brik
Newbie
Posts: 2
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Post by brik on Jun 10, 2007 19:06:33 GMT -5
OK - not much activity here lately.
Someone please comment - Would an LMC-1 be a decent piece of gear for a simple, reliable, high quality HT set-up? All I read are horror stories. People are living with quirks and frustrations that they should need to deal with.
I suppose it all depends on what my sources and display are.
If there is a perfect combinations of inputs that reliably work then I would love to hear about them. One for me, at the moment would be Dish 721 DVR (s-vid output) that I would want to upconvert to 1080p somewhere. I am in the market for a display and will be upgrading to a Dish HD DVR at some point too. i cant bite all of this off at once. Component DVD for now, HD or Blueray or PS3 later too. Oh, and analog cable? Nah. OTA HD? Hmm, I'm talking all video. Well, it IS a home theater after all.
I want to have a universal remote to control everything. I need to make things SIMPLE for the fam.
Maybe I need to look more at Outlaw but the prices go up much more there.
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Post by lcseminole on Jun 10, 2007 22:03:24 GMT -5
What horror stories??? If you mean the firmware/software issues, they have been fixed with this latest set of updates. I ordered my LMC-1 on May 31, it shipped June 1st, and received it June 5th. I haven't had any of the problems others have had. Lonnie at Emotiva assured me that my unit had been updated with the latest of both firmware & software, and so far I have NO reasons to doubt him since I've been putting it through it's paces all weekend. DPL IIx works as I believe it should and the DOLBY button on the remote cycles through all items endlessly. This unit is quite a step up from my upper end Onkyo receiver in the sound quality department. It has the right amount of digital inputs for me and I'm not at all worried about the new formats Dolby True HD & DD Plus since I plan of using the 7.1 external analog input and allow the HD DVD or Blu-Ray player do the decoding. Besides the 40% off my next Emotiva Pre/Pro will more than pay the $499 I spent on this unit. ;D
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theophile
Enthusiast
Professional Amateur-In All Things!
Posts: 17
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Post by theophile on Jun 11, 2007 7:20:20 GMT -5
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brik
Newbie
Posts: 2
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Post by brik on Jun 11, 2007 8:27:34 GMT -5
Thanks all for the replies so far. Horror stories, yes. Just google LMC-1 & preamp. You will find various board threads.
Sounds like things work as designed now. So, I suppose, the question for me is will the works as designed LMC-1 be a good solution for ME for HT.
My current setup is just a SD tv, decent DVD and dishnetwork SD DVR. I plan a video upgrade to go 1080p at about the same time I upgrade my amplification/processing. This would mean either a dishnetwork DH DVR or a verizon FIOS HD DVR. Also a HD DVD format, maybe PS3 or a dedicated HD-DVD or BlueRay player to compliment the vid display.
Quality is important to me as is price but another critical factor is the ease of use. If there is a lot of button presses, multiple remotes and a convoluted set of button presses to get things set up when switching from source to source then it not going to fly.
I also want to be able to optimize system the various speaker levels for my room. Once set up I do not want to have to change things. I read a thread that said, if I understand correctly, that sub levels need to be adjusted depending on what decode is used. Thats crazy IMO. My set-up will only be 5.1 for the foreseeable future.
So, bottom line, will I be able to use this and keep things simple? From what I have read I can expect good quality and good price. Can I also get easy to use, set it and forget it capabilities?
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Post by mrgreg on Jun 11, 2007 12:25:03 GMT -5
I've been using mine with my logitech harmony remote, and other than the known software issues, which are about to be fixed, it works great.
There aren't a ton of features, but the sound quality is just amazing.
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Post by lcseminole on Jun 11, 2007 15:36:00 GMT -5
mrgreg, The less amount of bells & whistles is what has drawn me towards Emotiva. I believe Dan has gone the build & sound quality route and that is what I've been looking for. I wanted the necessary functions and for it to do these functions well. Luckily my LMC-1 apparently has the updated firmware/software and for timeline purposes it was ordered May 31st & shipped June 1st. As for answering "brik", mrgreg nailed it, using a good remote so totally simplifies everything. My Universal Remote Control brand, URC-300 has made everything simple for my wife, especially since the touch-screen buttons can be edited. Macro functions are definitely the way to go.
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Post by The Administrator on Jun 18, 2007 9:47:08 GMT -5
My main problem with the LMC-1 was that it wasn't simple to use. Yes, it had a simple feature set and that is appealing, and it should be a 'fire-and-forget' sort of thing, but it wasn't. It had problems doing the simple things. Now, the LMC-1 that I owned was before the most recent update, so some of the problems may be fixed. But, from a usability standpoint... - Calibration problems. I'm not new to calibrating home theater systems. In fact, I'm somewaht compulsive about it. I had a heck of a time calibrating the channels on my LMC-1. It just seemed like I'd get them all set up correctly and then flip to a different source and they'd be off again. On my current pre-pro, the speaker levels are generally consistent, within +-4db of eachother. With the LMC-1, some speakers would need to be like -9db, while others +7db, etc. Then under different sources the sound would be all whacky (as expected with such a difference), etc. Also, the lack of a real sub LFE tone ticked me off. I know it's trivial, but it was a pain to bust out a calibration DVD each time...
- No unique memory for input sound settings. It was very irritating to me that the inputs wouldn't remember their settings.
- DD5.1/DD2.0, DTS debacle. It was irritating to flip to a channel and be forced to use a sound mode that I didn't want, and then be stuck in that mode until I paused the DVR or changed sources. #1 usability problem, as I couldn't just change the channel and expect that the sound would be as I wanted, or be stuck in some weird mode (DPL:Music, for instance). It's never been a problem with any other AVR I've ever owned.
- Hiss. I heard just enough background hiss on mine to be annoyed. Always there, regardless of input, etc.
The real issue (for me) is that Emotiva has not released a list of fixes. They say it's fixed (through conversations that folks have had with Emotiva and then posted), and there are several people around various forums that are reporting that some of the problems have been addressed, but no official word of what was actually fixed has ever come up. For a company that promises to be 'customer-oriented', that's bothersome.
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Post by lcseminole on Jun 18, 2007 17:18:36 GMT -5
I'm quite happy with my LMC-1. I'm not happy with the separate memory settings for the different inputs, but for me it's a minor incovenience. I received mine this June 5th and I haven't had the problem with the Dolby button on the remote. As for your problem with the background hiss, the sound floor on my unit is dead quiet. If their is anything on my unit to be updated, I would like the 'dongle' issue to come about, but I'm not overly disturbed with any aspect of my LMC-1, as I'm overly pleased with the sound and build quality!!!
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gonk
Audiophile
Technical Host
Posts: 30
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Post by gonk on Jun 29, 2007 6:35:44 GMT -5
It's been particularly quiet around here lately. Anybody heard anything? As I understand it, the USB dongle is on hold until the PC loader software/driver can get satisfactorily finalized, the firmware itself will likely need one more revision (the Dolby button bug being not entirely fixed in the late May firmware), the bug fix list remains absent, the logic for surround mode memory remains a bit unclear, the procedure for updating existing units needs explanation (what ship date separates units that only need the dongle from units that need to return to Tennessee, what procedure to follow to get a dongle or start the return process), and the documentation could still use an update to explain the way bass management works with the PLII/IIx changes made last year along with whatever surround mode memory explanation is developed.
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