2. home-theater
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Your thoughts on preamp/processors

Ok, what are your thoughts on this?

I have a EAD Ovation. I love it, it sounds awesome, looks great, but is a huge pain. If you are not familiar with EAD, their products do not have any buttons on the front.

So here is the issue, the batteries in the remote died while I was away on a business trip and when my wife put new batteries in, it dropped all the codes. Now it does nothing, not even volume up or down. I contact noble and they offer a remote for $275. While I debated on this, I bought a harmony universal figuring I can use it in another room if it didn't work. I was surprised, but they had EAD Codes in their online database.

So, now the unit works with the universal remote. However now my wife is even more confused by the system and it seems everytime I am away on business, she cannot operate this component. I have a 3 year old and he has no patience, this only frustrates the whole situation as she is trying to figure it out, he is bugging her in the background.

Do I just ditch the thing and get a new unit with a volume knob and traditonal buttons on the front?

Is there anyhing that can compare to the sound quality?

Is it smart to buy a unit that does not have HDMI?

I do have a seperate 2 channel music room, but even with that, I find I listen to quite a bit of music in this room as well as DVD Concerts.

I have FOCAL SPEAKERS, HD DVD Player and Pioneer Plasma in the room where the Preamp processor will go...

Sorry that was so long...help me out here.
musiqlovr
musiqlovr OP
54 posts
 
Well, I guess I should have added, that I also purchased a HD DVD Player and my Pioneer TV is auto sensing input. Problem is the TV will not pick up the HDMI source right away. The player is killer, but it takes awhile to load and thus does not output signal right away...so there is another source of frustration. I think I am going to call Harmony and see if they can help, maybe there is a way to delay switching the tv input?

Thanks for the help so far. Anyone have any luck with a different preamp processor that sounded as good?
cytocycle
1,043 posts
 
If you are just having video switching problems you can buy an Oppo HDMI switcher which has a remote and you can program the harmony to control that. 3 HDMI sources into 1.

When you get down to this level of programming of delays, the Harmony products are really hard to get right.. This is where the extra "Work" required on the Pronto's give you the flexibility to achieve all these setting. I use a Pronto 7000 with an RF receiver (supports 4 IR devices) so the remote doesn't have to be pointed at the electronics. I will get another RF receiver later so I can control all my devices without having to point it at everything. I have a Harmony remote also which was fast and easy to get up and running but couldn't handle my Video scaler and projector correctly with all the custom settings (delays and additional macros).

Don't forget to checkout AVSforum . com for programming remote tricks and remotecentral . com
glenfihi
525 posts
 
Just a thought on making the wife and kids happy. For the sake of the others in the household. Hook gear such as dvd player both to the TV and into your processors. Easy for the family to just use dvd hooked directly into AV input on TV. They won't have the full surround audio, but ease of use goes along way. When you are there and can operate gear, all can enjoy the full effect.
chouca
10 posts
 
I too love the sound of my EAD Ovation+ and am saddened by its abysmal ergonomics. My wife can't operate our home theater but luckily she doesn't want to.

I also hate the burst of digital noise the EAD often makes when I load or eject a DVD. I have to mute the EAD every time to avoid it! It's embarrassing for such expensive gear to misbehave like that, but I do love the sound.

Any suggestions on an as good or better sounding pre/pro with good ergonomics would be appreciated! HDMI support of high-def audio formats would be great too.
cytocycle
1,043 posts
 
Chouca: if you are having noise problems switching inputs and syncing with your DVD it's because of the amount of jitter your DVD player has.... You need to reduce the "Digital Flywheel" down to 3 which is the least sensitive to having a high end transport, otherwise it might be your digital cable.. This won't eliminate it but it will help it considerably and it will sound better. The default setting is '1' which is not very compatible with most dvd players.

The "Digital Flywheel" is a built in anti-jitter processor that EAD released a manual supplement describing how to change it.. I don't have mine anymore but you should look it up or contact Boolean electronics.
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