Surround sound calibration vs. subwoofer calibration

[RCHeliGuy]

Both my subwoofer and my surround sound system have mic'd calibration routines.

The subwoofer is supposed to be configured to be direct vs. manually setting the crossover since the surround sound system DSP's are supposed to automatically filter the signal sent to the subwoofer.

The instructions say to set the sub to half volume for the calibration to be figured into the total system.

Should I assume that it is a waste of time to independently calibrate the subwoofer before the whole system calibrates especially when the surround sound processor is 5 years newer than the subwoofer?

Or is there still some benefit to calibrating the sub before the whole system?

Thoughts?

 

[Hocky]

There is still benefit - do the sub first and the AVR second.

 

[JonFo]

^^^ What he said.

You want to let the build-in sub RC do a bunch of the work, as depending on the type of DRC in your Receiver, it might free up more capacity (taps) to deal with other frequencies than jut the ultra-low bass. It's usually a win.

 

[RCHeliGuy]

Got "everything" calibrated. Sounds much better with the matching satellites! Just watched Avatar and the satellites drew my attention more with the background soundtrack. Of course I was listening for them too, but they are much better matched and much more dynamic. They used to sound anemic compared to the center channel. Not any more!