A few questions about the Arcam AVR300 that I have searced for but can't find...

[Basil Plumley]

New to the world of Arcam with a recent purchase of an AVR300 - and as experienced as I am, I have a few questions about it if anybody could answer please...

1-Reference Level - the dial goes from 0 - 100 as owners will know...but where exactly is reference level - the point on the dial where the AVR goes to when it outputs it's test tones...?
I need to know this because I want to couple it with a Blu-ray player via the DVD-A inputs and need to balance the speakers.

2 - Complex memory...the manual boasts about the AVR having a complex memory and it remembers the surround mode that the individual input was on previously...mine doesn't. If I watch a film in DD PLIIx (which is my preference), when I switch it back on again, it reverts to DD 5.1 and I have to manually select DD PLIIx with the mode button on the remote...is this normal or do I have a problem or more than likely doing something wrong...?

Will probably have a few more over the coming weeks as I get to play with it a bit more so please bear with me and thanks for your help...

 

[Badger0-0]

it reverts to DD 5.1 and I have to manually select DD PLIIx with the mode button on the remote

This is pretty much standard practice, in that you set it to auto and it will go for the best standard (DD 5.1) and fall back to PLII if 5.1 is not available.

You probably need to change it from auto as the default setting, but why you would prefer PLII, I don't know and won't ask.

 

[Basil Plumley]

This is pretty much standard practice, in that you set it to auto and it will go for the best standard (DD 5.1) and fall back to PLII if 5.1 is not available.

You probably need to change it from auto as the default setting, but why you would prefer PLII, I don't know and won't ask.

It's not PLII - It's Dolby Digital PLIIx - it adds the 2 surround back channels to the 5.1 signal but instead of duplicating the signal in both as Dolby Digital EX does, it sends a discrete signal channel to each surround back speaker - it's kind of like the DTS ES Discrete version of Dolby Digital and sounds a lot more spacious than DD Surround EX - IMO of course...

 

[Badger0-0]

it sends a discrete signal channel to each surround back speaker

My understanding is it's not discrete, it's synthesised (it can upmix from stereo) but whatever, if you like it that's fair enough

I still think you need to take it out of auto as the default.

 

[Mark.Yudkin]

but where exactly is reference level - the point on the dial where the AVR goes to when it outputs it's test tones...?

To calibrate, set the speaker trims so that the SPL of the test tones is 75dB. Reference level is defined as a full peak swing on a DVD measuring 105dB (LFE: 115dB), being 85dB (average level) + 20dB headroom. It's also uncomfortably loud, which is why the test tones are quieter.

2 - If I watch a film in DD PLIIx (which is my preference), when I switch it back on again, it reverts to DD 5.1 and I have to manually select DD PLIIx with the mode button on the remote...is this normal or do I have a problem or more than likely doing something wrong...?

Check that you have configured "Surr. EX" to "Auto PLIIx" and "Use Channels 6+7 for" to "Dolby Surr EX" on the EX Settings menu page.

 

[KelvinS1965]

My AV9 is like this: I sellect a prefered setting such as PLIIx for stereo TV sources and it always drops back vanilla PLII the next time I use it. It also does this on digital sources when I prefer to have all 7.1 channels used even if it's 'matrixing' the rear surround effect I find it sounds more spacious on my setup. I've tried various settings (some suggested my Mark) but I've just got used to making sure I select the setting I want before I settle down to a film...it's a small price to pay for the better sounding Arcam processor/amp combo compared to my previous receiver.

 

[Basil Plumley]

To calibrate, set the speaker trims so that the SPL of the test tones is 75dB. Reference level is defined as a full peak swing on a DVD measuring 105dB (LFE: 115dB), being 85dB (average level) + 20dB headroom. It's also uncomfortably loud, which is why the test tones are quieter.

Check that you have configured "Surr. EX" to "Auto PLIIx" and "Use Channels 6+7 for" to "Dolby Surr EX" on the EX Settings menu page.

Thanks for that - yeah have done both of those and still can't make PLIIx "stick" - but as suggested, it is a small price to pay...

As for thr test tones, I have set those at the levels suggested, but am keen to know where that is exactly on the volume dial so that I can set the levels of my DVD player connected to the multi channel inputs correctly...

 

[Mark.Yudkin]

The value you want is 75, which is sort of correct.

The "problem" is that AVR300 is not a THX amp, and hence the volume control value is not a relevant setting as such. A detailed explanation from Andy Dutton (an Arcam engineer) can be found in this post.