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Post by hidefdave on Oct 27, 2014 12:51:19 GMT -5
Tony, I think that the Dirac will be a deliverance for you!  Because of it easy to use. Frenchy, I personally don't care if it is easy to use or not. Everything makes perfect sense to me. It does play a huge factor in my recommendation to others. Hello everyone. I am fairly new here but have been following all these threads for a while and would like to add my first impressions of the XMC-1 which I receive last week. First off let me explain how I got to to be an XMC-1 owner. Up until a year ago I had no experience with Emotiva gear. My music and home theater was based around an Onkyo TXN-905 receiver driving a set of 5 Mission speakers, 753 floor-standers at that the font, 751,s at the rear and a 75c center. These speakers are all 6 ohm and the floor-standers at the front dive down a lot lower than 6 ohms on occasion. After a while I noticed the Onkyo really struggling with this setup, especially during movies with HD soundtracks. So long story short, after a little research I decided to give Emotiva a try mainly because of their reputation for good affordable power amps so I got an XPA-5 and UMC-200. The XPA-5 finally controlled my speakers properly, I had never heard them so nicely controlled. The logical progression was to get the XMC-1 because as nice as the UMC-200 sounds I found its 2 channel music performance a little thin when using its DAC's. Analog pass-through from my Oppo 103 was fine. In addition I have a Linux music server and wanted a pre-pro with a USB DAC input plus I needed more HDMI inputs. So now I have had the XMC-1 for a few days here are my thoughts. First impressions: Out of the box my first thought was the build quality is very good, even the packaging has an air of quality about it. Connected it to the XPA-5 using XLR cables, hooked up my sources and powered up. Love the big OLED display. After setting up my speaker distances I started setting the levels using my Radio Shack SPL meter at the listing position and using the 65db test tones. For some reason the tones were around +15db hot, this was also the case for the 75 and 85db tones. In the end I elected to set my mains at 0db and bring everything else to match the fronts. Perhaps there is an issue with my meter, I will try again when I get a chance. Listening experience music: All my music is stored on a Linux server running MPD. The server recognized the XMC-1 when connected to the USB port. The XMC-1 was set to USB stream and reference stereo for all my listening. I can say the DAC's in this thing are very nice, the level of detail over the UMC-200 DAC's is subtle but to me its a warmer more revealing sound with a wider sound stage. Of course the downside to this is that poor recordings now sound worse, but well recorded material sounds great but its a nice problem to have. Listening experience movies: During my limited time with the unit I notice that there seems to be more detail and transient response on all channels. The center dialog is especially clear. The LFE also seems a lot cleaner, there is an overall "Wow that sounds good" and "I don't remember hearing that before" to the whole movie experience. Minor Issues: 1) Test tones as mentioned above, but that could be my meter and hasn't stopped me enjoying the unit 2) Did notice that my audio level dropped way down from my Apple TV via HDMI, I had to do a restart on the XMC for bring it back. 3)Have noticed that the audio sample/Bit display is not what I would expect as others have noted. Sample rate changes as I would expect from my known sources like CD from my Oppo in on HDMI or FLAC from my server in on USB but bits is always displayed as 24 bits. Unexpected bonus to users of 3D: I have two display devices, one it a regular LCD TV with no 3D capability, my second device is an Epson 5020 which is 3D capable. When I used this setup with my UMC-200 I would split the HDMI out via an active splitter to both my display devices. The downside of doing this was that the HDMI out would see the lowest common denominator, i.e the TV and decide it couldn't pass the 3D info to the TV so the projector was recognized as 3D capable. This meant having to physically disconnect the TV HDMI to get it to work on the odd occasions I wanted 3D. The XMC seems to handle this situation and although I've just tried it once it just seems to work. In summary I would like to say so far I think this is a well engineered piece of equipment which I think was worth the wait. Why does work get in the way of listening. Nice review Dave. Your test tone issue sounds like you are using full bandwidth instead of the bandwidth limited tones to set the levels. Tony Thanks Tony, That would explain it, I wasn't aware there was a choice of full vs bw limited tones in the level set menu. I'll take another look |
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Post by ansat on Nov 14, 2014 17:38:41 GMT -5
Added the following to my review. More to come once dirac / rew integration is complete. Tony Hello All, Edit 3 11/14 Updates - So far I have been impressed with the amount of updates that have been pushed out. We have had a total of 4 updates to date. 3 Linux updates and 1 FW update to the USB port. While the Linux updates are quite easy, the FW update remains to be installed as my laptops are all windows 8. While part of the blame goes to the manufacturer, most of the blame resides in the choice to implement something that is a known PITA. This hopefully end up on the "Lessons Learned" talk for the hardware choice for future products. While the Linux updates are easy and numerous, considering that the XMC is still missing one of the primetime features and not available for immediate sale, the updates are not as polished as you would normally find for the larger competition. The items that were addressed by the firmware were hit and miss, leaving some with existing issues and sometimes creating new ones for others. This type of update policy is what I would expect coming from a smaller business like emotiva and each update will act as a beta test due to limited equipment that emotiva carries, however I hope they get some help for Ray as it appears that all of the coding is left up to him alone. There isn't much that I can compare with the UMC-200 on this one as I came in late on the lifecycle, but the updates are more frequent with the xmc (which I assume is due to it being in house). Both the UMC-1 and UMC-200 have a general consensus there are still bugs that could be worked out through future updates and emotiva has elected to update the UMC-200 since 9/17/2013 and the UMC-1 has been "end of life" for some time. With the XMC being as expensive as it is, I hope that the lifecycle holds out longer then its predecessors and the bug fixes and the new features keep coming. Updates to date (11/14/14) Update 1.1 Update 1.2 Update 1.3 Questions? Comments? Thanks all, Tony |
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Post by ansat on Nov 14, 2014 18:16:15 GMT -5
lol just posted a comment in my review about the XMC not being available for purchase yet and what do I find 30 minutes later?  |
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Post by ansat on Dec 13, 2014 16:32:05 GMT -5
added microphone review to my review. (this review is starting to get pretty big...) Once I get the key and start playing with Dirac a little, I will get my final few edits to this review.
Thanks all,
Tony
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Post by ansat on Dec 15, 2014 14:43:27 GMT -5
Added
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Post by ansat on Dec 15, 2014 23:39:24 GMT -5
Added Dirac install review.
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Post by ansat on Dec 15, 2014 23:46:48 GMT -5
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Post by Dan Laufman on Dec 16, 2014 0:23:01 GMT -5
My advice is not to draw final conclusions on Dirac SQ until you run all positions during testing. We've tried to emphasize the importance of doing the complete sequence for good reason. On a side note, although you had some issues during set up and test, many others are walking through it just fine. Not sure I agree with all of your points, but this is a very useful and informative piece of work. Looking forward to your feedback when you've done a complete calibration!  |
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Post by bluescale on Dec 16, 2014 0:28:04 GMT -5
Thanks for the detailed Dirac review, Tony. If you're willing, I'd love to see PEQ sweeps in REW vs. Dirac sweeps in REW. If you'd rather not, no big deal...
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Post by bluescale on Dec 16, 2014 0:29:39 GMT -5
Looking forward to your feedback when you've done a complete calibration! Any indication of when the full version upgrade link will be live? I'd love to have adjustable curves soon. |
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Post by ansat on Dec 16, 2014 0:42:05 GMT -5
My advice is not to draw final conclusions on Dirac SQ until you run all positions during testing. We've tried to emphasize the importance of doing the complete sequence for good reason. On a side note, although you had some issues during set up and test, many others are walking through it just fine. Not sure I agree with all of your points, but this is a very useful and informative piece of work. Looking forward to your feedback when you've done a complete calibration! Thanks Dan, I plan to leave the Dirac calibration on my front row only for awhile. In a perfect world, it would be the only seats in the theater as the rear row is only a ft off the rear wall (and really bass heavy). For the front 3 seats I ran all 9 measurements (even on the first attempt) and the little playing that I did (after figuring out what dirac wanted) I enjoyed the results. If you can bring me 2 dirac banks in the xmc, I would make a calibration for the front row which is used weekly and a calibration for the front + rear (only gets used 3 to 4 times a year) As for the levels on round one, I think you got a bug in the system with reference stereo and enhanced bass. When the levels went crazy, I has to turn off enhanced bass 4 times to get it to deactivate and reference stereo was active before and after the Dirac run on the attempt that set the right and left 10+ db hot. I will call in tomorrow and go over what happened with keith. Tony |
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Post by ansat on Dec 16, 2014 0:46:04 GMT -5
Thanks for the detailed Dirac review, Tony. If you're willing, I'd love to see PEQ sweeps in REW vs. Dirac sweeps in REW. If you'd rather not, no big deal... All in good time.  I am still trying to decide which mic to take the measurements with. Tony |
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Lsc
Emo VIPs 
Posts: 3,435
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Post by Lsc on Dec 16, 2014 0:53:12 GMT -5
Thanks for the review! As a former owner of the UMC-200, I feel a little differently about the performance of the 2 pre-pros.
I am still waiting for the activation code so I don't have a full picture of the XMC-1, however....
1. The xmc-1 in reference stereo is extremely clean. I used the XDA-2 because of its cleaner sound vs the umc-200. Hence the base sound without room correction is clearly superior on the xmc-1.
2. This is theoretical still for me - Dirac is a professional level room correction which should be superior to Emo-Q / REW option.
Given these two simple points, I have to believe that the XMC-1 is clearly better but the UMC-200 is still an incredible bargain.
Where I think you stand with movies 95% and music only 5%, the inherent advantage of the XMC-1 may not matter much because the UMC-200 still sounds amazing with movies.
Perhaps you are better off with something like the Marantz 7702 that has Atmos and other features? I listen to a lot of music so absolute sound quality is important to me hence the XMC-1 is an easy choice.
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Post by ansat on Dec 16, 2014 0:55:14 GMT -5
Made a few edits as Dans post shows that my running all 9 positions was not communicated well. I also added that the reset and reboot was only recommend if you are just upgrading to 2.0
Tony
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Post by ansat on Dec 16, 2014 1:06:41 GMT -5
Thanks for the review! As a former owner of the UMC-200, I feel a little differently about the performance of the 2 pre-pros. I am still waiting for the activation code so I don't have a full picture of the XMC-1, however.... 1. The xmc-1 is reference stereo is extremely clean. I used the XDA-2 because of its cleaner sound vs the umc-200. Hence the base sound without room correction is clearly superior on the xmc-1. 2. This is theoretical still for me - Dirac is a professional level room correction which should be superior to Emo-Q / REW option. Given these two simple points, I have to believe that the XMC-1 is clearly better but the UMC-200 is still an incredible bargain. Where I think you stand with movies 95% and music only 5%, the inherent advantage of the XMC-1 may not matter much because the UMC-200 still sounds amazing with movies. Perhaps you are better off with something like the Marantz 7702 that has Atmos and other features? I listen to a lot of music so absolute sound quality is important to me hence the XMC-1 is an easy choice. the XMC will stay in the rack. While I am quite critical on the XMC, I really love the unit. It is a stunning piece of hardware. The umc 200 was just a awesome performer for the price. Really untouchable at its price point. Tony |
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Post by geebo on Dec 16, 2014 8:29:23 GMT -5
Nice review, Tony. I had my input sensitivity set a little higher (about the width of the blue button) and the output about the same amount lower. I set my left speaker level to be halfway between the -12 and -6 dB points on the scale and the others fell into place except for the subs which I adjusted using the controls on the subs to the same level as the other speakers. I never had a single clipping error with those settings. What level were you trying to set the speakers too?
I like Dirac as well and the only thing I find the need to adjust is the low end output. I like it about 4dB higher than Dirac chooses. I too am waiting for the full versions as well. I want to boost the bottom end by that 4dB but also limit the bass extension to about 28 because the X-Ref 12s just aren't designed to do much below that and Dirac must be pushing them hard to get the response down close to 20Hz on my system.
Thanks for the nice write-up.
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Post by ansat on Dec 16, 2014 9:13:54 GMT -5
Nice review, Tony. I had my input sensitivity set a little higher (about the width of the blue button) and the output about the same amount lower. I set my left speaker level to be halfway between the -12 and -6 dB points on the scale and the others fell into place except for the subs which I adjusted using the controls on the subs to the same level as the other speakers. I never had a single clipping error with those settings. What level were you trying to set the speakers too? I like Dirac as well and the only thing I find the need to adjust is the low end output. I like it about 4dB higher than Dirac chooses. I too am waiting for the full versions as well. I want to boost the bottom end by that 4dB but also limit the bass extension to about 28 because the X-Ref 12s just aren't designed to do much below that and Dirac must be pushing them hard to get the response down close to 20Hz on my system. Thanks for the nice write-up. I did not have a level in mind when setting them. But going with the recommended -24 had my input sensitivity at around +16 on the scale. The screen capture was a live capture with the microphone on. I needed to set the input sensitivity so that you could no longer see anything register on the screen. Tony |
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Post by geebo on Dec 16, 2014 9:29:07 GMT -5
Nice review, Tony. I had my input sensitivity set a little higher (about the width of the blue button) and the output about the same amount lower. I set my left speaker level to be halfway between the -12 and -6 dB points on the scale and the others fell into place except for the subs which I adjusted using the controls on the subs to the same level as the other speakers. I never had a single clipping error with those settings. What level were you trying to set the speakers too? I like Dirac as well and the only thing I find the need to adjust is the low end output. I like it about 4dB higher than Dirac chooses. I too am waiting for the full versions as well. I want to boost the bottom end by that 4dB but also limit the bass extension to about 28 because the X-Ref 12s just aren't designed to do much below that and Dirac must be pushing them hard to get the response down close to 20Hz on my system. Thanks for the nice write-up. I did not have a level in mind when setting them. But going with the recommended -24 had my input sensitivity at around +16 on the scale. The screen capture was a live capture with the microphone on. I needed to set the input sensitivity so that you could no longer see anything register on the screen. Tony Hmmm, I wonder why that would be. Did you play the test tones for each speaker and verify the level was below -6 dB for all speakers or did you bypass that part? I was able to get good results setting the input sensitivity to just barely below the -24. I wonder if there would be any benefit to setting it lower. |
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Post by ansat on Dec 16, 2014 10:33:09 GMT -5
geebo I did not have a level in mind when setting them. But going with the recommended -24 had my input sensitivity at around +16 on the scale. The screen capture was a live capture with the microphone on. I needed to set the input sensitivity so that you could no longer see anything register on the screen. Tony Hmmm, I wonder why that would be. Did you play the test tones for each speaker and verify the level was below -6 dB for all speakers or did you bypass that part? I was able to get good results setting the input sensitivity to just barely below the -24. I wonder if there would be any benefit to setting it lower. I tried everything the way the instructions were written, my room was just too quiet. The manual wants you to set the input gain to -24. What it is really doing is increasing the sensitivity so that the rooms noise floor is at -24. the quieter the room, the higher the gain needs to be to follow the -24 guideline. The louder the room, the sensitivity will be decreased. In each of my attempts including the successful ones, I did set the output to the center of the green. I spoke with Keith this morning and this was written this way to keep people from turning their speakers up louder then they should be played. Tony |
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Post by Jim on Dec 16, 2014 10:37:49 GMT -5
Hmmm, I wonder why that would be. Did you play the test tones for each speaker and verify the level was below -6 dB for all speakers or did you bypass that part? I was able to get good results setting the input sensitivity to just barely below the -24. I wonder if there would be any benefit to setting it lower. I tried everything the way the instructions were written, my room was just too quiet. The manual wants you to set the input gain to -24. What it is really doing is increasing the sensitivity so that the rooms noise floor is at -24. the quieter the room, the higher the gain needs to be to follow the -24 guideline. The louder the room, the sensitivity will be decreased. In each of my attempts including the successful ones, I did set the output to the center of the green. I spoke with Keith this morning and this was written this way to keep people from turning their speakers up louder then they should be played. Tony How quiet is your room when it's silent? Just curious what noise floor you have. |
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