STR-DN1080 Calibration Matching

[outpost33]

After auto cal is performed, the receiver offers an option for calibration matching. The feature is not well described in the manual:

Yes: Expands the sweet spot for the viewing position and allows you to enjoy more natural sound by trimming the wavefront for each pair of left/right speakers.

Can anyone explain in more detail exactly what this function is intended to do? Is it some kind of single-point equivalent of multi-point calibration, where several measurments are taken to create a better result over a wider area?

The feature cannot be switched on or off after calibration is performed, so it's difficult to do a direct a/b comparison. You have to run auto cal again in order to enable/disable it, which is frankly quite an odd interface choice.

[grolschie]

Hi @Win_88 

Thanks for that. If Sony could make the setting available in the System menu rather than having to re-calibrate to access it, it would make it easier to tell whether the setting is beneficial or detrimental on a particular setup.

[Win_88]

@grolschie

BTW, you can always send a ticket to Sony support via the website with any small feedback you have. I recently found out they have people looking through customer reviews and feedback for new ideas.

Win_88

[grolschie]

Thanks @Win_88 

[Daje00]

I figured out what this does. It basically sets the levels the same for the speakers. Example after running my calibration and before it asked to do the calibration matching my rear surround speakers were at -1 and -1.5db. After I selected yes for the calibration matching it put them both to -1.

[outpost33]

I found an interesting post about this on the Steve Hoffman Music Forums:

https://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/auto-calibrate-surround-system-trimming-the-wavefront.1089865...

Are we finally getting somewhere with this?

[expectingtofly1]

I realise this is a really old thread, but I was also trying to work out what this setting does.

I've found that it is much better described in the manual for the Sony STR-ZA5000ES  (which is the beefy AV amp for the custom installer market).  That amp uses the same D.C.A.C. calibration system.     It says :

Calibration Matching

When Auto Calibration is executed, this function works automatically, matching the distance and level of the right and left speakers. You can set this function only after the D.C.A.C. measurement process has been completed and the results of the D.C.A.C. measurement are saved. The setting is valid until you change it.

https://helpguide.sony.net/ha/strza5/v1/en/contents/TP0000963048.html

Which is much clearer than the "trimming the wavefronts" nonsense that that in sin the Sony STR-DN1080 manual

So basically, all it does is merge the calibration results for each matching pair of speakers to be the same (assuming you've got a room and speaker placement where that is appropriate).  That also explains why it can only be set at  calibration time, as it embeds the results into the saved calibration.

So it seems to me unless you have a perfect speaker placement, leave it off.

[HannahEd01]

Hey expectingtofly1, interesting info! Thank you for updating the thread.