Timing

Every delay is measured against one source: the reference. AudioMap starts from the full-range unit whose sound arrives latest, counting the delay its own filters add. Every other source is delayed to arrive with it, so the reference itself carries no delay.

Its row is marked Reference and says why: latest arrival, 2.4 ms filter (for example) when its filter delay is measured, latest arrival on a broadband relation, or latest arrival — filter delay not measured.

What it’s doing. AudioMap starts from the full-range unit with the latest broadband arrival. Subs don’t compete for this starting point (a sound system of only subs uses them all). If the solved alignment would still need a negative delay on a unit whose arrival was measured, including a sub, every delay shifts so that unit plays at zero and becomes the reference. The relative timing doesn’t change. A unit with no measured arrival never becomes the reference.

A two-speaker group with Mirror placement on is one unit: one delay for both speakers, and the pair keeps its own internal alignment. Turning on Stereo pair also turns on Mirror placement.

Each row shows the source, a relation chip and its delay. The chip says how that source is aligned to the reference:

• broadband: two full-range units, aligned from the arrival difference from 100 Hz to 8 kHz. Two full-range units are never treated as a crossover pair.
• crossover 68.8 Hz (for example): one side is band-limited, such as a sub, and the delay and polarity are chosen on the overlap around the hand-off. The frequency is the sub’s low-pass in the Crossover section: the corner playing if it’s on, else the frequency you typed, else the corner it holds switched off, else AudioMap’s suggestion.

Click the chip to change it:

• The first item is the relation AudioMap derived (ticked when you haven’t changed it). Pick it to go back to automatic.
• Broadband, offered when the derived relation is a crossover.
• Custom band: first drag across an empty part of the Magnitude plot to mark a band, then pick it here.

A sub is related to the top you chose for it in the Crossover section, so changing the partner there changes the relation here.

Each row except the reference row has a polarity mark, Ø. Blue means inverted. Amber means AudioMap recommends inverting but hasn’t. Click it to flip that source.

• On a crossover row the solver chooses polarity together with the delay, and applies it. For a sub that means trying each cycle at both polarities and keeping the one with the least cancellation against the rest of the sound system across the positions, inside a window around its measured arrival. Where no arrival can be measured, candidates stay within half a period, at the bottom of its overlap band, of the solver’s own estimate, and it is never played ahead of the reference.
• On a broadband row polarity is only a recommendation. You apply it.
• A polarity you set by clicking is kept by later solves.

If the solver can’t solve a row, for example because it can’t tell two cycles apart, the row reads not resolved.

Time Align, at the bottom of the sidebar, turns the whole alignment on or off.

• Turning it on runs a fresh solve, and the result plays.
• Turning it off bypasses every delay. Turning it on again re-solves; manual delays are kept.

A solve also lands and plays when:

• you change something on the Timing tab (a relation, a band, the weighting, a manual delay);
• you capture at the listening area;
• an auto-capture run ends.

Opening a project runs a solve. A project saved with an alignment keeps playing it, and that solve isn’t applied. A project saved with no alignment plays the solve’s result.

When a solve is refused. AudioMap won’t apply delays that can’t be real arrivals: one larger than the sound system could produce, or an onset that is only a noise peak. It won’t fit noise either. The quality readout then reads refused: not physical or re-solve refused: insufficient coherence, and the delays already playing are kept. In help mode (press H), hovering it shows the reason and what to do.

Positions: (All positions by default) picks one coverage average or one position. The pick becomes the measurement of every tuning, so it sets the EQ as well as the alignment. With more than one position included, choose what to optimise:

• Best average: the best alignment across the selected positions on average.
• Protect worst position: the worst selected position decides instead of the average, from the solver’s search to the final pick of what plays, so no selected position is left badly aligned.

Positions without a capture from every speaker are left out of the alignment. The sidebar then shows how many are used, for example 5 of 7 positions.

1. Click a row’s delay.
2. Type the delay in milliseconds (0 to 1000).
3. Press Return, or click away. Esc cancels.

The row now shows a Manual chip and a ↺ button. You can do this on the reference row too.

What Manual means.

• Every later solve keeps that delay exactly as you gave it, and re-solves the other rows.
• While any row is Manual, the reference stays where it is.
• It’s saved with the project.
• If something changes underneath it (the crossover, the groups, new measurements, the reference), an amber dot appears. In help mode (press H), hovering it shows: “Inputs changed since you set this. The delay is still yours; ↺ hands it back to the solver.”

↺ (Return this delay to the solver) clears the row and re-solves.

If any source has the Monitor role, the sidebar shows Exclude monitors from alignment. It takes effect from the next solve.

• The View menu offers Spatial, Impulse, Magnitude and Phase. Spatial is the default where your licence includes it.
• The traces are Summed After, each <source> After, and Difference, the aligned sum against the unaligned sum.
• Chips in the sidebar turn on Sum and Difference. The caret beside Sum chooses what it adds up. That’s display only: nothing that plays changes. Difference greys out while Time Align is off.
• Each row’s square shows or hides that source’s trace.
• On the Magnitude and Phase plots, each crossover band is labelled with its two units. Drag an edge to change it.

Delays read in milliseconds with two decimals. In help mode (press H), hovering a delay also shows what the geometry predicts (free-field) for comparison.