Switching between audio formats with different number of channels causes high latency variance on Marantz AV receiver

[AVLatency]

The Marantz NR1711 seems to exhibit a high variance in HDMI audio latency when switching between audio formats that have a different number of channels. If the same number of channels is used for all tested audio formats, the audio latency remains consistent between measurements.

This seems to be a problematic behaviour with this specific AV receiver. I believe that it is a good thing that this problem is revealed by the AV Latency.com toolkit, but it makes for a frustrating user experience for a reviewer. Maybe there is some way that a user of the AV Latency.com toolkit could be made aware of this sort of issue coming up with certain AV receivers...?

[AVLatency]

One possible “solution” to this is to present a pop-up when a high latency variance has been detected and formats with different number of channels was tested. It could say something like:

“A high latency variance has been detected. Some AV Receivers have a bug that causes their audio latency to vary greatly the first time a signal switches between audio formats with a different number of channels. Try re-testing with audio formats that share the same number of channels to see if this changes the audio latency variance.”

[AVLatency]

Another feature that could help with this issue is an advanced configuration option to disable format switching between passes to allow the user to test with only a single audio format. This would enable the user to understand the behaviour of the DUT in different conditions.

[AVLatency]

This feature to allow disabling format switching between passes has been implemented and is available under the advanced options.