MMC-1 Review

[Deleted]

Hello!

I purchased an MMC-1 last Spring in order to be qualified for the 40% off deal on the upcoming UMC-1. I figured I could keep the MMC-1 until the UMC-1 was released and then sell it for a small loss. It didn't quite work out that way...

The unit arrived in good shape a few days after I ordered it. The packaging from Emo is first-rate - double boxed and the preprocessor came wrapped in a nice cloth bag. Very classy.

So, I spent the next few hours disconnecting my Harman Kardon Signature 2.0 preprocessor and stuffing the MMC-1 in its place. The MMC-1 was very nicely built, a good solid product, quite heavy for a preprocessor. A peek inside the cabinet revealed a massive transformer, no wonder it was so heavy!

I wasn't real crazy about the abundance of buttons, I think the user interface could have been better. The tactile quality of the buttons was quite good, but the Power button was decidedly a little "cheesy", it didn't feel solid to me.

I liked the the blue dot matrix display and was glad that Emo provided several level of brightness, the bright setting was almost blinding.

The remote control was insane, felt like a solid block of milled aluminum.

Once I got it in place, I let it warm up for an hour or so before sitting down to listen. The sound quality was pretty good - each instrument was peceisely placed in the sound field and it was easy to distinguish where each player was situated, even if they were standing right next to each other. I also noticed that it drove my power amp to louder levels, I think it must have more voltage output than the HK.

While the sound quality was precise and detailed, I did notice quite a bit of sibilance, especially on vocals. Sibilance is that "spitting" or "hissing" sound you hear when singers pronounce an "s" or a "t". This was annoying, but I figured it might go away with some more break-in time. So, I let the unit stay on 24/7 for the 1st week and put a CD on in shuffle mode when I wasn't actively using it.

It never did go away. It abated somewhat, but was still present at the end of the week.

Also during this time, the unit exhibited odd behavior. When switching sources or from one surround mode to another, the MMC-1 would just up and die on me. I powered the system down and back again to regain control. This behavior was quite repeatable and went on for a couple days before I called Emo Support.

They indicated that the unit was in need of service. Instead of making me wait for a repair, they sent me a brand new one with a call tag for the broken unit. The Customer Service is first-rate.

I continued to listen to the 1st unit until its replacement arrived. The sibilance never did go away. I decided to not keep the replacement unit when it, too, had the same sibilance. I boxed it up and sold it for a minor loss, about $75. I figured that I'd be saving almost $300 off the UMC-1, so I didn't fret too much about the $75.

I then re-installed the Harman Kardon and fired it up: ahhhhh, no more sibilance!

My conclusions? The MMC-1 is a well-built unit with very good sound quality if you are not sensitive to sibilance. Emo's Customer Service is among the best in the business and to their credit they did everything possible to do right by me.

I am anxiously awaiting the release of the UMC-1 and hope that it improves upon the sound quality of its predecessor. If it doesn't exhibit any sibilance, I expect that I'll have it in my system for many years to come.

-RW-

[emovac]

thanks for doing the review. I have taken to using the remote for the MMC-1 to turn on and off the pre/pro to hopefully extend the life of the power switch. The sibilence was not overpowering to me, but I pick it up on certain lyrics. My pre/pro has been very reliable from purchase (about 10 months); the only problem was a faulty remote which Emotiva had to me within a few days. Customer service is exceptional.

[paulav]

Interesting, I ordered my MMC-1/MPS-2 combo in February of '08 and have had the same issue with sibilance. I've never contacted Emotiva about this as I figured it was inherent in the design. Did you ever bring up the issue of sibilance with customer service?

I to am hoping that the UMC-1/XMC-1 have cleaner sound.

[SticknStones]

I thought sibilance was more the result of studio recording, poor cable interconnect shielding, speakers or room acoustics! I was surprised by the MMC contributing!

Interesting article that discusses Sibilance as a bane to sound recording engineers!

www.videomaker.com/article/14106/2/

Here is another article that suggests using a graphic equalizer and reducing the 4k frequency by 6 db.

shanefield.blogspot.com/2004/12/hi-fi-article-3.html

I am really hard pressed to assign root cause for sibilance to the processor! Umm really hard pressed!

[TJHUB]

Jun 17, 2009 16:49:42 GMT -5 SticknStones said:

I thought sibilance was more the result of studio recording, poor cable interconnect shielding, speakers or room acoustics! I was surprised by the MMC contributing!

Interesting article that discusses Sibilance as a bane to sound recording engineers!

www.videomaker.com/article/14106/2/

Here is another article that suggests using a graphic equalizer and reducing the 4k frequency by 6 db.

shanefield.blogspot.com/2004/12/hi-fi-article-3.html

I am really hard pressed to assign root cause for sibilance to the processor! Umm really hard pressed!

I agree. I'm no expert, but I have a hard time thinking the MMC-1 was adding the sibilance. However, what's heard is heard and I hate it when people tell me what I hear...

I ran my MMC-1/IPS-1 combo for quite some time and I never had an issue with sibilance. I even had 4 different pair of speakers: B&W 602.S3, Ascend Acoustics Sierra-1, B&W 805S, and Salk HT2-TL. I surely should have heard the issue with the 602.S3s as the tweeters and FR was voiced very bright. Hmm...

[roadrunner]

This attempt to blame preamps or processors to sibilance is not new. When I spent a lot of time auditioning equipment in high-end shops back in the 70s I ran into this. I would bring a variety of Direct-to-LP records to use for A/B ing gear I was interested in. A phenomenom developed whereas the better the gear (or should I say the more expensive the gear) used the more prominent the sibilance became.

This concerned some of the shop owners and we spent quite a bit of time test and talking to the support staff and engineers for the offending equipment. They included McIntosh, Conrad Johnson, Klipsch, Luxman, and many more... tube and solid state.

The feedback we received from all of the sources said the same thing. That the root problem was in the recording. That the sound was not heard with lower quality equipment is what lead people to think that this vendor or that vendor produced sibilance in their high-end gear. The engineers indicated they had spent countless hours research and varifying that they equipment was NOT at fault. The distortion existed on the media and the high-end gear simply was good enough to detect and amplify the signal that was now audible.

Well engineered and mixed music recordings show that this gear does NOT have a sibilance problems... they only reveal that a problem exists in the media itself.

I have occasionally seen speakers that are prone to sibilance, but I have never seen a well made preamp or processor with this problem. This is just another of the proofs that garbage-in-garbage-out is still alive and well.

[SticknStones]

Nice Post guys! I love learning about all of this and always try to read up a little before putting something in type. I think we are all in agreement with this one!

[checkereddemon]

Someone wrote:

** I am really hard pressed to assign root cause for sibilance to the processor! Umm really hard pressed! **

I don't know WHY you would say this. The original reviewer swapped out one pre-processor for another. He immediately noticed increased sibilance in the sound quality. This seems VERY straightforward to me and cannot be ascribed to cables or recording quality or anything else. The ONLY thing that was changed in the system was the pre-pro, it has to be the culprit.

And the HK Signature 2.0 is a very good pre-processor, it was built on the same production lines as the Madrigal and Mark Levinson gear. It's getting long in the tooth features-wise, but its basic sound quality is really quite good.

Keep in mind that the reviewer's speakers are much more revealing than those found in most other's systems. The Gallos are much better than your average HT speakers and will reveal more faults in the reproduction chain. When you get it right, though, they can really sing.