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Post by shame302 on Nov 6, 2016 18:31:11 GMT -5
Just..... Wow. I honestly can not understand how such a piece of equipment made it to retail production. I'm really sorry if that's offensive. Tech suggested I try to re-flash to the latest firmware even though it already had it. I was apprehensive after searching and reading what a nightmare it can be (seriously?). I was not disappointed. What a hilariously inconsistent, finicky aggravating process. After no less than 19, NINETEEN attempts to flash the four modules in the firmware did I get four successful results. The first 18 all had similar but DIFFERENT failed results. Unbelievable and 100% unacceptable imho.
Now on to the results. Hoping RE-flashing to the current version of firmware that it was already on would make it work, you know, correctly, I hooked everything back up and set it up back in my system. Now, I have zero audio. No audio output what-so-ever. Nothing. Unbelievable. Yes it's set up correctly.
To re-cap. initially, it:
Would not properly run "emo-Q" would not "hear" speakers so couldn't calibrate. speakers x-overs of course. All I know is it reported no speakers. Maybe a bad mich. Who knows.. (I can live with that)
Will not not up-mix, 2 ch Netflix, (for example), into milti ch or PLII surround. totally unacceptable. My Nuforce does this fine.
Constant "pulse" from subs. sounds like a heart beat. Could possibly be in the system (not really) but only started with introduction of UMC-200 so it is almost certainly the unit. .It's the unit.. Also, 100% completely unacceptable. (EDIT) I understand that this may be HDMI related, which is possible because I previously used Optical.
Far as I know, those were my only gripes but imo, not up-mixing was a huge,unforgivable one.
Now, I understand that on a HTPC. (it's literally my ONLY source) the on screen popup from umc200 always said 3/2LFE no matter what. It's what the HTPC is set to. 2ch should pass as 2 ch. It seems it passed 2ch Netflix to the RX but nothing up-mixed in the RX like it did in my AVP-16. All I had to do was chose PLII on AVP16 and it mixed. no issues. UMC-200 made zero changes.
AVP-16 did everything I expected it to. I could select PLIIcinema for 2CH Netflix and get surround up-mixed like I wanted. The drawbacks were I was limited to lossy 5.1 optical and it had a quark where it wouldn't remember input source and it would sometimes crank the volume the wrong way. Unfortunately, it also dropped the front left main CH which prompted its replacement with a hopeful UMC-200.. I was admittedly excited to be done with those quarks and gain lossless 5.1HDMI. I chose the UMC-200 because I have a gen 1 XPA-5 amp and absolutely love it, and the UMC-200 was often compared to the Nuforce-AVP17 and 18, both of which must be better than my 16.
I have, with cooperation from the original owner, transferred my warranty and I sincerely hope Emotiva takes care of me on this but I'm absolutely shocked and disappointed at my current standings. If they can make my unit work correctly, I'll be satisfied but it should never take this kind of downtime and effort.
Currently looking for replacements if not suggestions.
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Post by geebo on Nov 6, 2016 19:45:02 GMT -5
Was the previous owner experiencing any problems that he made you aware of?
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Post by melm on Nov 6, 2016 19:57:06 GMT -5
Upmixing works fine on my UMC 200. It's been quite reliable over the years, but I agree the firmware update process is the worst I've seen -ever. I's just send it back and let Emotiva fix it. That's what warranties are for.
Mel
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LCSeminole
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Res firma mitescere nescit.
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Post by LCSeminole on Nov 6, 2016 19:59:57 GMT -5
Hopefully you were made aware of any problems from the previous owner, if you weren't then I believe your beef would be with them. Personally I never had any of the problems you have stated with the UMC-200 that I previously owned. Since you've stated that the warranty has been transferred to you from the previous owner, I'm assuming you've been in contact with Emotiva Tech Support since re-flashing the firmware about the problems you've stated above? If not, you really should be discussimg this with them so they can get it worked out for you. One question I have is have you actually performed a factory default since flashing the firmware? If not, that would be my first move.
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jlamo
Sensei
Its a good day!
Posts: 192
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Post by jlamo on Nov 6, 2016 20:08:31 GMT -5
I had similar issue concerning the dsp. My anthem would say 3/2 on the display as the incoming signal while the source was sending any type of signal except 2 channel stereo pcm . 2ch pcm was the only time I could change dsp options (pro logic movie ,music ,ect. Also if the other speakers are not set to on in the pre/pro menu then again those dsp options would not work of course . Anyways good luck .
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klinemj
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Post by klinemj on Nov 6, 2016 21:47:54 GMT -5
shame302How about you first calm down a bit, second...work with Emotiva on the issue and if needed, send it to them. The UMC series has proven to be pretty solid after initial issues w/the UMC-1's FW. And, yes, the FW update process is not ideal, but most people have worked through it with no issues (I have done it 3 times). But, when people have issues w/updates, they tend to have issues with operations (or lack thereof...). Your problem could be that simple. And out of curiosity, why did you try redoing the FW in the first place? Did the unit have issues you were trying to fix? Mark
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Post by The History Kid on Nov 6, 2016 22:06:07 GMT -5
I understand frustration when a product doesn't work right, but for some reason people have this thing of automatically calling that item a "piece of trash." I'm not sure why. We live in a world of mass produced products, and for some reason it's unfathomable that a bug gets through every now and then.
As for the issue, consider following Emotiva's diagnostics. If the problem persists it might require being sent in. These things happen, it's an electronic piece of equipment, stuff can fail.
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Post by Gary Cook on Nov 7, 2016 1:07:26 GMT -5
My UMC-200 works perfectly, I did have to replace the power supply, but that's it. Software updates were a PIA, the "Emotiva" method caused me nothing but grief, but the "forum" method worked for me. I'm totally happy with it, everything works as it should and as a result I won't be doing any more software updates.
Cheers
Gary
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Post by yves on Nov 7, 2016 2:24:58 GMT -5
I had to replace the power supply too. It can happen that the firmware update process keeps failing because of the power supply gone bad. Call Emo Support by phone just to be sure, I talked to Damon Steele and couldn't be happier about how professional and friendly he is, and in fact I have yet to come across a company that has better customer support than Emotiva. Agreed that the firmware update process of the UMC-200 is nerve wrecking if it doesn't work, but TBH you can't blame that if the unit is broken and needs to be repaired so don't panic.  If the UMC-200 acts normal except there's no sound, try powering it off for 10 secs by using the power switch at the back of the unit. The "heartbeat" sound is just how the UMC-200 reacts to the infamous "silent stream" bug that affects a lot of Windows HTPC users on many (or most) AVRs/prepros via HDMI, not just prepros from Emotiva so blame Microsoft because the problem is actually very well documented, and has been for years. The only real workaround used to be a little free program called AVR Audio Guard by Marc's Apps, but it is causing constant 100% CPU load on one CPU core under Windows 10 as well as has some minor stability issues (I'm on Windows 8.1), and the author of that program used to be active on several forums but appears to have vanished. I recently came across a better solution, see the post by a user named 0kk0 in this AMD forum thread (I'm on Intel/Nvidia, but it works perfect for me BTW). Link: community.amd.com/thread/185767 |
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Post by bolle on Nov 7, 2016 3:01:49 GMT -5
Hi, I had one of the very first UMC-200s until last weekend and I also always used HTPCs with it. The "pulse" and the upmixing problem are caused by your HTPC configuration, not the UMC!
Your HTPC is always sending 5.1, even if only 2-channel material is being played. The other channels then are empty, but it is still the 5.1 signal type, so the UMC can´t upmix. You have to configure your HTPC differently / use different software for playback. This is quite annoying and also took me some time to solve, but this is not the UMCs fault.
The pulse also is due to your HTPC not constantly outputting a stream. This can be also solved by configuration - I never had this issue on 3 different HTPC builds with the UMC.
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Post by yves on Nov 7, 2016 3:33:26 GMT -5
Your HTPC is always sending 5.1, even if only 2-channel material is being played. The other channels then are empty, but it is still the 5.1 signal type, so the UMC can´t upmix. You have to configure your HTPC differently / use different software for playback. This is quite annoying and also took me some time to solve, but this is not the UMCs fault. MPC-HC with the internal Audio Renderer these days allows for both WASAPI Exlusive Mode and audio bitstreaming over HDMI. LAV Audio Decoder used to come as part of the LAV Splitter that you could install separately way back when, but currently is hard coded into MPC-HC; the button that brings up the LAV Audio Decoder settings window can be found in MPC-HC settings by navigating to Internal Filters (or, if the button is greyed out, use the LAV Audio shortcut that's in the Configuration subfolder of your K-Lite Codec Pack folder in your Windows Start Menu). Wade through the three tabs in LAV Audio. Lo and behold... you're golden!     |
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Post by The History Kid on Nov 7, 2016 4:03:52 GMT -5
The "heartbeat" sound is just how the UMC-200 reacts to the infamous "silent stream" bug that affects a lot of Windows HTPC users on many (or most) AVRs/prepros via HDMI, not just prepros from Emotiva so blame Microsoft because the problem is actually very well documented, and has been for years. The only real workaround used to be a little free program called AVR Audio Guard by Marc's Apps, but it is causing constant 100% CPU load on one CPU core under Windows 10 as well as has some minor stability issues (I'm on Windows 8.1), and the author of that program used to be active on several forums but appears to have vanished. I recently came across a better solution, see the post by a user named 0kk0 in this AMD forum thread (I'm on Intel/Nvidia, but it works perfect for me BTW). Link: community.amd.com/thread/185767Somewhat O/T, but I've been looking for a resolution for this since last year. Thanks a bunch! |
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Post by shame302 on Nov 8, 2016 15:48:25 GMT -5
I appreciate the input guys. A few things.
Yes, I loaded defaults after flashing and before testing. I noticed no error messages on the front display but I did see two "mismatch" items in the backside of the menu section around where current version is listed. Forgive me, I forget exactly what it said. I had taken a pic of the updater after it had 4 successful installs and noticed that two of them have 0.00 listed as their versions. I'm guessing that's not right. They are the DSP2 code and OND code.
Any who, glutton for punishment I decided to re-flash the firmware. I have probably around seven or eight hours and countless or different attempts into this. Both the recommended way as well as the "forum ways etc. I cant even tell you what was the most successful. FINALLY I got all 4 modules to report successful. I took a pic for my records and followed the procedure to load defaults.
on power up, I have an error report on the front panel. It was the one that showed up most often but the instructions say to ignore those.
No DSP2 code!
OK. Well, Figuring it probably wouldn't make a difference one way or another, I re-flashed that module. Reported successful on the 5th attempt.. Same 0.00 version and same ERROR code result. This one installed fairly consistently. The one that almost always failed was the OSD code.
So, basically I have a bricked unit and I don't think I have the patience and nerve to put another X amount of hours into it with probably the same results. Ill contact EMOTIVA tonight or tomorrow and hopefully they can service it.
As far as the "pulse" goes, If it is indeed HDMI related that makes sense. I've only used optical spdif with the NUForce. Im not sure my pulse is the same as the "silend stream". My issue is, when the system sits idle, it pulses, just like a clock or heartbeat. Constantly. I've dealt with the audio clipping from system sounds by shutting them all off. That doesn't bother me.
As far as it not up-mixing for me the way I want and expect it to, I dunno. Like I said, the AVP 16 does it well and I don't think it unreasonable to expect any dedicated pre/pro to be able to handle that. Really, all I want at this point is for the thing to work.
As far as the HTPC goes, I'm using SHARKS Codec pack and basically wmp for everything with no problems.
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Post by yves on Nov 8, 2016 22:58:25 GMT -5
About the "silent stream" bug, Windows treats the HDMI audio idle state as "no audio stream gets sent to the HDMI output". But with an AVR or processor/preamp connected to the HDMI output, the correct behavior should be "the audio stream continues to be sent to the HDMI output, but the actual streamed data contains only silence", and this correct behavior is what the SoundSwitch v2 program effectively ensures. The reason why the UMC-200 can't upmix is because it treats multichannel audio as multichannel, just like bolle already explained in the 2nd paragraph of his reply. LAV Audio lets you work around that limitation by sending 2-channel audio as 2-channel (i.e. by leaving it "as is", instead of converting it to multichannel by adding extra channels the audio data in which contains only silence). For HTPC, Media Player Classic HomeCinema (MPC-HC) with madVR renderer is 100 times better than Windows Media Player. As for Shark007, personally I would steer clear of both him and his codec pack because... well, here's why: codecs.forumotion.net/t2392-why-should-i-use-k-lite-codecs-pack#12888codecs.forumotion.net/t1246-is-shark007-codec-pack-the-best#6284P.S., and here: codecs.forumotion.net/t2389-k-lite-side-loading-web-companion-from-lavasoft#12904K-Lite Codec Pack can be found here: www.codecguide.com |
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Post by shame302 on Nov 9, 2016 15:37:36 GMT -5
About the "silent stream" bug, Windows treats the HDMI audio idle state as "no audio stream gets sent to the HDMI output". But with an AVR or processor/preamp connected to the HDMI output, the correct behavior should be "the audio stream continues to be sent to the HDMI output, but the actual streamed data contains only silence", and this correct behavior is what the SoundSwitch v2 program effectively ensures. The reason why the UMC-200 can't upmix is because it treats multichannel audio as multichannel, just like bolle already explained in the 2nd paragraph of his reply. LAV Audio lets you work around that limitation by sending 2-channel audio as 2-channel (i.e. by leaving it "as is", instead of converting it to multichannel by adding extra channels the audio data in which contains only silence). For HTPC, Media Player Classic HomeCinema (MPC-HC) with madVR renderer is 100 times better than Windows Media Player. As for Shark007, personally I would steer clear of both him and his codec pack because... well, here's why: codecs.forumotion.net/t2392-why-should-i-use-k-lite-codecs-pack#12888codecs.forumotion.net/t1246-is-shark007-codec-pack-the-best#6284P.S., and here: codecs.forumotion.net/t2389-k-lite-side-loading-web-companion-from-lavasoft#12904K-Lite Codec Pack can be found here: www.codecguide.comThank you for the info my friend. I'll follow the links and do some research. Perhaps it's time to update my configuration all together.It's been unchanged basically for like 9 years I think I tend to stick with what works for me and make as few changes as possible. Hopefully Emotiva will take care of me and get this thing back to factory and I'll go from there. |
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Post by shame302 on Nov 9, 2016 18:29:45 GMT -5
More bad news. Looks like the original owner fibbed and the warranty is out of date for transfer so, I'm on my own in that regard. I've had it for over a month so its probably been too long to fight with the seller, ebay and PayPal over it plus, I've obviously tampered with it with the F.W. update attempt.
I've got a repeated "No DSP2 code!" error after any successful flash so the unit isn't retaining it. I find it hard to believe that it's hardware related as it didn't have THAT problem when I received it. Only manifested after F.W.update. Tech says this sounds like an issue that they have to fix. Shipping, plus $75 just to look at it and up to $250 for repairs and I'm sure shipping. On a unit I paid $400 for expecting no problems. On a discontinued model that sold for $500 originally. Awesome. Lesson learned.
So anyway. I can't find them but I'm looking for the older firmware versions just for giggles. I figure it can't hurt to try. Anybody have any ideas? I honestly don't even know what the module is/represents and info seems pretty scarce.
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Post by Soup on Nov 9, 2016 18:37:35 GMT -5
I would contact paypal. Should be no problem to undo the sale and get ur money back. Your money Your decision.
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Post by Soup on Nov 9, 2016 18:38:41 GMT -5
To answer your question. Contact emotiva for older firmware.
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Post by shame302 on Nov 9, 2016 19:25:55 GMT -5
I filed for a return on Ebay but I'm outside the 30 day window at this point. I DID contact the seller about the issues I was having as well as requesting info for the warranty transfer assuming I'd be good (and he did but it's not transferable to me). Maybe that will be enough to get my foot in the door. I really hate dealing with business this way. Ready to contact PayPal as well but Id rather him voluntarily resolve this. I asked for a return/refund and if that not preferable, I could forward the unit to Emotiva for service at his expense. I don't think that's unreasonable.
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Post by vneal on Nov 9, 2016 19:43:24 GMT -5
Knock on the wood----no UMC 200 issues ever
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