I credit crappy OTA radio with allowing me to learn to appreciate talk radio.

Anyway, I think if a pre-pro wants to be "current" it needs to allow one to listen to internet radio offerings in HQ.

I live in SF bay area and we have quite a few radio stations that aren't too bad. Many broadcast in HD quality as well. I personally don't listen to FM very much. I keep mine on talk radio AM stations, which I don't believe had HD? I just can't imagine paying a monthly fee for satellite cause I'm such a cheap bastard. Just basic phone, cable internet and tv cost me well over $200 a month and I complain about that excessively.

I have a question about this Trinnov Optimizer for setting up your speaker levels.

After you finish running the Trinnov Optimizer, does this mean all speakers in your system, front main speakers and also surround speakers, will then be correctly calibrated to Dolby Digital Reference Level for watching movies on DVD at the listening position where you placed the microphone for the Trinnov Optimizer?

And if so, does this only work for the front main speakers and surround speakers, or will it also calibrate your subwoofer's dB levels for Dolby Digital Reference Level at the same time it's calibrating the front and surround speakers to all play together?

Or do you still have to calibrate the subwoofer manually (like with Avia) for Dolby Digital Reference Level?

Thanks for any info.

As I understand it, Trinnov will not just adjust the dB level of all speakers, including subwoofer ( even the 990 does this), but equalize the entire system optomizing the sound for the mic position(s).
Since none of us has heard Trinnov yet, details are a little sketchy.

Trinnov will adjust speaker levels and distances. It will also do a ton of other things, most notably room correction/equalization and even speaker placement compensation. After running Trinnov's setup, you should not need to use AVIA's or Digital Video Essentials' test tones.

gonk: Ah, that's cool. In addition to your main and surround speakers, does it also calibrate the subwoofer to the correct Dolby Digital Reference Level, or do you have to calibrate your subwoofer manually with Avia?

The only reason that Trinnov really works is that it adjusts all of the channels. That includes the subwoofer.

While I agree IN THEORY, I think the jury is still out on Trinnov's effectiveness on LF content, particularly multiple subs or problematic rooms. The folks at SVS, for example, would probably claim their sub equalizer can improve LF performance over and above full range equalization systems such as the various iterations of Audyssey, MCACC, etc.

But I sure hope Gonk is correct, as this would mean buying a stand alone LF equalizer is not necessary with the 998.

Technically, the question was about channel trim (whether to use AVIA to set the sub level or let Trinnov do it), and for that there should be no question that Trinnov will be able to do that. You raise a good point, though. The implementation of Trinnov is going to be key, of course, and we haven't seen what can be considered a definitive example of that in a consumer product yet. Sure, SVS and Velodyne are going to say that their subwoofer EQ's are still valuable in spite of tools like Audyssey MultEQ XT and Trinnov (not to mention proprietary tools like Anthem's ARC), and in some cases they would be right. Aside from unusual cases (multiple subs configured uniquely, acoustically terrible space, or users who want that "tweaking" capability), though, I would hope that Trinnov could offer effective subwoofer equalization by itself.

Well, that must mean that any receiver with this Trinnov system (like the new Sherwood Newcastle R-972 and the upcoming 998), in addition to being able to automatically set the correct trim dB levels for Dolby Digital Reference Level calibration of all your speakers, must also have full range equalizer hardware built into the receiver that can compensate for room interactions that can cause peaks and dips in the frequency response of your speakers at the listening position.

This means you could place the microphone at the listening position, turn on the Trinnov setup routine, leave the room, and when you come back, all speakers, subwoofer included, are now calibrated to Dolby Digital Reference Level and all the speakers are delivering a pretty flat frequency response all across the whole range of frequencies. From your tweeters in your main speakers to your subwoofer. That's pretty impressive, if it actually works that well.