ARTICLE: What is Anthem Room Correction (ARC Genesis)?

Great write up Steve, perfect timing with the new Anthem processors/receivers dropping.
Never had Anthem or used Arc so looking forward to getting stuck into it all in the coming months, when I eventually get a MRX-740.
 
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I wish that someone could run a course for Arc Genesis.
 
Thanks Steve.

Good to hear more about one of the lesser discussed systems compared to all the noise regarding Dirac and Room Perfect.
 
As someone who is relatively new to ARC I found it quite easy to use and quite intuitive. However I didn’t like the automated results - to the extent I thought I’d made a big mistake by changing to Anthem. After using the ‘Guru’ service (do a search) it completely changed the results. The ability to share and amend the files is another great feature of ARC.

I would highly recommend the Guru service to anyone using ARC, it is more than worth the money
 
I bought an Anthem MRX 510 back in 2014 after reading Steve's review of the MRX 710 giving it and the ARC system a 10/10 and reference status. I'm still contentedly listening to it with the same speaker setup although I do re-calibrate from time to time and have upgraded to the 'Genesis' version of the software.

I find the ability to apply sweep tones to the speakers whilst watching the reponse curves in real time to be useful in exploring room acoustics whilst moving the mic and speakers around.

It was whist doing a recalibration that I discovered I had blown a bass unit in one of my floor-standing speakers which persuaded me to invest in a separate sub to take the strain of my sometimes over-zealous uping of the gain when watching movies.
 
As someone who is relatively new to ARC I found it quite easy to use and quite intuitive. However I didn’t like the automated results - to the extent I thought I’d made a big mistake by changing to Anthem. After using the ‘Guru’ service (do a search) it completely changed the results. The ability to share and amend the files is another great feature of ARC.

I would highly recommend the Guru service to anyone using ARC, it is more than worth the money
I will second that. He set my system up and showed me how to take measurements if any alterations in my room. Great guy.
 
Nice review Steve.

Still use my MRX500 but haven’t had to update ARC for a long time now. Ventured down the Audy route (7200WA) and then Dirac (AVR550). Didn’t really do it for me. Once Genesis came out, now with a Mac at home, went with the Anthem 720. Not looked back since. The new Anthem range are what some have been waiting for. They have a Lyngdorf vibe to their front panel.
 
It was meant to be - this morning's AVForums article is on ARC Genesis and this afternoon I pick up my new MRX-1140!
 
The toroidal transformer, the greater future-proofing, I also told myself that the 1140 was closer to being a twin of the AVM70, and resale value. But, really, I just wanted the battleship!
Fair enough :smashin:
 
I’m not at all sure why anyone buys an av receiver or a stereo amp without ARC, Dirac or RP.

(Assuming the cash is available).

It must be obvious by now that the room is the biggest player in sound quality.

I’ve owned all three and the DSPeaker Dual core.

All made the music much more listen to-able.
 
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I’m ‘probably’ one of the very few that felt a little underwhelmed with the older Anthem 720. But the newer generation of ARC and the new AVR’s has raised my interest again.
 
I’m ‘probably’ one of the very few that felt a little underwhelmed with the older Anthem 720. But the newer generation of ARC and the new AVR’s has raised my interest again.

It all depends on the room I suppose, but I found even the original basic ARC was genuinely useful in dealing without the whopping bass peaks I had at around 50Hz in one speaker and around 70Hz in the other.

The peaks certainly smudged the midrange clarity/detail available from what are pretty good speakers.

It took a short while to accustom my ears/brain to the perceived ‘lack’ of bass, but after around 20 or so hours of listening I couldn’t go back to no ARC; it wasn’t real bass that was gone, just flabby mush.
 
Ps, I must say it didn’t do much for anything above around 300Hz, but there wasn’t a noticeable issue there anyway and I hadn’t expected much, so I only used it from 300Hz downward after half a dozen or thereabouts experiments.
 
It wasn’t so much that for me but more a lack of cohesion/integration. Front to back/side surround blending wasn’t really there. It was like the sounds were being placed were they should be without blending it all together, it was quite odd.
Stereo or 2 channel was a bit amiss as well. The centre imaging was missing and music sounded cold and emotionless, not engaging at all.

When they’re available I’ll see if I can get a home demo from someone.
 
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It wasn’t so much that for me but more a lack of cohesion/integration. Front to back/side surround blending wasn’t really there. It was like the sounds were being placed were they should be without blending it all together, it was quite odd.
Stereo or 2 channel was a bit amiss as well. The centre imaging was missing and music sounded cold and emotionless, not engaging at all.

When they’re available I’ll see if I can get a home demo from someone.

I’ve not tried ARC for surround duties, I’m a stereo first fellow, but a lack of blending together seems odd. I’d have thought the whole point of the various room corrections in AV receivers was to do that very thing.

(I’ll be making a modest (ish) home cinema in my living room by the end of April using ARC and active speakers, so I hope I have better luck).

But I’m very surprised about your stereo experience; Arc worked straight away for me.

Dirac took a couple of weeks of experimenting, but eventually it was quite very impressive.

The newer Anthrms I’m told have more DSP power and a fair old bit of tweakability, so I’d hope you get better results this time.
 
I've been using ARC for several years now and its done a pretty good job. I recently changed my front stereo speakers (part of my HiFi separates) though which are very capable of lower frequencies, but ARC dumbs them (Focal Sopra no2) down when I feel it should be making use of them. I am going to upgrade to Genesis to see if I can tweak this slightly so the system uses these speakers more.
 
It wasn’t so much that for me but more a lack of cohesion/integration. Front to back/side surround blending wasn’t really there. It was like the sounds were being placed were they should be without blending it all together, it was quite odd.
Stereo or 2 channel was a bit amiss as well. The centre imaging was missing and music sounded cold and emotionless, not engaging at all.

When they’re available I’ll see if I can get a home demo from someone.
I have to say that’s pretty much the opposite of my experience. I know all our tastes are different, but I would imagine something was seriously wrong with the set-up to give you that impression.

One thing that tends not to be mentioned as much in the context of multichannel AVR’s compared to stereo amplifiers, but I think it just as valid, is amp/speaker matching. What speakers did you listen to the Anthem with? Maybe the speakers’ properties were sapping the Anthem’s strengths rather than playing to them?

Another factor that takes some experimentation is the crossover. My Dali’s are really super in the 50hz-100hz region, so my initial setup of an 80hz crossover wasn’t doing the system any favours. Crossing over lower (50hz) while maintaining a fairly high LFE (120hz) really helped the front 3 speakers to play to their strengths, but also allowed the sub to open up the soundstage still further.

As a generalisation, there is more to get wrong in a typical AVR’s set-up compared with a vanilla (non-DSP) stereo amp, so maybe that was the issue?

I have to say my own experience with the Anthem is incredibly dynamic, exciting, foot-tapping (with multichannel music of course) and wonderfully clear. Actually although I’m only running 5.1, front to back panning is fantastic. But then I don’t have an enormous room (about 3.7m x 4m) and my rear dipoles probably help with the feeling of cohesion. But in my previous home I wasn’t using dipoles and my experience was just as positive, albeit different. The rear soundstage was smaller, but panning was a little sharper and more snappy.

Certainly I’m happy with my Anthem/Dali/MA Silver combo, it was great with my previous ancient Ruarks and I’ve heard the amp driving some high end Paradigms, which sounded superb (as you can imagine, with Paradigm being Anthem’s sister company). But maybe there are some speakers that just don’t harmonise with the Anthem too well?
 
I’m ‘probably’ one of the very few that felt a little underwhelmed with the older Anthem 720. But the newer generation of ARC and the new AVR’s has raised my interest again.
You get that Marantz dodge lol..I believe the new onkyo have a form of Dirac live built into them, but surely it will be Dirac light..only time will tell.
 

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