speaker efficiencey?? Starting point...? 92db??

A speaker's efficiency rating is customarily the average midrange sound pressure level produced by a 1 watt input measured at 1 meter on the tweeter axis under anechoic conditions.

I say "customarily" because what's actually being measured and claimed varies somewhat from one manufacturer to another, but I figure you weren't looking for a long drawn-out answer. That 92 dB efficiency is considerably higher than average, assuming the numbers aren't somehow inflated.

The 92 dB efficiency rating of your speakers has no bearing in the setting of your channel levels - just follow the Yamaha manual as you have done.

Duke

Matrix wrote:

"But the 92 db absolutly has something to do with your channel levels, cause if they were 89 db vs. 92 db that means they would take 100 watts more of power to reach the same white noise level at 75 db that your 92db speakers do not take, so 89 db would have probably made you boost up the channels 2-3 db on your channel leveler during the test vs. not upping it at all on a few channels."

Matrix, I think you're making this more complicated than it has to be; I read that sentence several times and I'm still not sure exactly what it's saying. You are correct that an 89 dB speaker would require twice the power of a 92 dB speaker to reach a given sound pressure level, but at 75 dB measured at the listening position we'd be talking about tenths of a watt difference, not 100 watts difference.

All Dzigon has to do is set the levels according to the instructions. He doesn't have to take the speakers' efficiency into account - setting the levels according to the processor's instructions automatically does that and more.

Duke

Dziogn,

Sorry didn't realize I was making things more confusing. "Anechoic" means "without echo", and in this context refers to measuring only the direct sound coming straight from the speaker to the microphone, without any reflected sound reaching the microphone and being included in the measurement. Don't worry - it's not on the final exam, but that is the condition normally used when a loudspeaker's efficiency is measured.

I have no familiarity with the Yamaha YPAO system, so can't comment on it.

Can you turn your system up so that it no longer sounds "meek", but sounds right to you? If so, then you're in good shape. If not, is it because you're running out of volume control adjustment range, or is it because the sound starts to distort?

As far as soundstaging goes, so long as you have your speakers at the correct loudness relative to one another your soundstaging should be fine.

I suspect that the slight imbalance in perceived loudness that causes you to set the levels differently for your front 3 channels is related to room acoustics. The ears don't perceive loudness exactly the same way that an SPL meter measures SPL (let me know if you want more details on this phenomenon). Since ultimately it's your ears that you listen through, I'd say give them the final say as you fine-tune the relative channel levels. You're doing great if you can tell that one channel is .5 dB too loud or too soft!

Duke