Emotiva LMC-1 Review

Introduction

I’ve been living with my good old Sony STRDB940 AVR since my first foray into surround sound when I was living in Ireland in 2001. I purchased this particular AVR based on the reviews in What HiFi, which gave it a 5 star rating. It has performed very well over the years with no problems whatsoever. The only gripe that I have with it, as most people do with AVRs, is that it’s stereo performance leave something to be desired. Especially when you move from a dedicated stereo environment.

Moving along to 2007 and my Sony AVR has performed well, but is starting to look rather dated when compared to modern AVRs. For example, my Sony doesn’t have the latest Dolby or DTS modes, is not 7.1 capable, and has no component or HDMI support.

My components around my AVR have been upgraded too. I now have power amps for 5 channels and can use an old integrated to give me 7.1 capability. I have upgraded from the Starhub Digital set top box to the HD box which has component and HDMI outputs. The major upgrade was moving from my trusty old BenQ 6100 projector (800×600 4:3 DLP), to the Mitsubishi HC5000 projector (1080p LCD). The Mitsubishi has component and HDMI inputs too.

Looking further ahead I will have to decide whether to get dedicated HD-DVD and Blu-Ray players or put some appropriate drives in my HTPC. Either way, there are going to be more HDMI or component outputs coming soon. Combined with the improved video available 6 years later comes the new sound formats that the HD platforms can provide. Unfortunately getting the HDMI signals over long runs between different devices and working out the best way to get the HD sound formats (digital/analogue, bit rates, etc.) seems to be anything but clear at this point in time.

I was in a dilemma! I needed something to provide me with the modern video switching capabilities with the support for 1080p and the new HD sound formats. At the same time I didn’t need amplifiers, the audio/video processing would suffice.

I was reading some of the positive reviews and comments about the Yamaha 2700 and thought that might be the right solution. However, I really didn’t want to “waste” money on the amplifiers. I looked at the Emotiva processors and discounted them as out of date, with some having HDMI as an after thought, such as the Emotiva LMC-1. The LMC-1 also has two channels of amplification built in for a second zone. This is something that I was trying to get away from when considering separates! It is generally cited that one of the benefits of separates is keeping the delicate sound/video processing circuits away from the amplification.

You are probably scratching your head right now and thinking, hang-on, isn’t this web page about the LMC-1. What’s this guy on? 😉

What made me order the LMC-1 was the special offer of a 40% discount of Emotiva’s 2008 line of products that will include all the latest and greatest (for the moment) sound and video processing features. Looking at the lovely balanced outputs on Emotiva’s higher end gear I decided that an up to date version of that would be ideal. The LMC-1 would give me what I needed right now and I could upgrade to Emotiva’s next generation products when they become available. It is also cheaper than buying an AVR with all the same features, plus the unnecessary (for me) amplification.

Ordering the LMC-1

I opened Emotiva’s web site in Firefox, credit card in hand, and went through the order process. That was quite painless and I waited in anticipation. Then the bad news came that there was no cost effective way for Emotiva to ship to Singapore. They said that their quoted shipping cost with FedEx was US$358.00! I called up Emotiva to discuss the options, and the outcome was Vpost.

Vpost is a service from Singapore Post that allows you to have a USA address (or Japan) so that you can order goods from businesses that do not ship overseas. I had never used Vpost before, so I was a bit worried about how involved setting up an account was and all the steps required. I need not have worried as it was all reasonably painless, although I still think they could improve their web site a bit.

When I went back to Emotiva’s web site to order with my new Vpost address all sorts of strange errors started happening. I think they were trying to use my shipping address to validate my credit card details, which of course failed. I received a call from my bank as they were concerned about strange credit card charges for the same amounts appearing on my card. I was persistent and had tried to order a few times ;).

In the end I emailed Emotiva and organised a manual order. Unfortunately they are only a small company and some of the key people were on holiday, so the order took a week to process. The order was confirmed upon their return on March 28, 2007 and the box arrived in Singapore on April 11, 2007.

Costs

The table below outlines the costs of getting the LMC-1 to Singapore.

Expense Description	Cost
Emotive LMC-1	SG$772.23 (US$499 including shipping in USA)
VPOST Shipping Charge	SG$111.88
VPOST Insurance	SG$39.00
Singaporean GST	SG$39.09 (calculated on SG$763.47 with CIF of SG$781.76)
Total	SG$962.20

CIF is cost, insurance and freight, as kindly pointed out to me by my friend Peter. 🙂

Photos

Here are some photos that I took while I was unpacking my new toy.

Emotiva LMC-1 Main Box

Emotiva LMC-1 Second Box

Emotiva LMC-1 Front

Emotiva LMC-1 Rear

Emotiva LMC-1 HDMI Switch Front

Emotiva LMC-1 HDMI Switch Rear

Emotiva LMC-1 with HDMI Switch

Emotiva LMC-1 Accessories

Stereo Performance

I have my music on my HTPC and play it through iTunes, as I have an iPod. I did some quick listening tests comparing my old Sony AVR, Benchmark DAC-1 and my new Emotiva LMC-1.

With one person, i.e. me, going back and forth, flicking switches and changing cables, the listening tests are not exactly reliable. Also, the Benchmark DAC-1 has an unfair advantage, in my opinion, using balanced connections instead of RCAs. That said, here is my opinion.

The Emotiva LMC-1 does quite a good job with stereo music. It is certainly better than my old Sony AVR, with more detail, a wider sound stage, and most importantly more realistic reproduction of instruments and voices. The Benchmark DAC-1 is another level up from the Emotiva, as I would hope, having spent all that money on it. ;). However the Emotiva is closer to the Benchmark DAC-1 than to the Sony. It would be interesting to compare Emotiva’s higher end models with the Benchmark DAC-1.

On a very subjective, but somewhat tried and true testing method, I found my foot tapping away to a number of tracks while listening to the Emotiva. Even on MTV the Emotiva made a noticeable improvement to the music compared with my old Sony. That is saying quite a lot as the quality of the music signal from MTV is quite poor when compared to the Australia Channel’s RAGE program.

Someone sent me a message on a local forum here in Singapore asking how the Emotiva compared to a Rotel processor. I would love to know the answer to this question myself, but unfortunately I don’t have a Rotel lying around. I’ll see if I can find someone who wants to bring theirs over to my place or I’ll take the Emotiva to their’s.

Mitsubishi HC5000 Screenshots

Moving into my New House

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I’ll save the story for the bottom of the page, so you can see the photos first!

You’ll have to excuse the mess in the shots, but they were taken while unpacking all the stuff I bought and was only the second day I was there!

This is the view of the Kitchen from standing near the entrance from the hall.

Kitchen Left Side

This is the view of the Kitchen from standing near the entrance from the hall and looking out towards the courtyard (if the curtains were open 🙂 )

Kitchen Right Side

This is the lounge with real leather sofas! Haven’t even taken the tags off yet! This is looking from the window at the front of the house. You can see through the doors the light coming from the kitchen.

Lounge from Window

This is the view from the entrance of the lounge looking towards the front of the house. Gas fire place.

Lounge to Window

This is my room on the top floor. The ensuite is to the left and a very small balcony to the right.

My Bedroom

After being told that the house would be ready to move in no later than March 8, I was told it could be March 5. On March 5 I was told it would be March 9!

The lady fro the relocation agency, Ingrid, wanted to go over the lease with myself, Chris (Dutch flat mate at work apartment) and his flat mates. She came out to work and started to go through the document which was essentially a word document with no formal look or feel about it. A bit different to the standard government contracts for rental agreements in Queensland, which meant we had to go over every point. We started to note errors such as landlord’s names being different throughout the contract, dates incorrect, names of tenants spelt incorrectly, a cleaner clause was not what we had agreed to etc.

When we arrived at the house to sign the contracts we were told that the houses mentioned on the contracts were not available, as they were still not finished. The lady then wanted us to sign the contracts without any amendments. I complained about signing the lease on the grounds that it was a legal document and had too many errors to sign in it’s current form. I asked that we make the changes to the contract or add another page with the changes to be made and all initial it. The lady representing the landlord said she didn’t have the authority to do that.

After checking that I could still stay on in my current apartment I refused to sign the lease until a correct copy was ready on Monday. Chris had been listening to all this and did not want to sign either. Unfortunately Chris’ flat mates were in a tough situation as they had other people moving into their old rooms. After a couple of calls it was decided that all we had to do was make the changes to the contract and initial it. 🙂

After that we got our keys and started the move. Ingrid moved both Chris’ and my belongings from our work apartment to Chapel Gate, which was a great help. I had to go and buy some bedding, which you can see in the photo above, otherwise I would have been sleeping on an empty mattress!

I had to wash the sheets, pillow cases etc. before sleeping on them, so I had to read the washing machine manual. Front loaders may be better for your clothes and the environment, but they take for bloody ever and you can’t put much in them. I had to do an empty cycle first as it was brand new. I turned it on and waited for 10 mins while it was making a whirring sound. It was not going through the cycle, so I figured something was wrong :-). I had a look under the sink (the washing machine is in the kitchen!) and saw some pipes and what looked like taps. Flicked the taps on and then there was life in the washing machine. The poor pumps had been running dry for 10 mins. I hope I didn’t do any damage!

Waiting for a washing machine to complete it’s cycle is not very exciting when you don’t have a television or a stereo. It finally finished at around 10 pm. I then put the first load in and headed off to work to see how long it would take to walk there and do some chatting and read email. It takes about 25 mins to walk to work, which is about the same time as from my previous place. I can get to the top of O’Connell St. in the city in 20 mins walk and there are heaps of buses going past on the Drumcondra Rd. too. A taxi fare home costs around £4-6 depending on the traffic.

The next day I put another load of washing on (I’m getting good at it by this stage 🙂 ) and headed out to get some basics, like pots, pans, utensils, cutlery etc.. I had some help from Amanda (Irish lady I met from ICQ), who was my slave for the day, carrying the home starter kit I purchased while I carried the dinner set.

When we got back to the house it was like Christmas had come again. With packaging, bags and new toys to play with strewn across the kitchen. After Amanda had left I decided I’d better work out the rest of the appliances. I put all the new kitchen stuff into the dishwasher and tested that out. It will take a while for one person to fill that up again! On to the gas cooker, that didn’t take long :-). Then I had to clean out the oven and do a ‘burn in.’ Read about the freezer too, but haven’t got around to the fridge yet!

Sunday was not quite as exciting with the purchase of an iron and ironing board.

There a lot of photos here, so please be patient!

This is the view from my balcony. The house I’m in looks exactly like the three in the centre of the photo.

Sorry about the sun!