I calibrated a very nice 5.1.4 System comprising of an Arcam AVR 550 with Dali Fazon 5 speakers and subwoofer package with 4 in ceiling Dolby Atmos Height Speakers and Pioneer LX500 UHD Blu Ray Player. The Customer was using a Naim stereo power amplifier to power the second pair of height speakers. The setting was a very modern apartment living room where huge attention to details had been paid to the lovely decoration and styling of the room, it was a lovely room to spend time in.
The challenge of this calibration was the lovely setting, the owner is very mindful of sound leakage especially bass leakage disturbing their neighbours, even the general overall volume has to be carefully managed. The goal was to setup the system to be full range sounding, knitted together and dynamic without crossing a very tight line of too much overall volume, bass output and surround sound presence.
This is a much more difficult challenge than it sounds due to the massive dynamic range within modern 4K UHD and Blu Rays and often quiet vocal by comparison. That was the customers complaint about the system setup in general he has to turn the system up to hear the vocal but back down again during the big set pieces where the sound is often at its most dynamic. A situation I am sure a lot of people can relate to.
To achieve this goal I had to spend many hours tweaking Dirac Live and working closely with the customer in terms of listening tests so they could decide on the correct level and amount of bass and surround presence we could have. Too little bass extension and surround sound presence was not acceptable, too much bass punch and surround sound presence was not acceptable – there really was a very fine line between the two that I had to use Dirac Live’s very fine custom adjustment to achieve the best balance possible.
Customer Feedback
“Terry was both professional and friendly, working tirelessly to Dirac the system and explain what he was doing and why.”