude, go touch grass.

 

[Rja4000]

I searched for "test procedure" and "test equipment" and nothing stood out. If you can provide a URL, it should be standard.

AES Paper Presentation on DAC Measurements (Video)

As some of you know, I presented a paper at this year's Audio Engineering Society on measuring over 450 DACs. All the tests were detailed in the paper together with motivations and learnings from the multi-year project. The paper is only available for a fee (link below). AES asked for a short...

www.audiosciencereview.com

 

[NicS]

Audio Science Review FAQ #1

This is the first in a series of FAQs for Audio Science Review. 1. Who created Audio Science Review? The founder is Amir Majidimehr. You can find out more about me by clicking on my background link in my signature. Briefly, I have had a long career in computing, audio, video and imaging...

www.audiosciencereview.com

I'd start here, then message Amir directly.