AV Reciever sound modes, which ones do you actually use?

[hyperseven]

AVR's seem to come with an increasing amount of these.

Which ones are you daily drivers for say music, gaming, TV and movies?

On my 7.1 setup, Onkyo AVR, I just tend to use the same ones:
Music - Stereo (with sub)
Gaming - Direct
Movies - Direct
TV - Dolby neo

 

[hyperseven]

Movies - direct?

You realize that means you're only using the fronts and the sub?

I use:

Movies - movie mode
Music - pure direct (no sub, no processing)
TV - Stereo

Its an Onkyo, only had this model a couple of weeks but thought Direct used the same as the source, so if Stereo then Stereo, TrueHD-TrueHD etc, or is it me reading things wrong again

 

[hyperseven]

direct means all the fancy stuff is switched off. no bass management, no speaker distance correction, no speaker volume level correction, no audyssey or the equivalent if you're running it etc etc. the source is what you hear through the speakers. absolutely the last thing i'd want to run on an AVR.

for me, i dont use any surround modes and the only processing i do use is audyssey. dolby and dts stay as dolby and dts. stereo is stereo. DSD is DSD and so on.

doesn't say any of that in the manual, so you have an Onkyo amp?

 

[hyperseven]

I've had an 805 since 2007, yes. what model do you have?

SR444, needed HDCP2.2 so had to get rid of my old HK one

In the book:

Direct
In this mode, audio from the input source is output as-is.

For example, if a 2 ch source from a music CD is input, the output will be stereo, or if Dolby Digital signal is input, the sound field will be controlled in accordance with the number of channels present.

 

[hyperseven]

indeed, you hear the source and you cannot apply any surround processing, but it goes further than that. Look at page 14 onwards at the audio features which cannot be enabled if the listening mode is direct:

*AUDIO:
- Bass, Treble
- Phase matching Bass

*A/V Sync

*AccuEQ room calibration

*Music Optimiser
*Cinema Filter

etc.

Direct turns it all off

cheers, suppose I better have another read through