How Do You Determine Reference Volume Level?

Howdy,

What is the correct procedure/advice for determining a new volume reference level?

I purchased the 7700 a few weeks ago and I am very happy with it.

I have to determine what my new volume setting is for correct reference level.

My Onkyo TX-DS787 pre/pro has a reference setting but it is now way louder than the normal 75db setting with the 7700. (Found this out with my RS SPL meter.)

I turned my speaker calibration settings down all the way and still get 85 db.

Thank you for your help.

The avia DVD can help you do this. You will need a radio shack signal meter.

Joel

Forgive my naiveté, but what is the significance of knowing ‘reference’ level? Is this just for the sake of comparing various components?

I just turn the music on and enjoy…

It's useful to have some sort of baseline to use during calibration, and it's very important to calibrate speaker levels in a surround system. It's less critical to have a baseline that matches other people's, at least as far as simply listening to and enjoying your system - but the purpose of having a standard reference level is so that you can set the volume to that position and theoretically have the level that the sound engineer had in mind. (I don't know how many folks actually listen at that level, though...)

The 990 mic attempts to do this calibration, right?

I don't remember where, but I have read at least once or twice that the 990 mic yielded roughly the same results as the manual process.

All I know is that the volume during the 990 auto setup is borderline painful and I wouldn't want to sit through it again...for the third time...

The 990 mic does carry out this calibration, and while my geeky tendencies tend to make me do a manual calibration with an SPL meter it isn't really necessary to do more than the automatic calibration. 11B2P's Onkyo may not offer an auto-calibration mode, though.

Hi Guys,

Thanks for the advice.

No. My Onkyo does not do automagic calibration

The only time I use reference volume is to calibrate my 5.1 set up.

I think I may have figured a way of setting a new reference volume level for the 7700.

I hooked one of my speakers back onto the Onkyo, set the Onkyo to the indicated reference volume setting, calibrated the speaker to 75 dB using DVE as my source and a Rad Shack SPL meter.

Then hooked the speaker back onto the 7700, and adjusted the pre/pro volume down until the SPL meter read 75dB.

Noting the new volume setting, I calibrated all other speakers in the system to 75dB.

I think I have everything calibrated correctly now.

-Bill