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Hi folks,
I was so glad that I received my receiver on friday that I had the whole long wkend to set up my system. My system is as follows:
Toshiba 57HX83 RPTV
Marantz 5300 receiver
LG 7382 (Zenith 318 ) DVD player
JM Labs Chorus series 5.1 speakers (715 L+R, CC700, 705 satellites, and SW700)
I calibrated the system with the Radio Shack dB meter, and further verified with my ears. After calibration, the front speakers are only +/- 1 dB but the rear speakers are at +6 ~ +7 dB. Is that an acceptable range? The layout of my room doesn't allow for the ideal placement of the rear speakers. Instead of placing the satellite speakers to the L and R of the listening positions I have to put them 9' behind the listening position. I've attached the layout of my room below ... the "B" location is what I've picked for my rear speakers for now.
Another interesting thing is, reading the JM Labs' manual they recommend setting all speakers to "LARGE". That's kindda weird especially considering the rear 705 speakers are spec'ed down to 65Hz only, and the center only 61Hz. The front tower speakers do go down to 45Hz. I wouldn't normally set the speakers to large with these speakers.
I tried 3 different settings: 1. Setting all to small, 2. Setting all to large, and 3. Setting the towers to large and everything else to small ... and it seems like JM Labs do know their speakers because the best setting seems to be everything in "Large", while I set the cross-over freq. of the sub to 80Hz. Is this normal?
There is another reason why it might not be such a bad idea to set everything to 'Large" though, because reading the manual of the SR5300 it seems like the bass management fixes the cross-over to 100Hz when you use the SMALL speaker setting ... and everywhere I read on the web it states the crossover freq. for the 5300 is 80Hz, not 100 ... nevertheless that's what the manual says.
Anyways after I got the system calibrated I tested some music CD's / DVD's ... I started with Diana Krall's Concert in Paris DVD, followed by a few CD's from Rock to jazz to classical. The system sounds great. The speaker + receiver seems to be a good combination and I'm glad I didn't pick a denon receiver. The JM Labs chrous speakers are a tad on the bright side and good thing the Marantz is not. After playing with the alignment of the speakers it seems to have got some of the brightness out of the way ... the speakers are very musical and have good depth and good resolution to it.
Afterwards I tested a few movies. I started with the war scene in "The last samurai", followed by "The Gladiator" (Superbit), "X-2", "Driven" and "Star Wars". I was happy with the system for movies. There's a lot of details and dynamics to it. The left to right pans are nicely done, while the pans from front to back is not as smooth. This is especially apparent in the race scenes in Star Wars and Driven. This probably has something to do with the placement of my rear speakers.
I also thought the high end could be a little crisper ... in the coin toss scene of Driven, and in the first chapter of X-2 with bullet shells dropping, the high-end doesn't come out as much from the heavy bass background ... I may try to play with the alignment further and see if that helps.
As for the bass, it is tight, quick and adequate, despite the subwoofer is only 125W and only goes down to 35Hz. The sub sounded a little boomy though ... I wonder if it's because I place it too close to the corner? The sub also doesn't sit perfectly flat on the hardwood floor so maybe that has something to do with it too?
Overall despite the speakers aren't broken in yet I'm already very happy with the system. The Marantz does seem to be a little better for music than movies, but I still found myself re-watching my DVD collection late at night with the new system ... that says it all.
I was so glad that I received my receiver on friday that I had the whole long wkend to set up my system. My system is as follows:
Toshiba 57HX83 RPTV
Marantz 5300 receiver
LG 7382 (Zenith 318 ) DVD player
JM Labs Chorus series 5.1 speakers (715 L+R, CC700, 705 satellites, and SW700)
I calibrated the system with the Radio Shack dB meter, and further verified with my ears. After calibration, the front speakers are only +/- 1 dB but the rear speakers are at +6 ~ +7 dB. Is that an acceptable range? The layout of my room doesn't allow for the ideal placement of the rear speakers. Instead of placing the satellite speakers to the L and R of the listening positions I have to put them 9' behind the listening position. I've attached the layout of my room below ... the "B" location is what I've picked for my rear speakers for now.
Another interesting thing is, reading the JM Labs' manual they recommend setting all speakers to "LARGE". That's kindda weird especially considering the rear 705 speakers are spec'ed down to 65Hz only, and the center only 61Hz. The front tower speakers do go down to 45Hz. I wouldn't normally set the speakers to large with these speakers.
I tried 3 different settings: 1. Setting all to small, 2. Setting all to large, and 3. Setting the towers to large and everything else to small ... and it seems like JM Labs do know their speakers because the best setting seems to be everything in "Large", while I set the cross-over freq. of the sub to 80Hz. Is this normal?
There is another reason why it might not be such a bad idea to set everything to 'Large" though, because reading the manual of the SR5300 it seems like the bass management fixes the cross-over to 100Hz when you use the SMALL speaker setting ... and everywhere I read on the web it states the crossover freq. for the 5300 is 80Hz, not 100 ... nevertheless that's what the manual says.
Anyways after I got the system calibrated I tested some music CD's / DVD's ... I started with Diana Krall's Concert in Paris DVD, followed by a few CD's from Rock to jazz to classical. The system sounds great. The speaker + receiver seems to be a good combination and I'm glad I didn't pick a denon receiver. The JM Labs chrous speakers are a tad on the bright side and good thing the Marantz is not. After playing with the alignment of the speakers it seems to have got some of the brightness out of the way ... the speakers are very musical and have good depth and good resolution to it.
Afterwards I tested a few movies. I started with the war scene in "The last samurai", followed by "The Gladiator" (Superbit), "X-2", "Driven" and "Star Wars". I was happy with the system for movies. There's a lot of details and dynamics to it. The left to right pans are nicely done, while the pans from front to back is not as smooth. This is especially apparent in the race scenes in Star Wars and Driven. This probably has something to do with the placement of my rear speakers.
I also thought the high end could be a little crisper ... in the coin toss scene of Driven, and in the first chapter of X-2 with bullet shells dropping, the high-end doesn't come out as much from the heavy bass background ... I may try to play with the alignment further and see if that helps.
As for the bass, it is tight, quick and adequate, despite the subwoofer is only 125W and only goes down to 35Hz. The sub sounded a little boomy though ... I wonder if it's because I place it too close to the corner? The sub also doesn't sit perfectly flat on the hardwood floor so maybe that has something to do with it too?
Overall despite the speakers aren't broken in yet I'm already very happy with the system. The Marantz does seem to be a little better for music than movies, but I still found myself re-watching my DVD collection late at night with the new system ... that says it all.
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