[Dixter]

I can confirm... Excellent info for those looking to buy second hand.

James said : ...Realisers incorporating the new HSR41T/APM110 hardware will use the serial number format A16HS2001#xxxxxx.
They didn't update the serial numbers on the Modded units... so if you go for a second hand unit you will need to verify the 24ch hardware via the screen showing 24ch...

 

[You Gene]

James said : ...Realisers incorporating the new HSR41T/APM110 hardware will use the serial number format A16HS2001#xxxxxx.
They didn't update the serial numbers on the Modded units... so if you go for a second hand unit you will need to verify the 24ch hardware via the screen showing 24ch...

You mean like For-tune (German dealer) 1st generation realiser A162U1901#0000.. :
https://www.facebook.com/ForTuneVertrieb/
https://for-tune.de/produkt/smyth-research-a162u-realiser/
And yet the version showed on their facebook page is one of the new ones (A16PA or A1632)
Does it mean that you can not only upgrade a 1st generation A16 into 24ch. but also into any of the new versions, A16PA, A16AES, A1632, should you choose to do so...?

No one ever mentioned that.
Edit :
I think the photo has been tampered with by For-tune. They even mention :
…under license from Auro Technologies
… under license from Illusonic
but I cannot check because my A16 is on its way to James for repair (buzz)

 

[Litlgi74]

Hello friends...

I've done a final measurement of my main system... It will be that last until I can get into a studio...

This time I used a dedicated center channel and proper Dolby distances and angles for my overhead Atmos speakers. The results are fantastic... I am very, very pleased.



The measurements (Audiohobbits method) are of a 9.1.6 system in a virtual 10.8' x 10.8' room. All base layer speakers were measured at 65" from the sweet spot.

The measurements did take some time... But the results are well worth it...

My only issue is the gain of the SW. Its just to high for my Abyss headphones. To compensate... I've lowered the gain -10db on the SW channel in the listening room... This seems to work better than any of the other bass management solutions so far.



The dedicated center channel is now apparent and properly placed in the SVS mix. For some reason, using a main speaker as the center channel, had the sound bleeding into the left and right channels.

I'd love to hear your thoughts and opinions...

https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=12-Z8zIP3tnI4DHnystqFNc6UWZ7TKAOv

Thanks

 

[Litlgi74]

I do have a question... Is it possible to add a second SW (SW2) to make my 9.1.6 a 9.2.6?

I've turned on the 24 channel option. But there are no "Ref" for the "Vspkr" channels beyond 16... So I'm not sure how to go about adding the SW2.

Thanks for the help.

 

[Andrew Seeley]

Dear Mr Lilgi, please U\l to Google drive when you've had the chance!! And plus Or robust assurances of the google drive savvy, of your Capture-Master.

Smaug in 2160p upconversion and Optimus Prime in the first two movies before they botched his voice-are about to have a work out!!

 

[phoenixdogfan]

Well that would be like reviewing an AV-Receiver as a headphone amp!

It has a 16 channel DAC, 16 external outputs, can do every legacy and ATMOS and DTS-X codecs, and control of volume. Why not see if it can effectively be a true multitasker?

 

[phoenixdogfan]

@phoenixdogfan Did you get your measurements done?

Not yet, unexpectedly busy with other things.

 

[Thomasphoenix98]

Hello friends...

I've done a final measurement of my main system... It will be that last until I can get into a studio...

This time I used a dedicated center channel and proper Dolby distances and angles for my overhead Atmos speakers. The results are fantastic... I am very, very pleased.



The measurements (Audiohobbits method) are of a 9.1.6 system in a virtual 10.8' x 10.8' room. All base layer speakers were measured at 65" from the sweet spot.

The measurements did take some time... But the results are well worth it...

My only issue is the gain of the SW. Its just to high for my Abyss headphones. To compensate... I've lowered the gain -10db on the SW channel in the listening room... This seems to work better than any of the other bass management solutions so far.



The dedicated center channel is now apparent and properly placed in the SVS mix. For some reason, using a main speaker as the center channel, had the sound bleeding into the left and right channels.

I'd love to hear your thoughts and opinions...

https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=12-Z8zIP3tnI4DHnystqFNc6UWZ7TKAOv

Thanks

I tried your 9.1.6 PRIR. You've done a great job. Will have to do a man-loud listening later.

 

[Fox1977]

I do have a question... Is it possible to add a second SW (SW2) to make my 9.1.6 a 9.2.6?

I've turned on the 24 channel option. But there are no "Ref" for the "Vspkr" channels beyond 16... So I'm not sure how to go about adding the SW2.

Thanks for the help.

Having two physical SW doesn't mean you'll have a X.2.X PRIR. When you capture your system the A16 will play the LFE channel and capture simultaneously the signature of both SW. In your PRIR, the .1. channel will emulate both SW. At least, that's what i think, i did not try.

 

[Dixter]

You mean like For-tune (German dealer) 1st generation realiser A162U1901#0000.. :
https://www.facebook.com/ForTuneVertrieb/
https://for-tune.de/produkt/smyth-research-a162u-realiser/
And yet the version showed on their facebook page is one of the new ones (A16PA or A1632)
Does it mean that you can not only upgrade a 1st generation A16 into 24ch. but also into any of the new versions, A16PA, A16AES, A1632, should you choose to do so...?

No one ever mentioned that.
Edit :
I think the photo has been tampered with by For-tune. They even mention :
…under license from Auro Technologies
… under license from Illusonic
but I cannot check because my A16 is on its way to James for repair (buzz)

I was only pointing out that the Serial Numbers changed when Smyth resumed the builds with the new hardware but there are A16 units that have the new hardware but the serial numbers did NOT get changed and the best way to verify if a A16 has the new hardware is to query the A16 unit via the display screen... don't rely only on the serial number...

 

[sander99]

I do have a question... Is it possible to add a second SW (SW2) to make my 9.1.6 a 9.2.6?

Having two physical SW doesn't mean you'll have a X.2.X PRIR. When you capture your system the A16 will play the LFE channel and capture simultaneously the signature of both SW. In your PRIR, the .1. channel will emulate both SW. At least, that's what i think, i did not try.

As far as I know (from looking at the listed listening modes in the kickstarter update that describes the possibilities of the new hardware:
https://www.kickstarter.com/project...al-3d-audio-headphone-processor/posts/2781725 )
there is no 9.2.6 listening mode. However as Fox1977 says you can measure 2 subs together as 1. (Just make sure the sweep for measuring "the" sub during the PRIR measurements goes to both subs at the same time). Of course during use of the PRIR the 2 virtual subs will always play the same signal, they are effectively one single channel.

 

[audiohobbit]

What sander said.
I would not measure a separate SW2.
In "small" listening rooms one sub alone leads to massive room modes and an uneven bass distribution at the listening spot.
The usual way to overcome this is a multi sub system with several subs in the room that are tuned in frequency response/phase/delay so that the bass distribution at the listening spot(s) will be even.
The most elaborate of these systems is the DBA (Double Bass Array) with 4, 8, 12 or mor woofers.
BUT this will always be just one subwoofer channel, the LFE plus the redirected bass of the speakers.
So if you have such a multisub system that is tuned to deliver even bass at the listening spot it has to be measured as one sub channel.

Normally one would setup such a system with an additional processore and additional amps connected to the subwoofer output of an AVR.
There are some AVRs that allow the connection of 2 subs.
Sometimes they can be automatically measured by the AVR as one sub channel, so as a small mutli sub system but often the (redirected) bass is divided in a front and a rear sub, so that the bass of the front speakers gets directed to the front sub and the bass of the rear speakers gets directed to the rear sub. And this makes not much sense in a small room, because then you would have the room modes of the front sub AND the room modes of the rear sub, they would not add their bass to overcome the room modes!

And I don't know what the x.2.x Atmos setups do with the 2 different subwoofer channels. Atmos decoding itself can only use the subwoofer for the LFE, so does the LFE get directed to both subs? Or only one of them? or what?
In the Atmos@home whitepaper no 2nd sub channel is mentioned either.

 

[Litlgi74]

And I don't know what the x.2.x Atmos setups do with the 2 different subwoofer channels. Atmos decoding itself can only use the subwoofer for the LFE, so does the LFE get directed to both subs? Or only one of them? or what?
In the Atmos@home whitepaper no 2nd sub channel is mentioned either.

Thanks for the help...

I measured the SW2... but like I said... there is no way currently to use it with an Atmos profile... Maybe in the future... I'll have it for when we get DTS:X

What do you think of reducing the gain of the SW at the channel level via the listening room?

Oh... Can the PRIR filenames be renamed outside of the A16?

 

[audiohobbit]

Can you describe your speaker setup? Bassmanagement etc. What do you with the 2nd Subwoofer in your real speaker setup?
And how and with which signals you measured your PRIRs esp. your sub, how it was connected (directly to the Realiser or via AVR?)

If you measured the speakers in the PRIR as fullrange (either speakers are large enough or are bass managed outside the Realiser) and you then use no bass management (bass redirection to the "virtual" sub) in the Realiser, then you use the SW only for the LFE. In this case a +10 gain setting in the Listening room would be the same as the LFE+10 switch.
However there is no LFE -10 switch. So if your LFE channel is 10 dB too loud then you could lower it via this gain setting or on the bass management page (where the LFE +10 switch is) via the hp/av SW volume setting (2nd line from top).
This is what I did for a Studio PRIR that I have, recorded with Async signals.
I think this is a bit more convenient and more logical to set it there.

The whole LFE-boost story is complicated, especially when bass management is added for the normal speakers.

If someone don't know the backstory for this:
In movie soundtracks the LFE is recorded 10 dB lower than the other channels. This gives the LFE channel 10 dB headroom. At max. output every main channel then should be able to produce 105 dB, but the LFE then has to output 115 dB. This is because one LFE channel has to compete with the sum of several 105 dB main channels, summed up they are louder than 105 dB.

So the LFE signal has to be boosted up by 10 dB somewhere in the playback gear (the so called B chain in cinemas).

In a normal home cinema setup the AVR does this automatically. In the Realiser we have to set this up ourselves because it depends what device made the LFE boost or not, is the PRIR recorded already with the LFE boosted or not etc.

This is sometimes hard to find out. To be on the safe side one should measure the output frequency responses of the Realiser for LFE and the main channels.
I didn't do this yet. I just decided by listening to known movies. Especially if it's 10 dB too loud you will notice this normally.

But at this point I have to say that many headphones at a comparable listening volume like real cinemas can't handle the massive bass of cinema soundtracks and get overloaded, even if the LFE level is correct!
So far it still seems that I am the only one on the planet that had these problems. I tried many headphones and nearly all of them got overloaded by reasonably loud cinema bass.
Even the Audeze LCD2 I settled with eventually. I set up a high pass filter at about 30 Hz for the LCD2s with external hardware.
I now use in ear headphones for movies, in my case the relatively cheap Hifiman RE400, and they can handle nearly every kind of bass, I don't need a highpass filter for them.

So there is a slight chance that your LFE level is ok and just your headphones get overloaded.

in the first months with the A16 I used the stock Surrey room and as far as I found out it needs the LFE+10 boost for Dolby signals that are decoded by the Realiser itself. So you can test this and AB compare it to your room with the Dolby test signals that are somewhere linked in the thread that is linked in my signature.

For DTS signals that the Realiser can not decode at the moment it depends what your player does. My Panasonic DP-UB 424 UHD player decodes DTS to PCM at the moment and it seems that it alread does the LFE boost, so the LFE+10 switch is off for my Surrey DTS rooms.

With my studio PRIR it seems that the LFE boost was already done by the studio hardware somewhere. In this case for Realiser decoded Dolby signals the LFE+10 switch is off, but for Panasonic DTS-PCM decoded signals the LFE would still be 10 dB to loud and I set the hp/av SW volume to -10.


So this is all so complicated, one could write a thesis about that...

 

[audiohobbit]

Oh... Can the PRIR filenames be renamed outside of the A16?

We discussed this a few pages ago.
First of all the file name itself is not what the Realiser shows in its file menu.
What it shows there (user name, room name etc.) is stored as ASCII text in the header of the otherwise binary PRIR or HPEQ file.
One could open this with a hex editor for example to see this.
I asked Stephen if I can change the text there and save it so that the Realiser shows the new names etc. but Stephen said no, because the files are hashed ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hash_function ), so if you change anything the hash will be invalid and the file seen as corrupt by the Realiser I suppose.

However, the person I discussed this with some pages ago (sorry, forgot who it was) said that he tried to change the text entries in a hex editor (I presume) and it did work.
I think he wrote that the length of the file has to stay the same (the amount of bytes).
I think if you search for the term hash you may find the post some pages back.

Unfortunately I am either too busy or too lazy to write all these things down in a compact FAQ-like format to post in "my" thread (linked in my sig)