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Hi Guys,

I'm using the auto calibration on my Sony 5300ES and when its gets to the end its asking me to select the calibration type, which I am a little confused about.  The options are :

Full Flat : Make the measurement of frequency from each speaker flat

Engineer : Sets the frequency to one that matches that of the Sony listening room standard

Front Reference : Adjusts the characteristics of all the speakers to match the characteristics of the front speaker

OFF : Sets the auto calibration EQ to off

I'm not exactly sure which of these I should be choosing, any advice ?

Anyone know anything about this ?  The What hifi guys must have come across this when reviewing, any advice on what should be used ?

Please has anyone one got any advice on this, surely someone must have come across it when auto calibrating the sony amps ?

All of that's straightforward. If you ahve different makes of speakers, I'd recommend you set the amp using option 3, since that will attempt to balance out the 'colour' of the sound. Option 4 is self-explanatory, option 2 is an internal setting, by the look of it - sort of like a dsp mode for speakers, and option 1 is simply neutral.

I am using the Kef 3005SE speakers, so they are all the same.

In that case I'd go for option 1 or 3. What's best for you though is to try the different settings out and see which one you prefer overall. I'd suggest 3 might be best overall, since even matched speakers can produce different sonic effects depending on their placement and local environment, thus introducing unwanted 'colour' into the soundfield.

Ok thanks for that, I'll give them all a try and see what sounds best, any recomendations for what to use for testing ?

I'd recommend you pick out a film you know well, and try that, ditto with music too.

Ok cheers kaotician.  Would also appreciate if the what hifi team could post what they use when testing the sony amps, just out of intrest.

Ignore that last post I just found this thread : http://community.whathifi.com/forums/t/1272.aspx

Searched yesterday and I sure it wasnt there.  Anyway thanks for the help, great forum and mag !

kaotician:

I'd recommend you pick out a film you know well, and try that, ditto with music too.

Ok did a little bit of testing with my Ratatouille Blu-ray and after trying all the EQ options I cant really tell a great deal of difference.  When I set it to OFF though I do feel that the sound is clearer / purer.  Think I'll stick with this for now and see how it goes.  When its set to off does it just use the pure soundtrack of the source and not applying any gimmickery to the sound ?

The answer is likely no. What you've done in bypassing the auto calibration is to tell the amp you'll set the speakers up manually. This is not the same setting as you would use to set up how the amp treats the signal itself, prior to passing it out through the amplification chips themselves. To pass the signal through untouched will require that you choose the appropriate button on either your amp's front or the remote control. On my Yamaha, for instance, I have a setting called 'Straight', which does exactly as you've questioned about. It also has another setting called 'Pure Direct' which switches off any superfluous functions (ie if I'm playing a cd, 'Pure Direct' will switch off the additional video processing chips.

So once the auto calibration is completed, configuring the speakers distances etc and I manually change the speaker size and crossovers for the speakers, I'm going to be no worse off setting the EQ to off if I think it sounds better?  Or is it assumed that these EQ setting should improve the surround sound experience ?

No. If you think it sounds better, that's all the system requires for it to be a success for you. To put your mind at rest, if you take even a cursory glance through the sig's of various posters on here, you'll see hundreds or even thousands of different combinations of speakers and amps. If there were 'one true way', which in my view is the latent concept you're being bugged by, then all of these people MUST be wrong to have chosen as they have. So are they? No. Like you, they're going to have chosen the kit they've got, and how it's set up, because for them that's the best way  to get the sound the way they like it. They trust themselves, and so should you.

Ok thanks mate, you've been a great help.  I was just a little confused as to what exactly these different calibration EQ modes did.  I like to try and understand these things as I hate not knowing what something does ;-)

Reading through all the other post on the subject none of them suggested OFF they either suggested FULL FLAT of ENGINEER, so I was concerned maybe I was missing something, as I couldn't tell much difference in the modes while listening to the same bits over and over again on Ratatouille (although having to recalibrate every time to change the EQ mode didnt help as it can be switched back and forward like the sound field settings)