Harman-Kardon AVR 1650 - Manual (Page 20)

AVR 1650/AVR 165
20
Operating Your AVR, continued,
and Advanced Functions
Selecting a Surround Mode
Selecting a surround mode can be as simple or sophisticated as your individual system
and tastes. Feel free to experiment, and you may find a few favorites for certain sources
or program types. You can find more detailed information on surround modes in Audio
Processing and Surround Sound, on this page.
To select a surround mode, press the OSD Button on the remote to display the Master
menu:
** MASTER MENU **
INPUT SETUP
SURROUND MODE
EzSet/EQ
MANUAL SETUP
SYSTEM SETUP
Use the Up/Down and OK buttons to select Surround Mode. The Surround Mode menu
will appear:
* MODE : MUSIC *
DOLBY PLII MUSIC
CENTER WIDTH : 3
DIMENSION
: 0
PANORAMA : Off
BACK TO MASTER MENU
Use the Up/Down and OK buttons to select the desired surround-mode category.
Auto Select: For a digital program, such as a movie recorded with a Dolby Digital or DTS
soundtrack, the AVR will automatically use the soundtrack’s native surround format. For
2-channel analog and PCM programs, the AVR uses the Logic 7 Movie, Logic 7 Music or
Logic 7 Game mode, depending on the source.
Virtual Surround: When only two main speakers are present in the system, you can
use HARMAN virtual surround to create an enhanced sound field that virtualizes the
missing speakers.
Stereo: When you want 2-channel playback, select the number of speakers you want
to use for playback:
• “2 CH Stereo” uses two speakers.
• “5 CH Stereo” plays the left-channel signal through the front left and surround left
speakers, the right-channel signal through the front right and surround right speakers,
and a summed mono signal through the center speaker.
Movie: Select from the following when you want a surround mode for movie playback:
Logic 7 Movie or Dolby Pro Logic II Movie.
Music: Select from the following when you want a surround mode for music playback:
Logic 7 Music or Dolby Pro Logic II Music. The Dolby Pro Logic II Music mode provides
some additional settings. See Audio Processing and Surround Sound, on page 20, for
more information.
Video Game: Select from the following when you want a surround mode for game
playback: Logic 7 Game or Dolby Pro Logic II Game.
After you select the surround-mode category, the Mode menu will appear:
* MODE : MUSIC *
DOLBY PLII MUSIC
CENTER WIDTH : 3
DIMENSION
: 0
PANORAMA : Off
BACK TO MASTER MENU
Use the Left/Right buttons to change the surround mode.
You can also select surround modes using the AVR’s front-panel buttons:
1. Press the Surr Mode button. The Message display will show the surround-mode
category and surround mode.
2. To change the surround mode within the surround-mode category, press the Surround
Select Up/Down buttons. Each press will change to the next surround mode.
3. To change the surround-mode category, press the Surr Mode button. Each press will
change to the next surround-mode category.
Advanced Functions
Much of the adjusting and configuration your AVR requires is handled automatically, with
little intervention required on your part. You can also customize your AVR to suit your
system and your tastes. In this section, we will describe some of the more advanced
adjustments available to you.
Audio Processing and Surround Sound
Audio signals can be encoded in a variety of formats that can affect not only the quality
of the sound but also the number of speaker channels and the surround mode. You may
also manually select a different surround mode, when available.
Analog Audio Signals
Analog audio signals usually consist of two channels – left and right. Your AVR offers two
options for analog playback:
DSP Surround Off Mode: The DSP Surround Off mode digitizes the incoming signal and
applies the bass-management settings, including speaker configuration, delay times
and output levels. Select this mode when your front speakers are small, limited-range
satellites and you are using a subwoofer. To select this mode, use a digital audio input or
turn the Tone Control setting off, then select 2 CH Stereo mode.
Analog Surround Modes: Your AVR is able to process 2-channel audio signals to
produce multichannel surround sound, even when no surround sound has been encoded
in the recording. Among the available modes are the Dolby Pro Logic II, HARMAN virtual
speaker, Logic 7 and 5 CH Stereo modes. To select one of these modes, see Selecting a
Surround Mode, on page 20.
Digital Audio Signals
Digital audio signals offer greater flexibility and capacity than analog signals and allow
the encoding of discrete channel information directly into the signal. The result is
improved sound quality and startling directionality, since each channel’s information is
transmitted discretely. High-resolution recordings sound extraordinarily distortion-free,
especially in the high frequencies.
Surround Modes
Surround-mode selection depends upon the format of the incoming audio signal as well
as your personal taste. Although there is never a time when all of the AVR’s surround
modes are available, there is usually a wide variety of modes available for a given
input. Table A9 in the Appendix, on page 31, offers a brief description of each mode and
indicates the types of incoming signals or digital bitstreams the mode may be used with.
Additional information about the Dolby and DTS modes is available on the companies’
Web sites: www.dolby.com and www.dtsonline.com.
When in doubt, check the jacket of your disc for more information on which surround
modes are available. Usually, nonessential sections of the disc, such as trailers, extra
materials or the disc menu, are available only in Dolby Digital 2.0 (2-channel) or PCM
2-channel mode. If the main title is playing and the display shows one of these surround
modes, look for an audio or language setup section in the disc’s menu. Also, make sure
your disc player’s audio output is set to the original bitstream rather than 2-channel
PCM. Stop play and check the player’s output setting.
The channels included in a typical 5.1-channel recording are front left, front right, center,
surround left, surround right and LFE (low-frequency effects). The LFE channel is denoted
as “.1” to represent the fact that it is limited to the low frequencies.
Digital formats include Dolby Digital 2.0 (two channels only), Dolby Digital 5.1, Dolby
Digital EX (6.1), Dolby Digital Plus (7.1), Dolby TrueHD (7.1), DTS-HD High-Resolution