Emotiva RMC-1 AV Processor Review

[Koloth]

I like it...

View attachment 51851

Hah! The internet doesnt know everything after all. Its a terminus technicus, that I found used by philosophers of science of the Vienna Circle, although it may have been in use earlier, I dont know. Imho, it's very concise as it gets to the heart of the idea of scientificity.

"invariable" = unchanging
"intersubjectively" = between/across subjects (/persons)

Thus, a procedures results would be intersubjectively invariable if they were the same irrespective of the person administering the procedure. This is often taken to be the meaning of 'objectivity' as it makes it improbable that the individuality of the person had any untoward impact on the results.

 

[Costas EAR]

Instead, they ran it at -20 dBFS.

I really have no interest to defend emotiva, i think this avr is a beta bullshit full of bugs and without dirac (which was promised from the beginning), so drop dead, no worries.

But..
keep in mind that the goal to a multichannel immersive setup is to listen at reference levels both music and movies.
Reference level at an immersive setup means (for home use) something between 78(-80) dB's at listening position from each speaker (~85dB's from 5 speakers and ~88.5 dB's from 11 speakers) , which with typical consumer amps, or even with active speakers, is at about -20 (to -23) dB's on the volume control.

Let's take the Neumann 310 for example to use with this emotiva avr.
I copy the following from 310 specs:

Output level control (output level in 1 m based on 0 dBu input level): 94; 100; 108; 114 dB SPL

So, i think that you may discover that at 2-2.3 m listening distance (typical for home use), and if the monitor is set properly in input sensitivity, it will reach the desired reference level at ...-20 dBFS on emotiva volume control!

Well, they know that.

In fact, it is "common knowledge" that in a typical immersive setup, reference level is usually at about -20 dBFS.

I am using Trinnov audio possessor, and i get reference level at exactly -23 dBFS, with Neumann 310's. Pure luck? Don't think so..

Anyway, emotiva sucks! Amir rulzzzzzz

 

[Blumlein 88]

Vacuum... Wipers?

Back on topic, this whole exchange is just gross from the Emotiva side. Both the employees and the proponents are shooting themselves in the proverbial foot.

Who wants to start an audio company?

Until the late 1950s most wipers were vacuum operated. Almost stop when accelerating or going up a steep hill. Working best coasting or sitting still.

 

[SmackDaddies]

Until the late 1950s most wipers were vacuum operated. Almost stop when accelerating or going up a steep hill. Working best coasting or sitting still.

and when it was cold (the rubber hoses shrank enough to hold a vacuum. the worse was warm and raining....AMC's were tremendous pieces of shit. But they worked...unlike Emotiva...

 

[Grandzoltar]

The THX 0 dB reference level is a calibrated volume setting used in dubbing, cinema, and home theaters. The 0 dB (decibel) setting represents an average 85 dB SPL (sound pressure level). Movie soundtracks are created and mixed in dubbing theaters. Movies are presented and played back in cinema and home theaters. The general goal of the reference level is to preserve the directors intent which is to ensure that the volume level that the movie was created (mixed) at is the same as the playback volume.

Calibration
Pink noise and a sound pressure level (SPL) meter with C-weighting are used to calibrate the individual 5.1 or 7.1 speaker levels. This calibration balances all of the speakers levels so that they are equal and that no speaker is louder than any other. The calibration also sets the 0 dB volume setting to equal the THX reference level. Both internal and external pink noise signal sources can be used to calibrate the speaker levels. External calibration signals found on video discs are typically full range pink noise at a 85 dB SPL. A preamp/receiver's internal calibration signal is typically banded pink noise played at a 75 dB SPL which is -10 dB down from the reference level. The quieter -10 dB signal is chosen by manufacturers because it is less harsh for users. It is also important to note that banded pink noise and full range pink noise will produce dB level settings that are slightly different. Which one equates to the true reference level depends on who you ask and how flat the frequency response of your speakers are.

 

[jgirado]

Could you add this info to this thread so members could know better about posible incoming reviews in a public list ?

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...rm-for-a-review-but-still-in-the-queue.11710/

Done!

 

[SynthesisCinema]

Damn they sound salty. Conversation moved to new thread.
https://emotivalounge.proboards.com/thread/56431/emotiva-audio-review-discussion-thread


" This Arim has a high priced state of the art AP testing machine, some management technical background which he has retired from, and is now online publishing unsolicited test results of audio and video equipment. His income is from ad hits on his website. He has nothing to lose. He has no shekels in the game (except for that god awfully expensive AP test instrument).. He has tested many pieces of equipment, mostly DACs. Then he compares DAC results to AV prepro results. Face it, there are thousands of DACs products around but few prepros or AV receivers. He has dissed every prepro he has tested. I have a Marantz AV8805 - he dissed that. The new Monolith HTP-1 - he dissed that. He is dependent on owners loaning their equipment to him for testing (that in itself adds a questionable element). Thanks to Audio Precision, he has an excellent test rig or I doubt anyone would give him the time of day to read one of his reviews.

I would think that he would be open to law suits but he is rather obscure and that protects him (so far). And lets face it, FFT analysis is over the head of 90% of the population. "

 

[MZKM]

Has anyone ever seen .5volts as a "standard" measurement? I have seen other places do 2v, but never .5. Isn't this a an absurdly low value? How can they claim this is a proper "standard". .5 Volts doesn't get to reference volume with their amps does it? Do I recall their amps require 1.5v is required to fully drive their own amps?

They range, lowest I see from Emotiva is 1.2V and highest is 2V (their flagship DR models).

 

[Doodski]

Damn they sound salty. Conversation moved to new thread.
https://emotivalounge.proboards.com/thread/56431/emotiva-audio-review-discussion-thread


" This Arim has a high priced state of the art AP testing machine, some management technical background which he has retired from, and is now online publishing unsolicited test results of audio and video equipment. His income is from ad hits on his website. He has nothing to lose. He has no shekels in the game (except for that god awfully expensive AP test instrument).. He has tested many pieces of equipment, mostly DACs. Then he compares DAC results to AV prepro results. Face it, there are thousands of DACs products around but few prepros or AV receivers. He has dissed every prepro he has tested. I have a Marantz AV8805 - he dissed that. The new Monolith HTP-1 - he dissed that. He is dependent on owners loaning their equipment to him for testing (that in itself adds a questionable element). Thanks to Audio Precision, he has an excellent test rig or I doubt anyone would give him the time of day to read one of his reviews.

I would think that he would be open to law suits but he is rather obscure and that protects him (so far). And lets face it, FFT analysis is over the head of 90% of the population. "

What a load of malarky! Typical slagging and lies from what appears to be the jealous.

 

[ElNino]

Damn they sound salty. Conversation moved to new thread.
https://emotivalounge.proboards.com/thread/56431/emotiva-audio-review-discussion-thread


" This Arim has a high priced state of the art AP testing machine, some management technical background which he has retired from, and is now online publishing unsolicited test results of audio and video equipment. His income is from ad hits on his website. He has nothing to lose. He has no shekels in the game (except for that god awfully expensive AP test instrument).. He has tested many pieces of equipment, mostly DACs. Then he compares DAC results to AV prepro results. Face it, there are thousands of DACs products around but few prepros or AV receivers. He has dissed every prepro he has tested. I have a Marantz AV8805 - he dissed that. The new Monolith HTP-1 - he dissed that. He is dependent on owners loaning their equipment to him for testing (that in itself adds a questionable element). Thanks to Audio Precision, he has an excellent test rig or I doubt anyone would give him the time of day to read one of his reviews.

I would think that he would be open to law suits but he is rather obscure and that protects him (so far). And lets face it, FFT analysis is over the head of 90% of the population. "

That attitude is enough for me to cross Emotiva off the list of companies I'd ever buy from.

 

[SMc]

Hey, that was my first car too! I remember failing the state inspection because the stupid wipers which were vacuum operated would not run. We lived in Florida though so it would start. Until the transmission went bad. And bad again. Worst car in the world....

Who’d have guessed this would be a former Hornet driver site? ‘74 sedan. The three-speed manual transmission was better than the engine which needed major repairs at just over 100k. Electric wipers, fortunately.

 

[amirm]

For this not to devolve into an unproductive war of two persons (Amir vs. Emotiva dude) and two boards, losing themselves in ever finer details and disagreements of proper protocols and ways of presenting graphs (which Emotive would certainly like, as obfuscating and creating uncertainty would allow them to continue business as usual), a third party is needed.

There is really no disagreement. Their measurements for the most part match mine. SINAD, THD+N vs Freq, etc. Those are sufficient to damn this product for poor implementation given the much higher fidelity of the components used in them (DAC and Volume control).

Note that neither EMotiva, nor Audioholics have the same high performance analyzer I have. AP makes a multi-channel analyzer which is what they use. To cram all that in there, they reduced performance of the unit.

Regardless, there is an easy path to resolve this. They send me the unit they tested and I re-run my measurements on that. We don't need a third-party to run any test or get in the middle of this. Objective data can be confirmed easily if one of us has access to both units to test side-by-side.

But again, the critical measurements are the same whether they ran them or I ran them.

 

[SmackDaddies]

I would think that he would be open to law suits

No, telling the truth protects him from lawsuits. As in the truth is a 100% defense against libel suits

 

[timg]

It's too bad that there isn't an option to build a HTPC with MadVR, Atmos, DTS:X, Dirac, etc. and then use 2-3 of those Okto DAC8 Pro's into standard amplifiers (or Dante card into Dante amps). Something like this could have the best possible picture quality, best audio quality, ability to future-proof, etc.

Tim

 

[thxultra]

That attitude is enough for me to cross Emotiva off the list of companies I'd ever buy from.

Just a FYI , This wasn't posted by Emotiva but a user on thier message board..

 

[MZKM]

He's also situated somewhere in the US.

Same city as me. I often see him selling gear on Craigslist. He’s also building a smart AV home in a new development close by (he has videos up detailing the current process).

 

[MZKM]

I really have no interest to defend emotiva, i think this avr is a beta bullshit full of bugs and without dirac (which was promised from the beginning), so drop dead, no worries.

But..
keep in mind that the goal to a multichannel immersive setup is to listen at reference levels both music and movies.
Reference level at an immersive setup means (for home use) something between 78(-80) dB's at listening position from each speaker (~85dB's from 5 speakers and ~88.5 dB's from 11 speakers) , which with typical consumer amps, or even with active speakers, is at about -20 (to -23) dB's on the volume control.

Let's take the Neumann 310 for example to use with this emotiva avr.
I copy the following from 310 specs:

Output level control (output level in 1 m based on 0 dBu input level): 94; 100; 108; 114 dB SPL

So, i think that you may discover that at 2-2.3 m listening distance (typical for home use), and if the monitor is set properly in input sensitivity, it will reach the desired reference level at ...-20 dBFS on emotiva volume control!

Well, they know that.

In fact, it is "common knowledge" that in a typical immersive setup, reference level is usually at about -20 dBFS.

I am using Trinnov audio possessor, and i get reference level at exactly -23 dBFS, with Neumann 310's. Pure luck? Don't think so..

Anyway, emotiva sucks! Amir rulzzzzzz

With room correction, reference levels for movies should be 0dB. Now, I can push my system that loud for the occasional scene, but I’m typically -8dB for lossy movies (cable), -12dB for lossless movies (Blu-ray) and -16dB for lossy tv (cable). I never dip to -20dB or lower unless for music/YouTube.

 

[Dj7675]

They range, lowest I see from Emotiva is 1.2V and highest is 2V (their flagship DR models).

Thanks. And, for a balanced output they test it at a whopping .5V to I guess make the results look better? Thanks for the info.

 

[audioBliss]

There are recommendations for reference levels for different size rooms. For home use that is basically -10dBFS - louder than that and you'd need an amazing over the top room basically. And even then it probably needs to be way bigger than a typical home owner room. I can't be bothered to find the link to that info now but it's something to think about.

I find myself not really going that much louder than -15dBFS to -20dBFS unless I demo stuff for friends or whatever. But that said that does not mean that it's good enough for a $5000 processor. In a cheap AVR for $500 maybe but come on now. What if I have state of the art Purifi/AHB2 amps or whatever which benefit from higher voltage or any other reason. At this price point all bases should be covered. Also what happens when Dirac is active? I would expect/hope no one is using this thing without Dirac(below room transition freq.) and multiple subs.

I get Emotivas point but I think almost everyone would expect more at this price point.

 

[MZKM]

Thanks. And, for a balanced output they test it at a whopping .5V to I guess make the results look better? Thanks for the info.

I want to see their response to a question such as this:

“I am a potential customer looking at your products for my home theater system; I was looking at going fully in with your $5000 processor and multiples of your $1200 monoblocks. However, despite the amazing specs of your amplifiers, I see your own measurements of your processor indicating worse performance. So, should I be looking elsewhere for a processor to yield maximum performance from your amps?”

EDIT: Dang, their DR1 monoblock states just 82dB SINAD, so I guess the abi e message doesn’t work. Their $300 ICE monoblocks are a bit better at 85dB SINAD (and looks to need 1V).