# Emotiva UMC-200 and REW



## mircolino

Hi All,

I just got a brand new Emotiva UMC-200 preamp which comes with an 11 bands parametric equalizer (gain/Q) on each of the 7.1 channels. I personally find the included EMO-Q calibration software rather useless, so I decided to give REW a try!

Using REW, my goal is to set (for each of my 5.1 channels) the best possible crossover, trim, EQ gain and Q values in the UMC-200 preamp. Anybody that has already done that? :whistling:

Before I get started with REW I need to buy a calibrated mic/SPL meter. I have an external USB sound card (Native Instruments Komplete Audio 6) with XLR mic input and 48V phantom power, so I have no preference between USB or regular mic.

Cross Spectrum Labs sell the following models:


 Dayton EMM-6
 Dayton UMM-6
 MiniDSP UMIK-1

Which one would you recommend?
Also, do I need a SPL meter as well or anyone of the above mics will do?

Thank you in advance for your help,

---Mirco.

Source: HTPC with ATI Raden HD 6450 HDMI
Preamp: Emotiva UMC-200
Amp: Rotel RMB-1565
Front: B&W 804
Sub: Velodyne Optimum-10
Center: KEF iQ6C
Surr: KEF iQ8DS


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## norcalsteve

Hi,

I am of like mind and can share the following in my first post to this forum as a REW newbie.

I am also new to REW and after trying it out with the UMC-200 Mic for a week or so (bad idea and you will get bad results that are useless but can be used to practice using REW while you wait for your UMIK!), I bought a new UMC-200 / XPA-3 and SVS SB-1000 Subs and wanted to get the system dialed in properly.

So after a lot of experimentation and learning am now getting semi proficient at using the Manual EQ capabilities of the UMC-2000 with a UMIK 1 that I received it about a week ago. The UMIK ships from Hong Kong and I got it for $75 plus $20 shipping and arrived in just under a week via airmail but there was a weekend so might be faster if you order on a Monday or Tuesday. I highly recoomend the UMIK and you download a calibration file from their website and is totally plug and play with REW once you load the text calibration file. I am using a 10 year old laptop with the USB port for the Mic and is working great.

For test signals I don't use the sweep tones (yet) since due to soundcard limitations (i.e. don't have a good one) but instead I burned Full Range 10 to 20KHz Pink Noise wave files to CD set to 65K FFT length (you can save wave files of this type from REW) and then set the RTA to the same FFT length and seems to be working quite well when I play the test signals CD on my OPPO BDP-103. I even made a separate Left and Right Pink Noise signals by taking the L/R wave file that REW outputs and removing one of each channel using Wave Lab then saving as Left Pink Noise and Right Pink Noise separately. Each of these signals output from REW is 1 minute long and after you set your system to 75 dB you can take all sorts of measurements by turning subs on or off / amps on or off / disconnecting speakers or whatever you need to do to get individual measurements. 

With regard to measuring the Center and Surround channels I haven't gotten to that yet using Manual EQ and just use the EmoQ setting for movies and TV (which is really good and blows Flat setting away) and then use Manual EQ while listening to music since I like my results better after a lot of experiements.

In order to measure the Center and Surround channels my next plan is to use the UMC-200 "All Stereo" mode and the above mentioned CD test signals then selectively disconnect the Left and Right speakers to measure the Center chanel and turn off the XPA-3 to measure the Left and Right Surround and Back speakers that are driven by a UPA-500. 

That is the plan anyway and hope some of this info helps since have learned a lot in the last two weeks how to work with REW and the UMC-200 and am sure am not doing everything "optimumly" with my methods but will be learning more particularly after I spend some more time reading this forum.

So that is my long winded first post and have attached a plot showing Full Range / Front / Dual Subs Only with my custom Manual EQ setting for the UMC-200.

Steve


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## norcalsteve

Hi,

So you can see how well REW does using it's Generic Equalizer (set to 11 Bands) tools to determine a proposed Manual EQ setting for the UMC-200, here is a plot comparing the EmoQ auto setting results to my Manual EQ result and also Flat EQ setting which shows the low end ridiculously high becuase I am running my Dual SB-1000 subs at fairly high gain after a lot of experimentation found that works the best so far anyway.

Steve


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## AudiocRaver

Looks like you are off to a great start. That amount of improvement must sound like night and day. Keep us updated.


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## Shinx

Hi,

I made my setup with UMC200 and REW too.

For me perfect combination. Except the problem that the UMC200 cannot use the PEQ on the back surrounds. According to the Emotova Forum, it is related to limit of memory and processor. So it will not be fixed with an update.

What i miss in REW is a inviduall programming of the filter options. I use the option DCX2496, but this fits not peferctly to the options the UMC 200 has. 11 bands, DCX only 9.

Consider:
If you use the manual PEQ you need the make the level adjustment with an externel source (REW or others), because the UMC internal test tone bypasses the PEQ. Unfortunately the levels are not stored together with the different PEQ settings (manual1, manual2 etc).

Shinx


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## norcalsteve

Make your own Generic EQ with 11 bands in REW instead of the one you are using. Just uncheck all of the extra bands and then use 11 or 3 (for LFE) only. I am having great success with this method.

With regard to UMC-200 levels, you are correct that you need to use something like DVE HD Basics or Video Esssentials DVD or Blu Ray to set your 5.1 or 7.1 individual speaker levels then manually adjust the Tone Levels in the UMC-200. Your settings that EMO-Q determined ARE NOT CORRECT at least from my experience. This was a head scratcher to me as well since you are correct that the Tone Levels are always FLAT no matter what EQ mode you are in: EmoQ, ManQ1, etc....


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## micheledip

just starting to use my UMC-200 with REW/UMIK 

any tips because this is all new to me.

looking good so far thanks to steve help


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## micheledip

any tips with doing the auto eq with umc


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## Shinx

> just starting to use my UMC-200 with REW/UMIK





> any tips with doing the auto eq with umc


Maybe you can explain what your target is.

I my opinion, the automatic EQ (Emotiva calls it EMO-Q Gen2 on the UMC200) is not really working. I just tried it to find out if at least the EMO-Q is working for the back surround. But it doesn´t. But what I saw regarding speakersetup and EQ was not ok. Very strange speaker settings/crossovers. And it only offers automatic measuring for one position. This might be suitable für speaker setup (distance, levels etc), but is not enough for EQ. Modal issues cannot be adressed correctly when measuring only in one position.

I understand that you are using the UMIK. So with REW you have perfect tools to PEQ the EMO with the Manual EQ. Doing this you can choose the manual filter setting (which is the better way, because you can use less and more sensfull filters) or the automatic REW filter calculation (which is the easiest and fastest way)
In any case you should measure 4 to 5 positions around your sweet spot, average the responses in REW and based on this average curve you calculate the filters.

Shinx


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## micheledip

Can u pm or you Skype just because in Australia


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## micheledip

just not sure on the filtering on it i have being told to do a custom one with 11 like the umc


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## Shinx

Hi,

I have no skype and PM is not possible (maybe because to few posts)

Shinx


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## micheledip

ok


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## micheledip

just getting into it because coming from a marantz, i thought i would try the umc-200 for the price mated up to a xpr-5, speakers are MK s150 package


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## mircolino

Hi All,

I just received my calibrated Dayton EMM-6 mic from CSL so now I just need to calibrate the sound card.

I connected my Native Instruments Komplete Audio 6 USB sound card to the Emotiva UMC-200 preamp with a coax cable (from S/PDIF output 5/6 on the sound card to the Coaxial 1 input on the preamp).
I then closed the loop by running a RCA mono cable from the preamp Left-Front output to the sound card input 1 (48V off).

On the preamp menu I set the front speaker size to "big" to disable the crossover frequency, and the input mode to "direct" to disable any processing.

On REW I selected the following options:

Drivers: ASIO (buffer size: 512 samples)
Sample Rate: 48 kHz
ASIO Device: Komplete Audio 6
Output: 5: S/PDIF Output L
Input: 1: Input 1 L

By using a combination of input gain on the sound card and volume level on the preamp I matched both Out and In to -12dB FS in REW and run the calibration (the image attached is the result).

Somehow I was expecting a flatter response :huh:. Am I doing things right? Am i right to include the Emotiva UMC-200 in the calibration loop, or should I just calibrate the sound card?

Thanks,

---Mirco.


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## EarlK

Micro said:


> <<<<<<SNIP>>>>>
> 
> Somehow I was expecting a flatter response . Am I doing things right? Am i right to include the Emotiva UMC-200 in the calibration loop, or should I just calibrate the sound card?
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> ---Mirco.


I would say you are doing things right / though I like to include the mic pre-amp within the SC calibration loop-back ( since mic pre-amps are generally less linear than line ins or outs ) .










That system response is quite respectable // keep in mind the little LF wiggle is only a mere fraction of a db . 

:sn:


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## mircolino

Thank you so much for the confidence boost  Now I'm finally ready to start equalizing!

BTW, input 1 on the "Native Instrument Komplete Audio 6" sound card is the mic preamp input. So the graph above includes the mic preamp already. I'll experiment with other inputs to see if I get a better response, but you are right, ultimately that's the input the calibration mic is going to use.


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## mircolino

Now that I got the sound card calibrated with REW, I'm trying to calibrate the SPL in REW following John Reekie's procedure.

My "sound card" is basically a combo Native Instruments Komplete Audio 6 USB audio I/F connected to a Emotiva UMC-200 preamp via SPDIF coax cable. While the mic input on the audio I/F is balanced the line out on the preamp are not.

I was wondering if the same procedure would work with a balanced input and an unbalanced output?

I could perform the calibration procedure with all unbalanced cables but then, will my Dyton EMM-6 have a different sensitivity when connected to the audio I/F with a balanced XLR cable?

Thanks,

---Mirco.


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## jtalden

mircolino said:


> While the mic input on the audio I/F is balanced the line out on the preamp are not.


The link to the Komplete Audio 6 in your post lists 4 balanced audio outputs. You can use one of those.


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## mircolino

jtalden said:


> The link to the Komplete Audio 6 in your post lists 4 balanced audio outputs. You can use one of those.


the DAC / preamp stage is handled by the Emotiva UMC-200 which doesn't have balanced outputs.


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## jtalden

There is no need to go through the UNC-200 - it serves no purpose for a mic cal.

We only need to create a 1000 Hz sine wave of the appropriate voltage. The Komplete is the correct tool for that.

The concept is to use the Komplete to output a known signal level and use that signal to adjust the input level of the Komplete.


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