MC-1

[cwt]

Jan 6, 2022 21:58:47 GMT -5 jwb47474 said:

My intentions is to buy when standard stock is achieved and a few reviews come in. I do have a question: Since the AT300 has the capability to use the analog 2-4 inputs as a single 5.1 input, would the MC1 do this if a code from the AT300's remote is used or is this capability completely written out on the MC1's firmware?

The MC1;s circuitry is different from the at300 so theres always the risk of bricking it with a foreign firmware . I wouldnt try it - the MC1 manual is not up as yet so we dont know all its capabilities as well

In any case a 5.1 analogue input -if possible - would negate any room eq or bass management being done by the pre pro [if it even had adc's on the analogue ins]. Not to mention any atmos/dts-x decoding Good luck ; your indeed wise to wait for any early firmwares and feedback from users .

[titan2]

The manual has been up since 12/15.

[dlawmont]

Jan 5, 2022 13:51:07 GMT -5 titan2 said:

Get out the Champagne!  Received an e-mail that it was shipped.

Hey that is great news!  If you don't mind me asking ..... when was your order date?  Thanks.

[titan2]

Jan 7, 2022 9:01:40 GMT -5 dlawmont said:

Jan 5, 2022 13:51:07 GMT -5 titan2 said:

Get out the Champagne!  Received an e-mail that it was shipped.

Hey that is great news!  If you don't mind me asking ..... when was your order date?  Thanks.

About 10 minutes after it was posted on their website on 12/15.

[MusicHead]

Jan 7, 2022 11:44:13 GMT -5 titan2 said:

Jan 7, 2022 9:01:40 GMT -5 dlawmont said:

Hey that is great news!  If you don't mind me asking ..... when was your order date?  Thanks.

About 10 minutes after it was posted on their website on 12/15.

Not a minute too soon. The MC-1 is shown as "temporarily unavailable" now.

[sirphatsalot]

Just took delivery and briefly set up. I'll put it through its paces (hopefully) tonight. 


 

[housetech]

Cool, give us your thoughts

[octavarium]

Looking forward to hearing about people's experiences and impressions now that these are out in the wild.

[sirphatsalot]

So after playing around with it all night, here are my observations:

1. You can't manually eq left and right channels individually. They are a set. I find this very strange. You can if you are modifying your emoq values, but not if you are doing your own eq from scratch.

2. Emoq settings seemed fairly accurate as far as distances and levels for everything except subwoofers. I have two subs. The first was set to +7.5 and the second was +10 after emoq. Bass sounded way too loud after that. When I eq'ed using REW with my previous MC-700, levels were set to -5. When I get a chance, I'll run REW and redo all that.

3. HDMI switching takes a long time. Even when changing the output on my Shield from 4k60 to 4k24, the shield reverts back to 4k60 before I can get a solid picture to confirm 4k24.

4. My 1080p Oppo blu-ray and Toshiba hd dvd players arent showing video or audio with the MC-1, yet my 4k sony player, ps5, xbox series x, switch, and shield all seem to be working correctly (aside from the long time it takes for the signal to come back anytime an input or resolution changes)

5. The interface and remote are a clear step up from the MC-700, but still, the interface is nothing fancy. On screen volume is nice though. That wasn't possible on HDMI inputs 1-3 on the MC-700.

I really didn't have time to thouroughly evaluate sound quality, but I'm confident it sounds just a good as the MC-700, which I always found to be excellent in that department.

Hopefully the HDMI switching can be improved with future firmwares. As a workaround, I will use the HDFury Dr. HDMI. This solved all my HDMI issues with the MC-700, so hopefully it'll solve the issues with this as well.

I'm very curious to hear the thoughts and opinions of anyone else with one.

[cwt]

Jan 7, 2022 4:10:49 GMT -5 titan2 said:

The manual has been up since 12/15.

Right you are ; depends on where you look - not under product manuals for processors

emotiva.com/pages/product-manuals

[bmwfreak]

Hate to hear about the hdmi switching. I’ve had the itch to replace my xmc1 that is currently working flawlessly since I’ve had it really. The MC-1 seemed to meet that price point.
Thanks for your time and review.

[aznhorn]

Jan 8, 2022 1:15:15 GMT -5 sirphatsalot said:

So after playing around with it all night, here are my observations:

1. You can't manually eq left and right channels individually. They are a set. I find this very strange. You can if you are modifying your emoq values, but not if you are doing your own eq from scratch.

2. Emoq settings seemed fairly accurate as far as distances and levels for everything except subwoofers. I have two subs. The first was set to +7.5 and the second was +10 after emoq. Bass sounded way too loud after that. When I eq'ed using REW with my previous MC-700, levels were set to -5. When I get a chance, I'll run REW and redo all that.

3. HDMI switching takes a long time. Even when changing the output on my Shield from 4k60 to 4k24, the shield reverts back to 4k60 before I can get a solid picture to confirm 4k24.

4. My 1080p Oppo blu-ray and Toshiba hd dvd players arent showing video or audio with the MC-1, yet my 4k sony player, ps5, xbox series x, switch, and shield all seem to be working correctly (aside from the long time it takes for the signal to come back anytime an input or resolution changes)

5. The interface and remote are a clear step up from the MC-700, but still, the interface is nothing fancy. On screen volume is nice though. That wasn't possible on HDMI inputs 1-3 on the MC-700.

I really didn't have time to thouroughly evaluate sound quality, but I'm confident it sounds just a good as the MC-700, which I always found to be excellent in that department.

Hopefully the HDMI switching can be improved with future firmwares. As a workaround, I will use the HDFury Dr. HDMI. This solved all my HDMI issues with the MC-700, so hopefully it'll solve the issues with this as well.

I'm very curious to hear the thoughts and opinions of anyone else with one.

Thanks for sharing. Does it make any noise when switching between audio formats like the MC-700?

[LCSeminole]

Jan 8, 2022 1:15:15 GMT -5 sirphatsalot said:

4. My 1080p Oppo blu-ray and Toshiba hd dvd players arent showing video or audio with the MC-1, yet my 4k sony player, ps5, xbox series x, switch, and shield all seem to be working correctly (aside from the long time it takes for the signal to come back anytime an input or resolution changes)

Your Oppo bluray player and Toshiba HD-DVD players aren't HDCP 2.2 compliant, which is most likely why these players aren't working, and probably why they will work with the HDFury products. Depending on which Oppo blu-ray player you are using, there are firmwares that Oppo has that enable these HDCP 2.0 players to be HDCP 2.2 compliant. There are links on the AVS Forum that have been posted, myself included, in their respective owner threads, links added below.

Oppo BDP-83:
download.oppodigital.com/BDP83/BDP-83-60-1011_2.0.zip

Oppo BDP-93:
download.oppodigital.com/BDP0903/BDP9X_85-0106B.zip

[sirphatsalot]

Jan 8, 2022 16:16:11 GMT -5 LCSeminole said:

Jan 8, 2022 1:15:15 GMT -5 sirphatsalot said:

4. My 1080p Oppo blu-ray and Toshiba hd dvd players aren't showing video or audio with the MC-1, yet my 4k sony player, ps5, xbox series x, switch, and shield all seem to be working correctly (aside from the long time it takes for the signal to come back anytime an input or resolution changes)

Your Oppo bluray player and Toshiba HD-DVD players aren't HDCP 2.2 compliant, which is most likely why these players aren't working, and probably why they will work with the HDFury products. Depending on which Oppo blu-ray player you are using, there are firmwares that Oppo has that enable these HDCP 2.0 players to be HDCP 2.2 compliant. There are links on the AVS Forum that have been posted, myself included, in their respective owner threads, links added below.

Oppo BDP-83:
download.oppodigital.com/BDP83/BDP-83-60-1011_2.0.zip

Oppo BDP-93:
download.oppodigital.com/BDP0903/BDP9X_85-0106B.zip

Wow. Thank you!! I have been wondering about this for a very long time. I assumed it had something to do with HDCP.  On the MC-700 I would get a picture but no sound no matter what settings I used in the players. With the MC-1 now, there is neither picture nor sound (unless I change the EDID on the Doctor HDMI).   

Crazy that HDMI devices from 2005-2010ish just don't work with some of today's components. My Oppo is the BDP-80. I couldn't find the custom firmware, but the Doctor HDMI does the trick. Thanks again.   

[sirphatsalot]

Jan 8, 2022 13:11:11 GMT -5 aznhorn said:

Jan 8, 2022 1:15:15 GMT -5 sirphatsalot said:

So after playing around with it all night, here are my observations:

1. You can't manually eq left and right channels individually. They are a set. I find this very strange. You can if you are modifying your emoq values, but not if you are doing your own eq from scratch.

2. Emoq settings seemed fairly accurate as far as distances and levels for everything except subwoofers. I have two subs. The first was set to +7.5 and the second was +10 after emoq. Bass sounded way too loud after that. When I eq'ed using REW with my previous MC-700, levels were set to -5. When I get a chance, I'll run REW and redo all that.

3. HDMI switching takes a long time. Even when changing the output on my Shield from 4k60 to 4k24, the shield reverts back to 4k60 before I can get a solid picture to confirm 4k24.

4. My 1080p Oppo blu-ray and Toshiba hd dvd players aren't showing video or audio with the MC-1, yet my 4k sony player, ps5, xbox series x, switch, and shield all seem to be working correctly (aside from the long time it takes for the signal to come back anytime an input or resolution changes)

5. The interface and remote are a clear step up from the MC-700, but still, the interface is nothing fancy. On screen volume is nice though. That wasn't possible on HDMI inputs 1-3 on the MC-700.

I really didn't have time to thoroughly evaluate sound quality, but I'm confident it sounds just a good as the MC-700, which I always found to be excellent in that department.

Hopefully the HDMI switching can be improved with future firmwares. As a workaround, I will use the HDFury Dr. HDMI. This solved all my HDMI issues with the MC-700, so hopefully it'll solve the issues with this as well.

I'm very curious to hear the thoughts and opinions of anyone else with one.

Thanks for sharing. Does it make any noise when switching between audio formats like the MC-700?

I haven't noticed noise switching formats, but that doesn't mean it's not there. But I have noticed a very high pitched electrical noise when the MC-1 goes into standby. It sounds like coil whine. Maybe it'll go away after a while. I don't hear it when the unit is fully powered on though.   

[jwb47474]

Jan 8, 2022 4:54:00 GMT -5 cwt said:

Jan 7, 2022 4:10:49 GMT -5 titan2 said:

The manual has been up since 12/15.

Right you are ; depends on where you look - not under product manuals for processors

emotiva.com/pages/product-manuals

[jwb47474]

Let me get this straight: The MC1's HDMI inputs are not compatible with older legacy HDMI products which I have a lot of and still use and need to spend $500+ as a work around. I hope I am misinterpreting what is being said.

[bolle]

Jan 8, 2022 1:15:15 GMT -5 sirphatsalot said:

So after playing around with it all night, here are my observations:

1. You can't manually eq left and right channels individually. They are a set. I find this very strange. You can if you are modifying your emoq values, but not if you are doing your own eq from scratch.

Thank you very much. This actually would be a showstopper for me. Also this is something which DID work e.g. with the UMC-200.

emotiva / @keithl is there any chance that this will be changed with a new firmware release?

[cwt]

Jan 9, 2022 4:02:18 GMT -5 jwb47474 said:

Let me get this straight: The MC1's HDMI inputs are not compatible with older legacy HDMI products which I have a lot of and still use and need to spend $500+ as a work around. I hope I am misinterpreting what is being said.

The hdmi spec is supposed to be compatiblw with earlier versions like 1.4 ; this sometimes is stymied by the hdcp protocol that is used hence hd fury devices exist..

PG28 of the manual though says there is a enhanced hdmi setting which presumably refers to newer hdmi iterations which may have higher bandwidths . If you have trouble with your legacy inputs it says most wont ' otherwise to contact Emo for advice

HDMI Options - This menu offers several options related to HDMI operation. Options include
which HDMI Outputs are enabled, whether the MC1 will continue to pass video to the TV when
in Standby, some detailed choices about how the MC1 responds to HDMI-CEC commands from
other devices, and allows you to configure whether specific HDMI inputs support Enhanced HDMI
or not. (Most users will not need to use these options unless instructed to by Emotiva Technical
Support.)

[sirphatsalot]

So I spent quite a bit more time with it this weekend. Here are some more observations:

1. When skipping scene to scene on a blu-ray disk there is a loud unpleasant chirp or squeak. In case you are worried about speaker damage, you can mute before skipping. Not that I think it'll damage speakers, but just to be sure.

2. I calibrated the sound using REW this weekend. There are 3 save slots for eq settings, however, these combine Right and Left channel as one. They can't be eq'd separately, which pretty much defeats the purpose. However, there is a 4th slot that has the EmoQ settings after you run the autocal. What I did was go into that and delete each channels eqs (I don't trust EmoQ so I just do it myself with REW). Personally, I only EQ up to 500Hz or so and I leave everything higher alone. EmoQ was EQ'ing up to 20,000Hz. It was pretty decent eq'ing actually, but just a bit too much manipulation to my liking. Anyway, the EmoQ slot allows for separate eq values for all channels. So that is a nice workaround. But if you plan on having multiple EQs saved, then you're out of luck because the other three presets combine L and R.

Another issue I ran into was that twice when I was running REW, I noticed that the EmoQ eqs weren't being applied despite it being selected. Instead it was just showing the no eq (or flat) results. I power cycled the MC-1 and the EQ settings were once again applied. This is a bug that should be (hopefully) fixed in a new firmware (and yes, I was using the correct audio mode and not one that bypasses EQ).

3. I am using an HDFury Doctor HDMI from the MC-1 to the projector. And while everything is generally working, the switching inputs can take anywhere from 10 seconds to 30 seconds. And sometimes there just isn't a picture unless I change inputs and try again. It's definitely annoying, but I can live with it because, frankly, there is no other receiver/processor out there under $1,000 with 13.1 channels and this level of sound quality. And after I dialed it in, it sounded excellent. Far better than any mid tier big box av receiver.

4. The user interface is decent and laid out nicely. I didn't really run into any bugs with it. There is a nice feature where you can save your settings. Of course they are autosaved anyway, but I imagine incase they are reset or you change something you didn't mean to, you can load up the previous save. Eq'ing takes a long time, so I'm hoping it's all retained after new firmwares and I don't have to do it again.

5. As of today, the MC-1 still isn't in the Logitech Harmony remote database. I tried to manually enter it, but I ran into all kinds of problems. Hopefully it shows up soon so I don't have to use 6+ remotes.

It certainly isn't a perfect device, but after spending the weekend setting it all up and creating some workarounds, It should do the job. I know everything won't be fixed, but I'm hopeful some of these issues are ironed out with firmware updates. Time will tell.