Emotiva RMC-1+ AV Processor Review

[Fredygump]

So SINAD doesn't matter now or is not the right measurement? That's not what the companies who make products with high performing SINAD say, like Benchmark.

Best to stick with Marantz for me, whenever I build out my home theatre.

Lol! There are people who are arguing that SINAD is not important...I see similar posts on multiple platforms with the same title. A coincidence, I am sure!
(I don't mean that Emotiva is posting anti-SINAD content everywhere, but a few of the "subjective" reviewer types, I presume.)

 

[ban25]

Here are some quick measurement posted by Emotiva on their board.

View attachment 478207View attachment 478208View attachment 478209View attachment 478210

- Rich

Their measurements show the same rise in the noise floor past 10 kHz, as well as the out-of-band filter attenuation issue.

 

[amirm]

Here are some quick measurement posted by Emotiva on their board.

Thanks. Do these guys really not know how to take a screen grab in Windows??? They have to take a picture with a phone and post that? From a curved monitor no less? And they say I don't know how to use their product?

 

[amirm]

Looks like Reference Stereo is an incorrect way to measure this unit.

As posted in the manual, it absolutely is.

It bypasses output D/A section with relays, so you were only measuring its toslink D/A conversion, not the full digital path that is used in a typical home theater usage. So this review is not "compatible" with your other AVP/AVR reviews.

It can't bypass "D/A section." How would digital input be converted to analog if they did that?

In all of my reviews, I attempt to clean up the pipeline as much as I can. If there is Direct, Pure Direct, etc., I always turn them off as to not have an excuse why they did poorly. This way, we can compare their performance to that of simple DACs.

Yes, in use you would be using DSP and such. But performance will not get better. Only worse. Usually I also comment on whether such modes make a difference. Usually they don't as the issues are in Digital to Analog conversion.

Finally, this is how I test all AV products.

 

[Dougey_Jones]

You couldn’t pay me to use this thing.. PSU looks like a repurposed gaming PSU installed in the middle of the chassis.

 

[beeface]

their squabbling about the use of SINAD is amusing

 

[amirm]

their squabbling about the use of SINAD is amusing

Yeh, at one time, they googled the term. They found its definition in RF domain and post that it is only useful for testing AM transmitters or some such thing!

We actually had a good relationship until product after product performed poorly. A member sent me one of their CD players which would not work at all. I open the top and find a disconnected ribbon cable. I connect it, test it and post the review. As a courtesy, I sent their VP of engineering a link. His answer was that 1) I had ruined the day of the designers and 2) their CEO said the warranty was now void since I opened and fixed the unit!

 

[PristineSound]

1) I had ruined the day of the designers

I'm not understanding what he means by that.

 

[Fredygump]

Yeh, at one time, they googled the term. They found its definition in RF domain and post that it is only useful for testing AM transmitters or some such thing!

We actually had a good relationship until product after product performed poorly. A member sent me one of their CD players which would not work at all. I open the top and find a disconnected ribbon cable. I connect it, test it and post the review. As a courtesy, I sent their VP of engineering a link. His answer was that 1) I had ruined the day of the designers and 2) their CEO said the warranty was now void since I opened and fixed the unit!

Do they realize that we want them to do well, and that we would be delighted to see them hit a real home run?

What would it take from them to take this product to the top of the list? Is it better components, or do they just need a clever designer to lay out the board better? A few more iterations? How much would it cost per unit to make it a great performer?

I'm a bit suspicious that the CEO is a subjective audio person and is holding his people back. In the video I linked earlier both the CEO and VP of engineering are talking about the processors, and the CEO tells the story about how he decided that to make it sound better they should use a different op-amp. So yeah, it doesn't sound like he cares about objective audio quality and measurements.

But if he doesn't care about measurements, why is he making (or allowing his people to make) such a defensive and angry statement about the measurements when they already know how the thing measures? LOL!

 

[SuicideSquid]

Do they realize that we want them to do well, and that we would be delighted to see them hit a real home run?

This right here.

I occasionally delight in seeing the obvious snake oil scam products like audiophile cables and power conditioners get taken down a peg, I'm not happy when I see a genuine product post failing marks. It's disappointing! I'm not cheering for these companies to produce junk and laughing when they do - I want to see every product tested here hit a home run on the objective marks so that I can make my purchasing decision based on the important things, like aesthetics, features, and price.

 

[enricoclaudio]

I purchased the XMC-1 with the promised of delivering the HDMI 2.0 board upgrade in the next 3 months and took 18 months for Emotiva to fulfill the promise. Then 12 more months of beta testing firmwares for the HDMI board. Then they released the XMC-2 and I had the opportunity to trade in my XMC-1 for the XMC-2 paying only $600 but I passed on the offer and sold the XMC-1 for $1600. Avoid Emotiva at any cost.

 

[RndmLstner]

That being said, for a little less money, I will upgrade my Sony STR-za5000es to a Sony STR-az7000es. As much as I would like to go with a pre/pro and separate amplification, there are just too many quirks to do so when the Sony is an extremely polished product with “good enough” fidelity.

Did not age well.... See Sony STze-za5000es review ("There are some serious bugs in this Sony.")

 

[beeface]

Did not age well.... See Sony STze-za5000es review ("There are some serious bugs in this Sony" & a lower SINAD)

woof

 

[TimoJ]

It can't bypass "D/A section." How would digital input be converted to analog if they did that?

It could if there's a separate d/a converter just for Toslink. But then again, if internal signal processing was bypassed, how was small/large speaker selection still active... Or was that just some spurious signal that leaked thru to the Toslink conversion? You didn't measure frequency response with small/large setting? So it's still unclear if output's d/a conversion was actually used or bypassed.

 

[SuicideSquid]

It could if there's a separate d/a converter just for Toslink. But then again, if internal signal processing was bypassed, how was small/large speaker selection still active... Or was that just some spurious signal that leaked thru to the Toslink conversion? You didn't measure frequency response with small/large setting? So it's still unclear if output's d/a conversion was actually used or bypassed.

Is the core argument here that Amir should have tested using HDMI? Because the HDMI connection didn't work. That's relevant information.

 

[TimoJ]

Is the core argument here that Amir should have tested using HDMI? Because the HDMI connection didn't work. That's relevant information.

I don't know RMC-1+'s signal flow. Their desciption of reference stereo is confusing. It looks like all digital signals go thru all the same circuits as they normally do and then use the same output DACs. In that case measurements are valid and Emotiva has a bug somewhere or bad circuit design.

Measurements of AVRs/AVPs should be done via HDMI and if it doesn't work properly then find out why. There are examples where HDMI vs. Toslink are performing differently.

 

[NTTY]

It could if there's a separate d/a converter just for Toslink. But then again, if internal signal processing was bypassed, how was small/large speaker selection still active... Or was that just some spurious signal that leaked thru to the Toslink conversion? You didn't measure frequency response with small/large setting? So it's still unclear if output's d/a conversion was actually used or bypassed.

Yes Amir did and commented in the review:

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:

On top, there's no reason for Toslink to suffer any issue of that sort. Those are coming from post digital and analog processing of the digital input signal, to convert it to analog.

 

[muslhead]

Sad to see Emotiva has done nothing with all the previous failures, customer complaints and 3rd party testing data.
So many other, better performing choices for less money
Am so glad i sold my xmc.

 

[mdsimon2]

Here are some quick measurement posted by Emotiva on their board.

View attachment 478207View attachment 478208View attachment 478209View attachment 478210

- Rich

Thanks for sharing.

It is difficult to read due to the horrible quality photos, but they are clearly using A-weighting and a slightly lower bandwidth (20-20K vs 10-22K). It also looks like they have the generator set to 400 Hz, although their photo of the FFT itself shows 1 kHz.

My guess is the 89 dB vs 96 dB is entirely due to A-weighting and slightly lower bandwidth.

Michael

 

[prerich]

Do they realize that we want them to do well, and that we would be delighted to see them hit a real home run?

What would it take from them to take this product to the top of the list? Is it better components, or do they just need a clever designer to lay out the board better? A few more iterations? How much would it cost per unit to make it a great performer?

I'm a bit suspicious that the CEO is a subjective audio person and is holding his people back. In the video I linked earlier both the CEO and VP of engineering are talking about the processors, and the CEO tells the story about how he decided that to make it sound better they should use a different op-amp. So yeah, it doesn't sound like he cares about objective audio quality and measurements.

But if he doesn't care about measurements, why is he making (or allowing his people to make) such a defensive and angry statement about the measurements when they already know how the thing measures? LOL!

More than likely - he/she is just a CEO and has no interest in AV at all. The CEO's purpose is to keep the money rolling in. I've seen people who know nothing about music at all (can't sing, can't play), but they have Grammy awards.