950 DBPLII CR mode very little sound from rears

Hi Folks,
I have a 950, 7 M200 and a Rocket ultra setup with 300's for side suround. Reguardless of the source I use, TV, DVD, CD, etc and when then 950 is in PLII M or C CR mode I got just about no sound from the side surounds or rears. I can only hear music from the rears when in 7 setero mode. I have entered in the distances of all my speaker from the center and calibrated all speaker to 75db. I tried various setting in the DB PL parameter setup but I am unable to hear anything from the rear without walking up to them and placing my ear against the tweeters. Is there something that I am failing to adjust or does it sound like my 950 is not working correctly? Should I be able to hear significant music sound from the rears? M or C mode doesn't seem to make any difference. Any ideas?

In general, if you're hearing sound from the rears, you haven't configured things correctly. The goal of PLII is to produce a convincing 3d soundstage for whatever the source, and it does this by reproducing the ambience. Any sound you're getting from the surrounds, therefore, should be subtle.

In other words, everything's normal.

Jeff

I'm not even hearing "subtle" ambience. I have to put my ear practically right up agaist the tweeter to hearing anything. So way it is now can't be normal. Everything sounds like it comming from the fronts. I can adjust the width of the center center just fine and I can hear a definite difference between "all center" and "no center". Is there a way I can make the rear louder so I hear ambience? I had a friend over last night listening too so I know it isn't just my perception.

You should be hearing all you want from your rear speakers in PLll, cnewlander. Set Panorama to ON. Then, try scrolling thru the Dimension setting- you should notice a fairly large change as you go from Step 0 to Step -1. If not, you may have a problem! PS-- Have you set speaker levels by doing channel calibration with a sound level meter? Best wishes...

I did a channel calibration to 72db with the analog radio shack meter. I defintely have Panorama ON and scrolled through the Dimension settings from -3 to 3 - Neither myself or my friend who is an audiophile nut could not tell a difference. It is not source related as it happens with input from a digital coaxial input or analog.

So far one person says I should only hear ambience and another says I shouod hear all I want. I'm just getting into Home Theater -Anyone else have an opinoin on this? Thanks.

Craig

I hear a fair bit when listening to broadcast stereo, especially during commercials (commercials make themselves seem louder by putting sound/music in across as much of the spectrum as they can). I'd say you may have a problem. On a side note was 72 dB a typo? Recommended is 75 db (just a quibble) The only other thing I can think of is that in the configuration menu, making sure the surrounds are on and that you have it set up for all seven not just 6 (RS/LS not BS) ... probably thought of all that already. Call the Outlaw Support, they are exceedingly helpful.

So far one person says I should only hear ambience and another says I shouod hear all I want. I'm just getting into Home Theater -Anyone else have an opinoin on this? Thanks.

Do the speakers sound completly normal in 7-S mode? So no issues with loose connections?
DLPII is VERY recording dependent, In other words depends on what you play as too what might get sent to the rears (sometimes nothing). I'm sorry I'm tired but will try to recall if there are any demos I can think of with heavy side/back info. Recently I noticed that the movie "Frenquency" via my Satelite feed was killer through the 950 DPLII. Not throughout the film however (ambiance moments) sometimes the film stayed across the the fronts ....it depended on the scene, But there was several , EX: where a background choir shifted distincly to sides/rears with frnt channels carrying dialog then a noticable sift of dialog to the side as a charater moved during some of the drama moments. There are some recordings that DPLII can not effective steering on (any noticable).
Outlaws do you have some good demo recomends for him to verify his DLPII activity level?

I have to admit that when I first used PLII I wasn't that impressed. In fact I couldn't understand what the fuss was all about, the surrounds I thought were weak. It wasn't until I turned the circuit off that I realized the enveloping effect it provided. So you should notice "something" as you switch it on and off, (provided it's working properly and you have the parameters set correctly). Try Pink Floyd's "Dark Side Of The Moon" cd and see what your system will do.

Play around with the settings too. I like the effect more with the imaging shifted more towards the back of the room.

Listen. I own a Lexicon MC-12. It's considered to be one of the finest surround processors in the world, with a list price of around $9,000. When I listen to my MC-12 in Logic 7, Lexicon's world-reknown surround processing mode, I almost never hear the surrounds, nor would I want to.

The goal of surrounds is not to make each one of your speakers noticable: it's to make whatever source you're listening to sound as realistic as possible.

Not only do you not want to make your surround speakers noticeable, the majority of specifically-designed surround speakers are designed in such as way as to further reduce the amount that the speaker is noticed.

In other words, people spend good money (is there any other kind?) and lots of it deliberately trying to eliminate the effect whose absence you're complaining about.

Jeff

Jeff, you've got to remember to turn those surround amps ON. I keep reminding you but you always forget!

Sanj

(turns on surround amp)

Well, whatdya know? It turns out that the surrounds are supposed to be louder than the mains.

Never mind.

Jeff

Jeff wouldn't have this problem if he used TUBES

No, I'd have a whole bunch of other problems instead.

Jeff

But you'd have to consider it like a "high maintenance woman" : a lot of trouble, but worth it!!!!

[This message has been edited by soundhound (edited July 26, 2003).]

Well I have owned tube equipment as well as solid state equipment for over 35 years in this hobby, and I have been fortunate and blessed enough that both were reliable so cost did not eat me up as much as the few "high maintenance women" (to be known as HMW in the rest of this post) that I had. Now I never had high cost audio equipment at the same time as I had HMW, I wonder if there is a connection. Since I traded in my last "HMW" for a more reliable conventional model woman (CMW) over 30 years ago I came closer to my audio goals for a brief period of time until the one of the accesories that the CMW came equiped began working after lying dormant for years.This was to have the greatest impact on my audio life style. It seem the CMW came equiped with a clock of some sort (labeled in future BC.) This clock went off and never shut up as CMW approached 30 and thus resulted in 2 female "high maintenance children" (HMC). The cost of HMC started immediately and continued to effect the audio expenditures at crucial times, with cheerleading, softball, volleyball, proms, cars, colleges, weddings and many others. All of these had a major impact on audio expenditures eliminating all gains I had saved on the HMW trade in. As I neared retirement and thoughts of the great Home Theaters and wonderful new tube gear I could now afford were floating through my head when another fly in the ointment occured. It seems that my HMC inherited the BC from their mother and we were blessed with 4 high maintenance grand children (here after known as HMGC). Now the HMGC are not a total expenditure but as they spend as much if not more time here as home it did have a impact. Cost for the HMGC by the CMW is way out of line with the cost for new audio gear and I can only assume this will get worse as at least 2 of the HMGC will have BCs. At least this time around I did get a few boys so I can start the training and love for audio all over again.

I have a similar issue with DLPII. Many of my TV stations have no surround content yet others have nice content. I thought it was the way my cable company was transmitting the audio portion even though all stations I get are in stereo. Is there a difference in stereo "quality" from cable TV that would have some with surround content and some not when using DLPII?

Absolutely! Many TV stations, cable or not, are broadcasting a mono signal. This is bad news for the PL II and Neo:6 modes on your 950. Like any matrix decoder, they work by analyzing a stereo signal, sending common (L+R) info to the centre channel and steering the difference (L-R) signal amongst the surrounds. A mono signal will all bunch up around the centre speaker. Is this what you're hearing when you find a station with "no surround content"?

Best,
Sanjay

Exactly, all the sound is "bunching" in the center. The thing that confuses me is that my TV says the signal is stereo. Can the TV be tricked by thinking a signal is stereo but it is really mono? All my major network channels do not sound good in DLPII.

I was considering satellite but the delayed channel lock issue I have read about bothers me.

Yes it can. The signal is being sent using the usual stereo carrier, which causes the TV's stereo indicator light to turn on, but the sound itself is mono. For example, can you find old mono recordings on CD? Of course you can. It's still 2 channels of sound, but the same signal on both channels.

For situations like this, you might want to try the 2-channel mode. The sound will still image in the centre, but it may sound a bit more fuller (if your main speakers are larger than your centre).

Best,
Sanjay