EmoQ nearly gave me a heart attack

[mtw]

Hi All,

I am a new Emotiva owner - I purchased a UMC-200 with 2 XPA-100s.  The amps are connected to Totem Acoustics Model 1 Signature speakers, biwired with 14ga cables.  Speakers are rated for 120W into 4 Ohms.

I plugged in the EmoQ and started the auto-calibration sequence.  I expected it to be loud - and it was. 

What gave me a heart attack was the way that, towards the end of the sequence, the woofers on my speakers were practically jumping out of the cabinet.  Is this normal?  I'm honestly afraid to run the calibration sequence again (I will be adding an area rug and some armchairs soon) for fear that the woofers will blow out.

Is this fear warranted?

Cheers!

[Andrew Robinson]

Jan 2, 2014 12:37:09 GMT -5 mtw said:

Hi All,

I am a new Emotiva owner - I purchased a UMC-200 with 2 XPA-100s.  The amps are connected to Totem Acoustics Model 1 Signature speakers, biwired with 14ga cables.  Speakers are rated for 120W into 4 Ohms.

I plugged in the EmoQ and started the auto-calibration sequence.  I expected it to be loud - and it was. 

What gave me a heart attack was the way that, towards the end of the sequence, the woofers on my speakers were practically jumping out of the cabinet.  Is this normal?  I'm honestly afraid to run the calibration sequence again (I will be adding an area rug and some armchairs soon) for fear that the woofers will blow out.

Is this fear warranted?

Cheers!

It's not unheard of, given one's room, placement of speakers etc. that Emo-Q can reach levels up to 100 dB SPL when running its calibration tones. One way to "protect" your speakers, and limit Emo-Q's "guess work" during the process is to set your crossovers BEFORE running Emo-Q. Setting your crossover points to between 80 to 100Hz across the board before running Emo-Q should aid in curbing excessive SPL output from the process' test tones. While running Emo-Q the software determines a better crossover point for your speakers it will change it upon completion of Emo-Q. But to answer your original question, it's not impossible for the software to put out test tones up to 100dB. It's not common per se, but it's not impossible either. If you have any further questions or wish to speak to someone in more detail regarding Emo-Q please contact our technical support team at 877.366.8324. 

[PGT]

It's a 'feature' unique to Emotiva.
_____________________________________________________________________
- Sometimes the terseness of my reply can't be blamed on my phone.

[mtw]

Jan 2, 2014 12:51:41 GMT -5 Andrew Robinson said:

Jan 2, 2014 12:37:09 GMT -5 mtw said:

Hi All,

I am a new Emotiva owner - I purchased a UMC-200 with 2 XPA-100s.  The amps are connected to Totem Acoustics Model 1 Signature speakers, biwired with 14ga cables.  Speakers are rated for 120W into 4 Ohms.

I plugged in the EmoQ and started the auto-calibration sequence.  I expected it to be loud - and it was. 

What gave me a heart attack was the way that, towards the end of the sequence, the woofers on my speakers were practically jumping out of the cabinet.  Is this normal?  I'm honestly afraid to run the calibration sequence again (I will be adding an area rug and some armchairs soon) for fear that the woofers will blow out.

Is this fear warranted?

Cheers!

It's not unheard of, given one's room, placement of speakers etc. that Emo-Q can reach levels up to 100 dB SPL when running its calibration tones. One way to "protect" your speakers, and limit Emo-Q's "guess work" during the process is to set your crossovers BEFORE running Emo-Q. Setting your crossover points to between 80 to 100Hz across the board before running Emo-Q should aid in curbing excessive SPL output from the process' test tones. While running Emo-Q the software determines a better crossover point for your speakers it will change it upon completion of Emo-Q. But to answer your original question, it's not impossible for the software to put out test tones up to 100dB. It's not common per se, but it's not impossible either. If you have any further questions or wish to speak to someone in more detail regarding Emo-Q please contact our technical support team at 877.366.8324. 

Hi Andrew - thanks for the reply!  I'll give tech support a call before I run the calibration again.

[hansk]

Hi,

I wish I had seen this thread before and had set the crossover point into the subwoofer to 100hz instead of the 55hz as I had the same experience this Friday. I had run EmoQ once or twice right after my UMC-200 arrived in the summer of 2013 and the calibration was ok. Now this week I hooked up a subwoofer and calibrated again and in its second round the volume went up so high, that it fried the woofers of my 2-way Celestion SL6Si. I am now so afraid that I will not run this procedure again. I mailed Tech Support but haven't got a reply yet.

When I ran the calibration last year it was not that loud for sure, so I am wondering if the new firmware could be related or was it that low crossover point. A warning on that would have been nice, now I need to spend some hundreds of $$$$ again to find a good set of Celestions.
UMC-200 on latest firmware, Rotel RB-1572, Celestion SL6si(now useless) and replaced with B&W 685 for now, SVS PB-10.

Hans