Audyssey Unveils an Upgrade to Room Calibration With MultiEQ-X
In 2004 Audioholics contributing writer Patrick Hart interviewed a new company called Audyssey with an up and coming room acoustic calibration technology called MultiEQ. After two decades in the business, Audyssey is one of the industry leaders in research-based audio technologies that correct acoustic problems to improve the sound quality of your listening environment from home cinema rooms, to movie theaters, and even automobiles. We know that room correction is an important part of setting up a home theater system for best speaker performance. There are many systems such as ARC Genesis Room Correction (Anthem AV), AccuEQ (Onkyo), MCACC (Pioneer), DCAC (Sony), YPAO (Yamaha), Dirac Live (Select Brands), and Audyssey MultEQ (Denon/Marantz).
MultEQ is the basic room correction feature that is included in many Denon and Marantz Home Theater Receivers. To use MultiEQ, a provided microphone is plugged into the receiver that receives test tones generated by the receiver. The receiver then analyzes the test tones and determines factors such as speaker distance, speaker level, and crossover points. The receiver then saves those settings.
For an additional $19.99 Denon and Marantz owners can also download the MultEQ Editor app which works with the MutlEQ feature in the receiver but adds more features such as:- View speaker detection results, to check correct installation.
- View before and after results of the Audyssey calibration, making it easier to identify room problems.
- Adjust the overall EQ frequency roll-off for each channel pair.
- Switch between 2 high frequency roll-off target curves.
- Enable/Disable midrange compensation to make the sound brighter or smoother.
- Save and load calibration results.
Recently, Audyssey released information on MultEQ-X, Audyssey’s newest software application for calibrating home theater AVRs that have Audyssey’s MultEQ room equalization technology built-in. Just as with the MultEQ and MultQ Editor options, you initially connect the provided microphone to the receiver, but the setting options are more extensive as the receiver and PC communicate over your home network.
MultEQ-X brings users greater control over calibration parameters, more detailed information about their room acoustics, and a variety of other key features
--Audyssey
Some of the new features in the new MultiEQ-X include:
- Measurements with detailed frequency responses for individual channels for easy room tuning
- Subwoofer-level adjustment with slow and super-slow time rates
- An advanced target curve designer, with new “Cutoff Mode” control, as well as complete control over target sound for every channel and every preset
- Manual override of all automatically detected parameters
The new software platform from Audyssey was built from the ground up to serve the needs and interests of both professional installers and the most passionate AV enthusiasts. Users get complete control over their target sound response, with the ability to customize the frequency range and tonal balance of each individual speaker in the system.
--Audyssey
The new app-based platform will ensure that MultEQ users that are already in the system will be the first to experience improvements and advancements to the MultEQ suite of software/firmware room correction tools that are currently under development. At launch, MultEQ-X will support all Denon and Marantz AVRs that are compatible with the “Audyssey MultEQ Editor” mobile application (available on iOS and Android).
The MultEQ-X update is a more advanced system for users who desire greater control and a more immersive user experience that is still best served by the larger screen and more powerful processor of a desktop or laptop computer.
--Audyssey
We did get a chance to talk with Jeff Clark, Director of Software Engineering at Audyssey Laboratories and asked him to elaborate on some of the features of the new system.
Question: Can you enter manual PEQ filters for each channel without running Audyssey first?
Jeff Clark: You can enter manual PEQ filters for each channel pair, but the individual channel assignments are a "coming soon" feature. The PEQ is not applied as PEQ, but is converted to Audyssey FIR filters, with the accuracy depending on the PEQ parameters and the technology level (MultEQ, MultEQ XT or MultEQ XT32).
Question: How many bands per channel?
Jeff Clark: The user can add as many PEQ bands as their computer will handle. The UI/UX is not yet optimized for this use case, but it does work.
Question: Can the software be put on multiple computers for the end user or does the license restrict to just one?
Jeff Clark: The software may be installed on any number of computers. The license key for each unique AVR is $199.99, and is per-user, and is not transferrable. The rationale for this is that the software will receive upgrades and new features for free, so rather than charging for version upgrades and so-forth, we ask the user to "upgrade" the software when they upgrade their AVR. If an AVR breaks we'll help a user get their replacement licensed.
The new MultiEQ-X system is compatible with a 64-bit version of Microsoft Windows 10, with the October 2018 Update or later installed (version 1809 / Build 17763). This includes the newly released Windows 11. Support for more systems will be available in the future. We plan on testing this new MultiEQ-X PC based software on our Marantz SR8015 AV receiver so stay tuned...
See also:
Confused about what AV Gear to buy or how to set it up? Join our Exclusive Audioholics E-Book Membership Program!
Recent Forum Posts:
PENG, post: 1529350, member: 6097
From what I can see, the graph will look better if you limit the range to about 3 to 3.2 kHz, but then you would have to use REW/Umik-1 to measure a few more positions to see if it messed things up too much when your ears move a foot or 2 in any directions (left/right, up/down etc.). Matthew found such issues with Audyssey but I did not find that at all so obviously it depends.. With “X”, you may get away without using REW, but it would hurt to do both.
Im going to do that now PENG. To be totally honest things sound great with no Audyssey but I do believe implementing a setup like youve described can help. I also want to add a rising bass curve. Ive been extremely impressed with the LSIs thus far.
Pandaman617, post: 1529180, member: 88642
52771
Top trace is 500hz limited reference
Bottom trace is full range Audy correction via the EQ-X app.
From what I can see, the graph will look better if you limit the range to about 3 to 3.2 kHz, but then you would have to use REW/Umik-1 to measure a few more positions to see if it messed things up too much when your ears move a foot or 2 in any directions (left/right, up/down etc.). Matthew found such issues with Audyssey but I did not find that at all so obviously it depends.. With “X”, you may get away without using REW, but it would hurt to do both.
PENG, post: 1529217, member: 6097
Are those graphs with 1/12 smoothing applied? If so, I would like to see 1/24 or even 1/48 smoothing. It looks like they have a dip just below 2K, that's fine if they sound good. If not, you can EQ'ed them out by disabling MRC but I think for that to work you can't limit the EQ range to 500 Hz, you would have to let it EQ to at least 2.5 kHz I would think.
I have MRC disabled in full range and yes the mains are now LSi15s. I moved my F50s to the side for a future two channel system and am using the 15s with an LSiC soon to be replaced by a single LSi9.