What's the latest word on the Emotiva UMC-1?

The Anthem D2v is an expensive unit that I have heard several times. Have you compared it's sound to the Emotiva unit? Have you compared a highly regarded amp like the Odyssey Stratos or Parasound Halo to the Emotiva using a good pre-amp?

Your comments remind me of a friend who was telling me that Definitive Technology "Buys" all of their good reviews. He had heard their big tower speakers many times and they were steely, bright and two dimensional. So, after letting him listen to my new Merlin speakers I then connected my mid-fi Def Tech towers to the Manley Stingray amp and his draw dropped. Not that they were a match for a high end Merlin speaker, but he certainly learned why the speakers are well reviewed. The same goes for many components including the Emotiva amps.

Again, the Emotiva processor's issues are fixed. I own it and the latest firmware upgrades repaired all problems.

It's no fun to consider that a 7000 dollar product sounds no better or inferior to a 1000 dollar product. But it happens all the time in audio.

BTW, I don't consider ANY processor high end gear regardless of cost. The Onkyo, Marantz and Anthem units are not worth their cost (based on my experience with them) when you hear what a company like Emotiva is doing. True, I'm a recent tube convert, so a lot of SS gear sounds mid-fi to me these days.

As for Lexicon, I always thought their gear was pseudo-high-end and laughed hysterically when a dealer told me about the tests of their BD-30 blu-ray player. Getting what you pay for takes a lot of hard work. When someone, who spent a ton of cash on a component hears about something with the same functionality for a lot less, they prefer to assume that theirs is better. Understandable, but it's often not the case. I have an expensive tube based CD player next to a 300 dollar Oppo player that illustrates that point very nicely.

Cheers,

Rob

Robbob: Your world is a dedicated, acoustically tuned theater....and it's easy to say that you don't believe in or use room equalization. I would love to have that luxury as would most buyers of processors and amplifiers....but that's not our real world. we have real rooms, we have spouses opinions, we have large picture windows, etc. In an untuned environment, I will take a mid-fi Denon over an Emotiva UMC-1 every time...and yes, I had a UMC-1 for many months. I have heard an audyssey tuned room vs EMOQ because I have an Audyssey Sound Equalizer and I could compare the two....there was no comparison in my lousy to average acoustically family room. I now have a denon 4311 on order with Audyssey xt32 which will allow me to equalize multiple subs as well....and I'll sell the sound equalizer since it's no longer needed with Audyssey XT32.

Yes, the UMC-1 sounded quite good when it worked....I sent it back when the return period ended and Emotiva still had a number of outstanding problems that were driving my wife and I nuts. Perhaps they fixed them since then, but I wasn't going to take a risk of wasting my money on a buggy processor. But keep in mind that I was using it with the Audyssey Sound Equalizer...and I doubt that any UMC-1 user is going to buy a sound equalizer and pro install kit for $3000 to make their $699 processor sound good in THEIR real room.

I believe that an Onkyo, Integra, Denon,.... box with Audyssey multEq and certainly one with the more powerful Audyssey Multeq XT will sound much better in the average room than a UMC-1 using or not using Emoq.

Just for completeness, all my tests were done with an NHT Power 5 amp, James sub and NHT speakers all around (2.9's, ac2,L5's)

"It's no fun to consider that a 7000 dollar product sounds no better or inferior to a 1000 dollar product. But it happens all the time in audio."

Could you give us some examples?

Yes Lexicon rebadged ther new Oppo, thats old news but I talked about the MC8 that was made years ago and by most accounts was a superb product in its day....try to stay on topic.
I noted the Emotiva was good for the money..........what more do you want? Dont be so insecure.

GHstudio,

You're correct as I do have a dedicated theater room that has been rebuilt to achieve good sonics. But I've had this debate before and I maintain that I can easily do better tuning a system in ANY room than the various systems out there. So can most of my audiophile friends.
For that reason the automated tuning feature, while nifty, was of no interest to me with ANY of the processors I tried. I evaluated them based on sonics.

If someone lacks the skills to tune a system, then I agree 100% to go with a Denon or Onkyo. But using their auto tune feature utterly failed for me and I could always improve on those settings with ease.

All of that aside, the UMC-1 has a superior pre-amp section and the issues have been resolved. Again, I have a system that represents a big investment in money and time. If the UMC-1 was never debugged and sonically poor I'd toss it on the trash.

Rob