@@MFKitten To add on to hailgod's advice, you also have to have audio running somewhere (for me it's at least starting a track in Spotify) otherwise Wavelet gives you the 'no new sessions have started yet' screen.
@@MFKitten Basically what AP May said plus one tip: If the app doesn't detect the audio playing, turn on legacy mode. The "proper" way to do it is to do the extra setup for the app you're using, but I've been using legacy mode for years without any problems.
With the help of this video, I've been tuning my iem with your frequency target as the base, and now I have my own personal target, which I've successfully match with my other iems/headphones. Really huge thanks to you, and also those who are involved to make the frequency measurements and AutoEQ possible for everyone else.
11:52 Small correction - Mastering engineers don't usually get all the instrument tracks (multitrack). They get a single stereo track from the mixing engineer. It's a common mistake to think mix and master is the same thing. (note - i know stem mastering is a thing, i'm talking about the traditional mastering process)
And when we do get stems, they are frequently improperly assigned and of limited help. I send a detailed document to any artist who wishes to master with me. It’s not overly technical, but it is a bit complex. I’ve lost a project over this, so stubborn was the engineer in the face of change.
@@jirehla-ab1671 yes. badly made products sound like shit to start with. 13:34 is exactly what @crin is talking about. you can't fix the bass curve with iems or any other product that can't do those frequencies. "diminishing returns in relation to the drivers that vibrate" exactly that.. some products don't vibrate correctly for various reasons. others, are worth buying if they are capable of making the sounds you want.
as someone who hasnt tinkered much with EQ, i really appreciate the side by side comparisons. i kind of which it was a longer loop, just to have more time to think about the nuances, but hey thats why youre walking us through how to do it ourselves
Dude, you have no idea how helpful your video is for me as a beginner. This is EXACTLY what I've been looking for. You're awesome, keep up the good work!
When I learned how to master when I got a audio engineering education I learned that the basis to master a track is to never ever add gain to any frequency unless you absolutely have to. You find the issues and remove them. Most masters are 90% dips (the good ones, that is).
I really don't know anything about audio, but isn't that what the pre amp section does? So reducing the pre amp by whatever your max boosted frequency is makes it so that frequency boost is actually +0dB and everything else are dips?
Hey since ur more experienced than I could u do me a favor and listen to the music I’ve made in the past year? I would love a pros opinion on my mix, I use dt770’s for the final mixing of my songs and I use garage band to make them, ignore the music rule breaks like saying fuck staying in one key
The reason EQ gets a bad rep, aside from the psychological aspect of potentially having gotten the wrong headphones and needing to admit error and correct them, is the fact that older digital EQ technology really wasn't all that great. But nowadays, it's pretty damn exceptional. Of course, this still assumes that the drivers in your headphones or earphones are competent enough to take it. Some aren't, most will, and some of the ones that will can handle it really well without any noticeable signs that they've been EQ-ed. While it's still worthwhile to hunt down your sets such that EQ isn't necessary, it's really nice that you can now use parametric EQ with a variety of different models for each point to completely reshape your sonic experience.
Thank You so much for this video. Literally breathed new life into my headphones and made me enjoy some older pairs much more. Using your tool and spending a couple hours playing around i've managed to get a much more 'me' sound that I never would have been able to figure out without this.
Yes, EQ is the most misunderstood tool, specially 'high end' freaks turn around if you start talking about EQ. But even with ALL high end speakers I had, EQing was necessary for room correction. So let'm walk away and enjoy yourself. For iPhone, KaiserTone got nice EQ tools, sure, for music only. Listening with normal 15$ dynamic inears, I do (measured) correction up to 2 kHz, 2-12 kHz by ear (to much individual components, that can't be measured good enough). The cheapies EQd sound better than a bunch of real expensive iems with non eq. At the end it's still a individual thing, but never got lucky with the harman curve, I guess they did a sort of restroom acoustic.
I always think EQ is OK, especially to fix part of frequencies. But most people is not fixing their audio with EQs. With an analogy, they add too much ingredients when they only need add fried shallots
I've never seen any "'high end' freaks" turn around when somebody is talking about EQ. literally every audiophile knows what it's for. what is this snobbishness?
@@barbasour Maybe there are 'cultural differs' in the way, audiophiles think. Or let's say, there are many purists, that won't touch any sound control unit cause it's not 'pure', even if the room or ear canal do massive frequency peaks. So in the end, that's OK, too. Won't judge anybody. Just can't understand it really, I call them masochists :)
Another important caveat would be to watch out for ear canal resonance. This will be different on every ear and measuring rig. IME, this makes anything past 5K kind of a crapshoot. A sine wave generator and careful listening can assist when manually eq-ing in this range
Poweramp EQ has evolved a lot since this video. You can now pretty much EQ any app with 2 adb commands, also you can enable a mode that also detects apps that may not be detected otherwise. It has so much tuning methods. I found it better than Wavelet, as I can tweak more, especially in the low bass range. It is not bug free and sometimes it does not switch to the right headphones automatically, but if you don't need AutoEQ or your headphones are not in the Database of Wavelet and you want something with more control, Poweramp EQ is in my opinion better. Wavelet is easier, but I personally want more control.
I just wanted to thank you for your insight and recommendations. Your blog really helped me put into context the value of certain headphones on the market, mostly because most other headphone "reviewing" websites spread false information/don't have an objective evaluation system in place. It helped me a lot.
when i used the auto eq with peace i didn't know the big difference but i reset my pc and the difference stands out so much, my ears thankyou for this video. Went beack to the auto eq settings and it sounds great.
@@linolingelbach2214 I use both. When I feel like having a bass boost I use it but more times than not I find on the S12 the bass is more than adequate just using IEF Neutral.
Very interesting and informative video, Crin! I just wish I could capitalize on your insights and advice, but I’m limited by hearing loss [as a consequence of age and, 50+ years ago in the US Army, a sustained period of having to endure close and unprotected exposure to some very large boomsticks!]. Nevertheless, I’m grateful for the chance to learn more about what actually happens when I try to fiddle around with the souundstream that’s fed to me by my headphones, IEMs, and hearing aids. Thanks! {Full Disclosure: I’m an unapologetic IOS guy (iPhone & iPad) when it comes streaming most music . . . and I use a CD player and a Schiit Loki Mini Equalizer and Magni 3+ amp for enjoying classical music. I hope this doesn’t disqualify me from being a subscriber! ;^) }
I was looking at videos on your other channel then got sad when I had seen you had no activity in couple months. I got lucky and found your new channel through your Twitter. You might get more subscribers if you release a short video announcing the channel change. glad to see your still going at it.
Thanks man. I'm not an "audiophile" but I spent like 20 minutes on this and now I know my headphones sounded like shit without Peace APO. Some background... I bought my headphones for battery life because its mostly for gaming (the battery literally lasts 2 weeks), so I got the Sennheiser GSP 370 and I used the autoEQ for the GSP 600.
I've been use the EQ like you did in the later half since 15. I'm over 30 now and with a lot of trial and error, articles and videos, I kinda understand now what each frequency does and what boosting/cutting them does. But this video of yours is the shortest and most comprehensive and well demonstrated video on this subject. I wish I found something similar when I was 15.
as someone who just bought a pair of KSC75's, i can 100% confirm that if you try to push anymore bass into them it sounds like dogshit. I just tried casually producing some music on them to see how they would work and hoo boy, if you crank the lower frequencies at all it gives you a brand new meaning to bass bleed. everything is like clipping *and* muddy at the same time it's incredible.
Excellent video. I actually discovered the equalizer function on your graph tool last weak and have been messing with it since then. While there are things that EQ can’t really fix (like imaging) but this is definitely a way to experience your headphones/IEMs in a different way.
Laying in bed watching this on my newly received ZS10 Pros as my first IEM. And WoW I have a lot to learn, I really appreciated playing the shifts in frequencies, thanks!
There's one BIG thing that might explain the audiophile's proclivity against EQ: Phase effects. Dan Worrall has a great set of videos about different types of EQ and what they do to the phase/temporal information. The gist is that you have to trade off between maintaining the accurate timing of audio events and maintaining the phase of co-incident events. This occurs for every single individual filter type, which means every individual pole in an EQ. What does this mean for people tuning their own IEMs? It means that you MIGHT get the tuning you want, and it might be a perfect target curve of your liking, but you might very well DESTROY the soundstage in the process. Phase-dependent information includes things like imaging and timing. I might get my breakbeats to sound more treble-forward, but I might turn those fast snare attacks distant and washy in the process.
Hence the hate among some of the users. I'm very sensitive to changes in soundstage and have tried eq-ing manually, automatically, via help from others, etc., but each time (on diff devices, too) I compare against the neutral and almost always return to no tuning
No, "phase effects" are not a problem for using EQ on headphones. Remember that in a linear time invariant system such as headphones, ANY change to the magnitude frequency response will also change the phase frequency response. It doesn't matter whether that is done with an EQ filter or by changing the tuning of the headphone itself. Adding damping meshes will change the phase angle,removing damping meshes will change the phase angle. Increasing or reducing the front volume will change the phase angle. increasing or reducing the length of the front tube will change the phase angle. Adding or removing a venting hole will change the phase angle. Anything that changes the magnitude ("frequency response") also changes the phase angle. This means that any headphone that doesn't have a completely flat magnitude frequency response will already not have a flat phase frequency response either. By applying EQ to fit the magnitude to the target curve, we are removing the difference between the headphone's frequency response and the frequency response of the target. And if we're using minimum phase filters to do that, we are automatically also removing the difference between the headphone's phase and the phase of the target.
guys. Frequency response graphs are just a reference point for how the tuning might sound to an average person. you are likely not the average person. your ear is shaped uniquely to you and the ear tips you are using affects this greatly as well. autoEQ might by a good change but it's really a shot in the dark for getting the tuning correct for how the mix was intended to sound in the studio. The BEST thing you can do is google a tone generator and grab a digital eq for your headphones/iem. 1. Make sure the EQ is flat. 2. set your volume to where you would normally jam out to music on using the 500hz tone (good tone close to human voices). 3. step down the tone frequency to the next EQ step down and try to discern if the tone is louder or quieter. adjust the eq until the tone you started with and the tone you are on feel like they are the same volume. 4. walk down the eq steps until your reach the bottom, then start again at the tone step just above 500hz and continue adjusting tones until all the tone steps have been adjusted. while this is great for a flat curve and not a harman - I suspect it's at least what the original mixer intended for the music to sound like.
@@JBT97 that's interesting. I wonder if the harman curve is common because alot of people are less sensitive to the upper frequencies - so they have to turn up those frequencies in order for the freq curve to sound balanced
I can't give enough thumbs up. I have the Pixel Buds Pro (shame on me 🤣) and recently discovered that in the audiophile community they are pretty "disliked". I don't have any good audio gear and always wanted to listen to "well sounding" headphones. Just imported the harman eq for my buds and didn't hear any difference at first. But then I realized. What on earth are these high hats?! They suddenly sound like real ones and not those weird ishhsss and zzzzss' that I heard before. This video saved me from asking, what I could miss and if its worth buying some more expensive headphones or not. Best tutorial I have seen for eq with all the demos and descriptions you made at the frequences so far.
Ok wow, thank you for this. On my Logitech G Pro X it made it too quiet after auto EQ, which I figured was the pre-amp being at -6.8. I put that to 0 and activated Peace's automatic anti-peaking option instead, which I hope does the job. It's way too quiet otherwise. But oh god it sounds so much better now, it feels like the audio equivalent of putting on glasses.
Well nevermind, that auto anti-peak just sets it down and keeps it there, it's not as active as I imagined. I'll have to lose some volume to use the config, but it IS a lot better.
This tool is so dope. I now have a profile that matches the Dusk to the B2 (just to see what it sounds like) and also a Harman 2019 v2 Dusk curve that is VEIL REMOVING imo. It's revealed a few mistakes on some songs that I never heard before haha
If ur on apple get the music player app hs player, it’s basically built for audiophiles, it has a 10 band eq and preamp control, it’s amazing, it made my kz’s last longer before I upgraded and realized they were average
It baffles me how so many vinyl enthusiasts have never heard of the RIAA EQ curve. Vinyl is literally a compressed audio standard, yet many enthusiasts are in denial about that.
I have used Poweramp for many years now, it's a SERIOUS music player, brilliantly customizable, you can go into settings and increase volume adjustment (levels) steps from 30 to 100, you can have a 5 band graphic equalizer, or a 31 (or any amount of bars between), two different types 'Graphic' or 'Parametric'. You get a fee trial, and it's only a coupla £/$ to get full Poweramp. It really is a BRILLIANT app! Skins, visualizers, crossfade settings, Resampler settings, so many tunable/customisable settings. Love it! If you have an Android phone, give it a try, it may very well become your essential media player app.... 👍 😎🇬🇧
@@MondayMoustache This is what I have found on Poweramp forum, hope this helps. I personally don't use 'Auto EQ' feature as I have set my graphic up to max 31 bands, however... Admittedly Crinacle's video on this matter has peaked my interest, so I'll be looking into this myself... 😏
@@thedarkknight1971 thanks! I assume a preset would be made for one of the settings and not the other so i'm unsure what the "proper" overlap setting is for autoeq presets
@@MondayMoustache No probs. But, again, something I've not played with yet (haha even after all these years using Poweramp lol). I've usually stuck with the basics (well, a 'basic 31 bar graphic - basic lol) and then tuned my Sony's and Sennheisers to my taste (I agree with Crinacle, NOTHING wrong with setting your own EQ - as long as you don't go mad). And then I save my separate personal presets for each genre of music I usually listen to. If you haven't yet, go into Poweramp, SETTINGS, AUDIO, GRAPHIC, then set 32 bands, then I usually set LOWEST as 10 and HIGHEST as 20,000. Then, it's little adjustments at a time, and I NEVER have the "Stereo Expand" or, any of the Reverb, Hall, Concert, Room, Theatre or whatever, on at all (as can mess with the stereo sound and quality of output to headphones/IEMs etc... ☺️
Thank you, Wavelet helped me a lot. The default tuning of the Sony WF1000XM4S sucked. I tried fixing it myself using the EQ built into the Sony app, but Wavelet did it much better with AutoEQ.
Thank you very much :) For a long time now I have had a problem that certain frequencies create a resonance in my livingroom. But now with this windows EQ that is fixed. I have been in the dark for years :(
Love your work! Thanks! Just starting to understand some things. It's amazing how little I knew a few years back, and most people know almost nothing about sound. Just like me in the past, believing my Razer Kraken Pros were good for music, and after that I got a HyperX headset and was amazed and hated Razer and their intense marketing. After that I learned a few things here and there and got myself Audio Technica ATH-M50x. The difference was amazing and I fell in love. Sadly, my dog chewed those to pieces. Now after 2 years I managed to gather the funds for the BeyerDynamic DT 770 Pro. I am very happy. I don't believe they're necessarily the best but they are more than enough! I hope I keep learning and in the future look to myself right now as ignorant!
I'm using Wavelet on my Android for a year now, really love it!!!.. I don't need to EQ everything, most of the time I just crank the Buffer size slider to max at 8192 samples and not using EQ at all.. And boy it make a big difference, in a good way.. yeah the latency for bluetooth device will be bad, but it's still good for music or movie, and I'm using wired IEM most of the time anyway.. Well I'm a noob in term of EQ or audio, so if I want to use auto EQ, for bass tune I'm using Grado Hemp or Ibasso IT04 for mid range, and done with it.. lol
For iOS there is EQE which requires a jailbreak. It features unlimited parametric eq bands, and a AutoEQ feature where the parametric profiles are being loaded 👍🏻
Unfortunately its pretty useless for anyone with modern iDevices. I feel like a uberpoorPleb myself when comparing viperfx on my android with nothing else on ipad pro :(
@@Moootin Exactly that. My older 2020 ipad air 4 (A14) runs 15.4 and Ipad pro m1 is on the current latest, both lie outside of JB domain :( :( Its a crying shame an "advanced OS" like ios cannot give support for system-wide EQ (though there's sound signature change support (boosting vocals/treble/bass for headphones featuring the apple H1 chip! Arrgh )
Awesome! I have been using APO since your previous video and it has been very helpful (my current headphones are very muddy), and this is more of a tutorial on how to actually do it yourself. Thanks!
@@OcaOca You can use it for free, but to get access to the "expert" equalizer (and the autoeq presets) you need to pay $3 a month. I think it is worth it though. It is a very well made application.
I highly recommend Headphone EQ by MathAudio. Much more easy and way more accurate than any other method. Corrects the impedance mismatch between transducer and your ear canal/ear drum. I use it all the time together with Equalizer APO. Without proper ear adjustment any headphone will always sound wrong. You are not the average of any target curve!
Agree! Same goes for your headphones/earphones. Get a measurement setup and measure before and after EQ to ensure you are hitting the target you intend to. Your set isn’t someone else’s measured set!
Very interesting program. Like an advanced version of a tone generator. Do you just take the filters you made and put them into APO? I wonder how effective the crossfeed feature is, considering you can also use it in APO.
@@Luinitari It kinda becomes unnecessary to do measurements. All you do is correct the target of your given headphone to your ear. But sure if you can afford it buy some rig. Although its not as straight forward as one might think with those.
@@JBT97 It can export a config file for APO yes. The crossfeed is the best sounding I've ever heard. It's a great plugin. I have it on my EQ APO as a VST always and switch between different EQ profiles that way.
@@Perenbarn Well, I have measured multiple sets of the same make and model earphone, and process variation is real and can be significant. You can also see that without making your own measurements by finding earphone models on Crinacle’s site where he has multiple copies measured and comparing them.
I was very wary about using eq at first but now its the most fun thing in this hobby since getting new headphones. you can have just bass and nothing else or just highs and nothing else, this shit was hilarious even if your not going to use it practically. even said that I do use it practically but on;y when actually listening to songs. its a bit of a hassle to open every time for gaming or just watching videos
I didn't know much about EQing, then got into it first when custom tuning a set of earbuds using a free app. The earbuds were unlocked (i.e. EarFunFree Pro 2) and able to be tuned with my Android phone (Samsung GS10+) using an app called "AirReps15 6x" to establish a persistent 10-band default tuning. Before doing this, I first found a Pink Noise site and used my headphones to identify my personal resonant ear canal frequency (i.e. 6000Hz...I am over 50...so the frequency is on the low side, I suppose). Once I had my resonant frequency as reference, I used third party presets from another TH-camr (Oluv's Gadgets). In any event, the earbuds went from sounding like crap to sounding terrific. This set me on a path to discover how I could do this using my PC as the music source and also able to deliver lossless quality. As I use a Windows 10 Pro PC, I needed a proper solution and chose the FiiO BTA30Pro, which has TX, RX, and DAC modes...so I can use it wireless OR wired. When wired, I choose DAC mode to feed an AMP (Yamaha CR-420 receiver or Nakamichi SR-2E receiver). When Wireless, I set the BTA30Pro in TX mode and settle for AptX Adaptive (codec) using my IEM BT5.2 earhooks (KZ AZ09 Pro's). The earhooks I marry to a variety to IEM's (e.g. S12, T3+, Oilna, HeartMirror, etc.). However, here I need to leverage EqualizerAPO with Peace (a user friendly GUI), both are free EQing software. I have taken presets from GITHUB's AutoEQ for most of my IEM's plus my planar headphones (HE400se, when cabled to my receiver) and it works like a charm. The instructions are simple for a non-programmer and the setup was pretty fast.
Using an EQ, I can confirm that Shure IEMs can play frequencies above 10 kHz. Who knew? I used to be one of those people who believed that if I had to EQ I bought the wrong product. Now I see it as "fixing the engineers' mistakes". Dead-neutral with a bass boost (what I prefer) seems hard to do right on an engineering level but the end-user can pick up the slack with minimal effort.
Oh man I love eq peace gui apo all day long I love it to death complete game changer for all my media consumption needs with my Ifi zen stack and lcd2 and cascades love it love it love it
I have a set of the akg n400s and use EQ because I like a little more bass than they come with. I've always been a fan of EQ make bad head phones decent, decent headphones good, and good headphones great.
Me: sounds neat. Probably don't need it because i don't care about sound THAT much. But maybe i'll humor him and use the literally free app. Me 10 minutes later: ... Forgive me for ignoring your bday present to me for 3 months. I am unworthy.
Thanks for giving EQ its due respect. More should be delved into such as testing and compensating for our left and right ear capabilities with all frequencies. Especially since left and right ears can be significantly different we require stereo EQ. I would care more about what a so called non EQ using “purist” reviewer thinks if I knew their individual hearing capability profile… for both ears. THEN we can talk.
"testing and compensating for our left and right ear capabilities with all frequencies". You really need an extra hobby, dude. You've gone too far, and it's high time somebody told you so. Pull back from the audio a little and try something new for a while. I think it will be good for you.
i'm nowhere near audio expert or an audiophile but EQ really turn my cheap speaker to something different lol, like it's muddy and bloated bass, it doesn't even good for watching movie, but after EQ-ing and turn that High freq slider a little bit high and lower the bass freq a little bit (using Walk Through the Park for reference), it become "listenable" and pretty good for watching movie. but if you really have a pretty bad shit like for once i try to use $1 earphone, no matter how much you turn that EQ slider up or down, it'll still sound like dogwater :D
I always have a inner conflict with myself when crinacle uploads I want to listen to music but I want to watch his video hmmmm the winner today is crinacle
I usually do EQ by ear so hi-fi music and movies sound perfect to me. I mix music a lot so I hear what needs tweaking for my taste at least. I just did EQ on my audio-technica ATH-E40 and the 4 kHz range ( I cut -13 dB) which was the biggest problem. It sounds much more realistic now. That standard high midrange boost probably made it easier to hear if on a loud stage, but in the studio it should not be there...
good points you made but I still find EQing or using Auto EQ profiles kind of a hassle. When I change my headphones I have to change my profile too and I usually forget that. Also reliability of measurements or unit variance is a thing. Not every 8k peak is a 'peak' for example. In this sense Resolve's video touched these topics better. In the end I think you find a headphone you mostly like and try to change the little things you don't like with eq. Trying x band eq to see what each frequency does to your particular headphone is a good idea and a big step to EQing by ear.
Measurement is not a problem unless you have crin, oratory etc. Also i trust yours yoo because they look more stable allways to me. This eq completely changed the buying behaviours. For example if i was in this hobby 10 years before, i would be just care about tuning and comfort. Now im just looking for distance from the target on iems and headphones(no peaks or cuts bigger than 10db). If they give more technicalitites, who cares about the tuning?
It's about time someone did a video on this subject. Well done. There's one thing you mentioned that isn't clear to me. That part about not boosting past your gain. How do you figure out what that value is? With a "audiophile" device like a dongle or dac/amp (be it desktop or portable) or a DAP, there's probably a datasheet or something? But what about a basic device like your phone? P.S. - Also, props for linking to your suggested EQing tools. Haven't heard of the ones you suggest for Android. I've been using one that AFAIK is just called "Equalizer". Ten bands, but the bands are fixed i.e. you can't customize the wavelengths, but you can make your own custom EQs using those fixed bands. Seems to work well enough.
The hatred towards EQ of traditional audiophiles was probably "manufactured" by the high-end audio industry to keep die-hard audiophiles in the rabbit hole of never-ending quest for perfect gear and hence constant buying. 😂. But seriously now, I'm not old enough but I've read that the analog EQ of decades past had unwanted "side-effects" on the sound, so there's that. But present-day EQ is in the digital domain, but I guess some people have been stuck in the past, so to speak. It's not unusual for me to hear people say "not a fan of EQ" without any specific reason. If these folks want to spend big money on expensive tweaks and worse, snake oil, well it's their money, who are we to tell them what to do with it.
I like using EQ with software like voicemeeter banana, it's just too bad I can't get EQ working with this program in the video. I import an EQ file and it sounds exactly the same.
i use a frankenstein- wall of sound audio system. all loudspeakers have volume control, so i can set the tweeters, mids, sub, transient favoring and steady tone favouring speakers independantly and adjust their positioning independantly.
I've used Poweramp since 2014. By far the best equalizer and player I have ever come across for Android. I highly recommend getting it and it's super easy and customizable.
@@Mishael_Agyei-Boamah i thought other parametric eq's were cascade so i was confused by envelope being default, ill need to find out which one is more accurate to autoeq curves
I have been using a personal approach to equalize my headphones or earphones, I used it before I knew that the AutoEQ existed and still use it for models that are not in the database. First I create a file with white noise, e.g. in Audacity, and then separate it into individual bands using 31 band EQ, i.e. attenuate all bands except for one and save multiple files. Then I scan these files with a Replay Gain which should make the perception volume of these files pretty equal, I guess this step may be omitted if I used pink noise instead. Then I play these individual band limited files of noise and compare them in terms of loudness to each other and change the level of each frequency band respectively, the result is often pretty good, though it is not as accurate as using appropriate measuring techniques and using a parametric or a graphic 127 band EQ. (I prefer the AutoEQ to this technique if the phones are in the database.) I also use it sometimes to the addition of the AutoEQ if I replace my original earpads which also changes the sound signature, they sometimes provide more EQ profiles for some headphones with different earpads.
I am actually pretty annoyed with myself for not, at the very least, doing the braindead steps for EQ. This is truly opened my headphones, and soon IEMs. THANK YOU papa Crin. Fuck o--
EQ creates phase distortion.. Issues I have is it changes the phasing and I can hear it, best bet for me personally is find a setup I like that does my idea naturally but sometimes EQ can be fun to mess with! :)
I love his take on audiophiles and their feelings on EQ when he is the absolute biggest and most virulent attacker of EQ and headphones being trash until you EQ them. A lot of headphones don’t take to eq at all and some are marvelous. But the out of the box tuning was trash so the whole thing is trash lol this man just likes to trigger folks and I’m one of those triggered. Lol I subscribed just so I can hear his takes and get mad.
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Play with my tools
crinacle.com/graphs/iems/graphtool (for IEMs)
crinacle.com/graphs/headphones/graphtool (for headphones)
Now I'm not doing it. 😠
jkjkjk
"Play with my tools"
Yes daddyyyy >_
what song you use? Mr. crin
I'd love to play with your _tool_ daddy crin~
any chance you could review the Oneplus Buds Pro?
Didn't know Wavelet was such a universally recognized tool for EQing on devices, and graph tool on your website is very useful as well, thanks!
I can't figure out how to get autoEQ going in wavelet, and it's annoying. Only gives me graphical EQ. Ugh.
@@MFKitten To add on to hailgod's advice, you also have to have audio running somewhere (for me it's at least starting a track in Spotify) otherwise Wavelet gives you the 'no new sessions have started yet' screen.
@@hailgod1 p
@@UD503J You can go into the setting and enable "Legacy mode" and then you can turn it on whenever
@@MFKitten Basically what AP May said plus one tip: If the app doesn't detect the audio playing, turn on legacy mode. The "proper" way to do it is to do the extra setup for the app you're using, but I've been using legacy mode for years without any problems.
"If you are on iphone... Go fuck yourself" the way he said it got me lolling. Excellent.
You're using IPhone 14? No way... wait fr? I have something for you... ❤
Go fuck yourself
listening through laptop speakers: ah yes hmmm the nuances of the profiles are really coming through
Where's your HD800S?
With the help of this video, I've been tuning my iem with your frequency target as the base, and now I have my own personal target, which I've successfully match with my other iems/headphones.
Really huge thanks to you, and also those who are involved to make the frequency measurements and AutoEQ possible for everyone else.
11:52 Small correction - Mastering engineers don't usually get all the instrument tracks (multitrack). They get a single stereo track from the mixing engineer. It's a common mistake to think mix and master is the same thing.
(note - i know stem mastering is a thing, i'm talking about the traditional mastering process)
I was about to make this comment too.
totally agreed. stem mastering or 2 track master
And when we do get stems, they are frequently improperly assigned and of limited help. I send a detailed document to any artist who wishes to master with me. It’s not overly technical, but it is a bit complex. I’ve lost a project over this, so stubborn was the engineer in the face of change.
@pavlebn, does EQing has a diminishing returns in relation to the drivers that vibrate it's using regardless od audio device?
@@jirehla-ab1671 yes. badly made products sound like shit to start with. 13:34 is exactly what @crin is talking about. you can't fix the bass curve with iems or any other product that can't do those frequencies. "diminishing returns in relation to the drivers that vibrate" exactly that.. some products don't vibrate correctly for various reasons. others, are worth buying if they are capable of making the sounds you want.
as someone who hasnt tinkered much with EQ, i really appreciate the side by side comparisons. i kind of which it was a longer loop, just to have more time to think about the nuances, but hey thats why youre walking us through how to do it ourselves
My upmost respect on all the effort put into this tool! But I gotta say Crin, your website is pretty unusable on mobile browsers......
True. The tier lists specifically, sadly.
It doesn't load more than the first few entries on my end (even when I view it in desktop mode)
@@Arado159 Damn that's worse than mine. At least on my phone it still loads but takes around 2 minutes before I could actually scroll.
lol set in on desktop mode on your mobile browser.
@@jamirvillarosa7924 doesn't work very well either "lol".
I'm all for ads that support crin, but it stays loading like three videos at once and using all my mobile data lol
Dude, you have no idea how helpful your video is for me as a beginner. This is EXACTLY what I've been looking for. You're awesome, keep up the good work!
When I learned how to master when I got a audio engineering education I learned that the basis to master a track is to never ever add gain to any frequency unless you absolutely have to. You find the issues and remove them. Most masters are 90% dips (the good ones, that is).
totally agreed
I really don't know anything about audio, but isn't that what the pre amp section does? So reducing the pre amp by whatever your max boosted frequency is makes it so that frequency boost is actually +0dB and everything else are dips?
Hey since ur more experienced than I could u do me a favor and listen to the music I’ve made in the past year? I would love a pros opinion on my mix, I use dt770’s for the final mixing of my songs and I use garage band to make them, ignore the music rule breaks like saying fuck staying in one key
@@robinrai4973 That's exactly why you use the pre amp yes.
But mastering engineers have access to limiters and other ways to gain match. End consumer usually don’t.
I'd like to have measurements (and maybe even a review!) for the HD58x in the graph tool as well.
you have a funny name
lol funy name man XD
its warm, too warm. you dont need to know more.
@@rez3594 warmer than the HD6xx?
@@imembridibuddha It isn’t really. It just has a bit more sub bass. Still not for bass heads tho.
The reason EQ gets a bad rep, aside from the psychological aspect of potentially having gotten the wrong headphones and needing to admit error and correct them, is the fact that older digital EQ technology really wasn't all that great. But nowadays, it's pretty damn exceptional. Of course, this still assumes that the drivers in your headphones or earphones are competent enough to take it. Some aren't, most will, and some of the ones that will can handle it really well without any noticeable signs that they've been EQ-ed. While it's still worthwhile to hunt down your sets such that EQ isn't necessary, it's really nice that you can now use parametric EQ with a variety of different models for each point to completely reshape your sonic experience.
Thank You so much for this video. Literally breathed new life into my headphones and made me enjoy some older pairs much more. Using your tool and spending a couple hours playing around i've managed to get a much more 'me' sound that I never would have been able to figure out without this.
Yes, EQ is the most misunderstood tool, specially 'high end' freaks turn around if you start talking about EQ. But even with ALL high end speakers I had, EQing was necessary for room correction. So let'm walk away and enjoy yourself.
For iPhone, KaiserTone got nice EQ tools, sure, for music only.
Listening with normal 15$ dynamic inears, I do (measured) correction up to 2 kHz, 2-12 kHz by ear (to much individual components, that can't be measured good enough). The cheapies EQd sound better than a bunch of real expensive iems with non eq. At the end it's still a individual thing, but never got lucky with the harman curve, I guess they did a sort of restroom acoustic.
I always think EQ is OK, especially to fix part of frequencies. But most people is not fixing their audio with EQs. With an analogy, they add too much ingredients when they only need add fried shallots
@@riposte5127 That's not for you to decide though, it it? Most of it is subjective
I've never seen any "'high end' freaks" turn around when somebody is talking about EQ. literally every audiophile knows what it's for. what is this snobbishness?
@@yeagmatic less to do with "subjective" and more to do with not correcting to flat before applying personalized EQ
@@barbasour Maybe there are 'cultural differs' in the way, audiophiles think. Or let's say, there are many purists, that won't touch any sound control unit cause it's not 'pure', even if the room or ear canal do massive frequency peaks. So in the end, that's OK, too. Won't judge anybody. Just can't understand it really, I call them masochists :)
Another important caveat would be to watch out for ear canal resonance. This will be different on every ear and measuring rig. IME, this makes anything past 5K kind of a crapshoot. A sine wave generator and careful listening can assist when manually eq-ing in this range
Poweramp EQ has evolved a lot since this video.
You can now pretty much EQ any app with 2 adb commands, also you can enable a mode that also detects apps that may not be detected otherwise.
It has so much tuning methods.
I found it better than Wavelet, as I can tweak more, especially in the low bass range.
It is not bug free and sometimes it does not switch to the right headphones automatically, but if you don't need AutoEQ or your headphones are not in the Database of Wavelet and you want something with more control, Poweramp EQ is in my opinion better.
Wavelet is easier, but I personally want more control.
Dang. It really improved the quality and clarity. Thanks man! And thanks to the people behind this project. 🤟
I just wanted to thank you for your insight and recommendations. Your blog really helped me put into context the value of certain headphones on the market, mostly because most other headphone "reviewing" websites spread false information/don't have an objective evaluation system in place. It helped me a lot.
when i used the auto eq with peace i didn't know the big difference but i reset my pc and the difference stands out so much, my ears thankyou for this video. Went beack to the auto eq settings and it sounds great.
S12 EQd to IEF Neutral is absolutely fantastic. Everyone that owns that S12 I believe should do this it turns into a borderline endgame IEM.
IEF neutral with bass boost is 🔥👍
@@linolingelbach2214 I use both. When I feel like having a bass boost I use it but more times than not I find on the S12 the bass is more than adequate just using IEF Neutral.
Very interesting and informative video, Crin! I just wish I could capitalize on your insights and advice, but I’m limited by hearing loss [as a consequence of age and, 50+ years ago in the US Army, a sustained period of having to endure close and unprotected exposure to some very large boomsticks!]. Nevertheless, I’m grateful for the chance to learn more about what actually happens when I try to fiddle around with the souundstream that’s fed to me by my headphones, IEMs, and hearing aids. Thanks! {Full Disclosure: I’m an unapologetic IOS guy (iPhone & iPad) when it comes streaming most music . . . and I use a CD player and a Schiit Loki Mini Equalizer and Magni 3+ amp for enjoying classical music. I hope this doesn’t disqualify me from being a subscriber! ;^) }
Thank you for your service Sir! Love from the UK 💖
Crinacle I have not been here since finding my first pair of headphones but that intro got me so good you're great at content creation
Wow thank you! Looked at the database of the AutoEQ, and it has all of my earphones and Headphones. Pretty complete database
I was looking at videos on your other channel then got sad when I had seen you had no activity in couple months. I got lucky and found your new channel through your Twitter. You might get more subscribers if you release a short video announcing the channel change. glad to see your still going at it.
Thanks man. I'm not an "audiophile" but I spent like 20 minutes on this and now I know my headphones sounded like shit without Peace APO.
Some background... I bought my headphones for battery life because its mostly for gaming (the battery literally lasts 2 weeks), so I got the Sennheiser GSP 370 and I used the autoEQ for the GSP 600.
I've been use the EQ like you did in the later half since 15. I'm over 30 now and with a lot of trial and error, articles and videos, I kinda understand now what each frequency does and what boosting/cutting them does.
But this video of yours is the shortest and most comprehensive and well demonstrated video on this subject. I wish I found something similar when I was 15.
ill just keep writing and let youtube decide which to show, they might appear eventually too
@@iikatinggangsengii2471 What
@@iikatinggangsengii2471 I didn't get what you're talking about.
as someone who just bought a pair of KSC75's, i can 100% confirm that if you try to push anymore bass into them it sounds like dogshit. I just tried casually producing some music on them to see how they would work and hoo boy, if you crank the lower frequencies at all it gives you a brand new meaning to bass bleed. everything is like clipping *and* muddy at the same time it's incredible.
This is one of the most “must see videos” of TH-cam
Excellent video. I actually discovered the equalizer function on your graph tool last weak and have been messing with it since then. While there are things that EQ can’t really fix (like imaging) but this is definitely a way to experience your headphones/IEMs in a different way.
what is imaging dependent on?
Mostly mids and highs as they serve as directional clues for human ears
Just found out your old channel got aliven't, finally made it back to audio dad
Used auto eq to harman on my steelseries headset and I'm hearing instruments I didn't know existed in Lost In Paradise. It's nuts tysm
Laying in bed watching this on my newly received ZS10 Pros as my first IEM. And WoW I have a lot to learn, I really appreciated playing the shifts in frequencies, thanks!
There's one BIG thing that might explain the audiophile's proclivity against EQ: Phase effects.
Dan Worrall has a great set of videos about different types of EQ and what they do to the phase/temporal information. The gist is that you have to trade off between maintaining the accurate timing of audio events and maintaining the phase of co-incident events. This occurs for every single individual filter type, which means every individual pole in an EQ.
What does this mean for people tuning their own IEMs? It means that you MIGHT get the tuning you want, and it might be a perfect target curve of your liking, but you might very well DESTROY the soundstage in the process. Phase-dependent information includes things like imaging and timing. I might get my breakbeats to sound more treble-forward, but I might turn those fast snare attacks distant and washy in the process.
Hence the hate among some of the users. I'm very sensitive to changes in soundstage and have tried eq-ing manually, automatically, via help from others, etc., but each time (on diff devices, too) I compare against the neutral and almost always return to no tuning
No, "phase effects" are not a problem for using EQ on headphones.
Remember that in a linear time invariant system such as headphones, ANY change to the magnitude frequency response will also change the phase frequency response.
It doesn't matter whether that is done with an EQ filter or by changing the tuning of the headphone itself. Adding damping meshes will change the phase angle,removing damping meshes will change the phase angle. Increasing or reducing the front volume will change the phase angle. increasing or reducing the length of the front tube will change the phase angle.
Adding or removing a venting hole will change the phase angle.
Anything that changes the magnitude ("frequency response") also changes the phase angle.
This means that any headphone that doesn't have a completely flat magnitude frequency response will already not have a flat phase frequency response either.
By applying EQ to fit the magnitude to the target curve, we are removing the difference between the headphone's frequency response and the frequency response of the target.
And if we're using minimum phase filters to do that, we are automatically also removing the difference between the headphone's phase and the phase of the target.
the absolute moment i decide to go on the journey of using autoeq this drops and i consider this a sign from god
Yo Crin. Thanks a lot for your work! You just made my day mate.
Marvelous! So far I am doing that using the RME ADI-2 DAC FS. Now it would be going to full control and greater easiness.
I love this guy! I bought my kz zs10 pro for gaming and I could not use it to listen to music, I auto eqed with some extra sub bass. THANK YOU!!
guys. Frequency response graphs are just a reference point for how the tuning might sound to an average person. you are likely not the average person. your ear is shaped uniquely to you and the ear tips you are using affects this greatly as well.
autoEQ might by a good change but it's really a shot in the dark for getting the tuning correct for how the mix was intended to sound in the studio.
The BEST thing you can do is google a tone generator and grab a digital eq for your headphones/iem.
1. Make sure the EQ is flat.
2. set your volume to where you would normally jam out to music on using the 500hz tone (good tone close to human voices).
3. step down the tone frequency to the next EQ step down and try to discern if the tone is louder or quieter. adjust the eq until the tone you started with and the tone you are on feel like they are the same volume.
4. walk down the eq steps until your reach the bottom, then start again at the tone step just above 500hz and continue adjusting tones until all the tone steps have been adjusted.
while this is great for a flat curve and not a harman - I suspect it's at least what the original mixer intended for the music to sound like.
Found another one
I've done this with a couple of IEMs/Headphones. I was quite surprised how similar the resulting FR is to Harman (at least to 5k).
@@JBT97 that's interesting. I wonder if the harman curve is common because alot of people are less sensitive to the upper frequencies - so they have to turn up those frequencies in order for the freq curve to sound balanced
If you’re on iPhone and want Parametric EQ, the Qudelix 5k is a good middleground, albeit not free. I wish there was a build of Poweramp for iOS.
Even on Android, PEQ is not really free or available without root. Qudelix 5k FTW!
qudelix might as well be free. Best money ive ever spent. Its an amazing little thing.
@@temporoyale6251 poweramp has a yearly sale where it's not even 20 cents no i got it that way
There's Neutron Player with a really good Parametric EQ. Horrible UI though, but you'll get used to it after a while
@@mokapot8779 Agreed, so hard to navigate lol but glad for the auto eq
I can't give enough thumbs up. I have the Pixel Buds Pro (shame on me 🤣) and recently discovered that in the audiophile community they are pretty "disliked". I don't have any good audio gear and always wanted to listen to "well sounding" headphones. Just imported the harman eq for my buds and didn't hear any difference at first. But then I realized. What on earth are these high hats?! They suddenly sound like real ones and not those weird ishhsss and zzzzss' that I heard before.
This video saved me from asking, what I could miss and if its worth buying some more expensive headphones or not.
Best tutorial I have seen for eq with all the demos and descriptions you made at the frequences so far.
Ok wow, thank you for this.
On my Logitech G Pro X it made it too quiet after auto EQ, which I figured was the pre-amp being at -6.8. I put that to 0 and activated Peace's automatic anti-peaking option instead, which I hope does the job. It's way too quiet otherwise.
But oh god it sounds so much better now, it feels like the audio equivalent of putting on glasses.
Well nevermind, that auto anti-peak just sets it down and keeps it there, it's not as active as I imagined.
I'll have to lose some volume to use the config, but it IS a lot better.
This tool is so dope. I now have a profile that matches the Dusk to the B2 (just to see what it sounds like) and also a Harman 2019 v2 Dusk curve that is VEIL REMOVING imo. It's revealed a few mistakes on some songs that I never heard before haha
where to download this tool because on the website there is only description
Extension is just how I like it. Instruments like cymbals just sound amazing.
If ur on apple get the music player app hs player, it’s basically built for audiophiles, it has a 10 band eq and preamp control, it’s amazing, it made my kz’s last longer before I upgraded and realized they were average
can't seem to find it anywhere, how did you download it?
Been using it for a few days and the sound quality is great.
The explanation on the different frequencies was really helpful, Thanks.
It baffles me how so many vinyl enthusiasts have never heard of the RIAA EQ curve. Vinyl is literally a compressed audio standard, yet many enthusiasts are in denial about that.
I have used Poweramp for many years now, it's a SERIOUS music player, brilliantly customizable, you can go into settings and increase volume adjustment (levels) steps from 30 to 100, you can have a 5 band graphic equalizer, or a 31 (or any amount of bars between), two different types 'Graphic' or 'Parametric'. You get a fee trial, and it's only a coupla £/$ to get full Poweramp. It really is a BRILLIANT app! Skins, visualizers, crossfade settings, Resampler settings, so many tunable/customisable settings. Love it! If you have an Android phone, give it a try, it may very well become your essential media player app.... 👍 😎🇬🇧
should poweramps parametric eq be set to "envelope" or "cascade" when using autoeq settings?
@@MondayMoustache To be honest, not sure off top of my head, will check and get back to you 🤔
@@MondayMoustache This is what I have found on Poweramp forum, hope this helps. I personally don't use 'Auto EQ' feature as I have set my graphic up to max 31 bands, however... Admittedly Crinacle's video on this matter has peaked my interest, so I'll be looking into this myself... 😏
@@thedarkknight1971 thanks! I assume a preset would be made for one of the settings and not the other so i'm unsure what the "proper" overlap setting is for autoeq presets
@@MondayMoustache No probs. But, again, something I've not played with yet (haha even after all these years using Poweramp lol). I've usually stuck with the basics (well, a 'basic 31 bar graphic - basic lol) and then tuned my Sony's and Sennheisers to my taste (I agree with Crinacle, NOTHING wrong with setting your own EQ - as long as you don't go mad). And then I save my separate personal presets for each genre of music I usually listen to. If you haven't yet, go into Poweramp, SETTINGS, AUDIO, GRAPHIC, then set 32 bands, then I usually set LOWEST as 10 and HIGHEST as 20,000. Then, it's little adjustments at a time, and I NEVER have the "Stereo Expand" or, any of the Reverb, Hall, Concert, Room, Theatre or whatever, on at all (as can mess with the stereo sound and quality of output to headphones/IEMs etc... ☺️
Thank you, Wavelet helped me a lot. The default tuning of the Sony WF1000XM4S sucked. I tried fixing it myself using the EQ built into the Sony app, but Wavelet did it much better with AutoEQ.
Just found your channel this past week... love your humor and knowledge man! We would be great friends!! keep grinding.
Thank you very much :) For a long time now I have had a problem that certain frequencies create a resonance in my livingroom. But now with this windows EQ that is fixed. I have been in the dark for years :(
Love your work! Thanks! Just starting to understand some things. It's amazing how little I knew a few years back, and most people know almost nothing about sound. Just like me in the past, believing my Razer Kraken Pros were good for music, and after that I got a HyperX headset and was amazed and hated Razer and their intense marketing. After that I learned a few things here and there and got myself Audio Technica ATH-M50x. The difference was amazing and I fell in love. Sadly, my dog chewed those to pieces. Now after 2 years I managed to gather the funds for the BeyerDynamic DT 770 Pro. I am very happy. I don't believe they're necessarily the best but they are more than enough! I hope I keep learning and in the future look to myself right now as ignorant!
I'm using Wavelet on my Android for a year now, really love it!!!.. I don't need to EQ everything, most of the time I just crank the Buffer size slider to max at 8192 samples and not using EQ at all.. And boy it make a big difference, in a good way.. yeah the latency for bluetooth device will be bad, but it's still good for music or movie, and I'm using wired IEM most of the time anyway..
Well I'm a noob in term of EQ or audio, so if I want to use auto EQ, for bass tune I'm using Grado Hemp or Ibasso IT04 for mid range, and done with it.. lol
Holy cow wavelet is great, thanks!
For iOS there is EQE which requires a jailbreak. It features unlimited parametric eq bands, and a AutoEQ feature where the parametric profiles are being loaded 👍🏻
Unfortunately its pretty useless for anyone with modern iDevices. I feel like a uberpoorPleb myself when comparing viperfx on my android with nothing else on ipad pro :(
@@maxpayne69. latest public jealbreak is with ios 14.8 A13 or older. I would not consider an iphone 11 old. But not the newest yes
@@Moootin Exactly that. My older 2020 ipad air 4 (A14) runs 15.4 and Ipad pro m1 is on the current latest, both lie outside of JB domain :( :(
Its a crying shame an "advanced OS" like ios cannot give support for system-wide EQ (though there's sound signature change support (boosting vocals/treble/bass for headphones featuring the apple H1 chip! Arrgh )
Super helpful video, really been loving your info as I'm getting started on this audiophile journey, they've been super helpful.
Awesome! I have been using APO since your previous video and it has been very helpful (my current headphones are very muddy), and this is more of a tutorial on how to actually do it yourself. Thanks!
Easy and straightforward instructions. Thx a lot !
DT770 user here - throwing the IR file for it into APO did all I'd have wanted it to do: Shovel away at Mt Beyer and fix the low end. Just dope.
If you're on Mac, use eqMac. They've got the autoeq presets already loaded in.
Approved....
Is it free?
@@OcaOca You can use it for free, but to get access to the "expert" equalizer (and the autoeq presets) you need to pay $3 a month. I think it is worth it though. It is a very well made application.
proooooo thank you sooo much ❤❤❤
i have a kz x hbb pr2 iem
now its much better 😁
thanks from all of my heart 💗
I highly recommend Headphone EQ by MathAudio. Much more easy and way more accurate than any other method. Corrects the impedance mismatch between transducer and your ear canal/ear drum. I use it all the time together with Equalizer APO. Without proper ear adjustment any headphone will always sound wrong. You are not the average of any target curve!
Agree! Same goes for your headphones/earphones. Get a measurement setup and measure before and after EQ to ensure you are hitting the target you intend to. Your set isn’t someone else’s measured set!
Very interesting program. Like an advanced version of a tone generator. Do you just take the filters you made and put them into APO? I wonder how effective the crossfeed feature is, considering you can also use it in APO.
@@Luinitari It kinda becomes unnecessary to do measurements. All you do is correct the target of your given headphone to your ear. But sure if you can afford it buy some rig. Although its not as straight forward as one might think with those.
@@JBT97 It can export a config file for APO yes. The crossfeed is the best sounding I've ever heard. It's a great plugin. I have it on my EQ APO as a VST always and switch between different EQ profiles that way.
@@Perenbarn Well, I have measured multiple sets of the same make and model earphone, and process variation is real and can be significant. You can also see that without making your own measurements by finding earphone models on Crinacle’s site where he has multiple copies measured and comparing them.
I really enjoy your work. Thank you for your thoughtful and concise teaching!
3:29 Rohsa is cultured.
Im fairly new to this and this helped me a lot! best video ever thanks!
I was very wary about using eq at first but now its the most fun thing in this hobby since getting new headphones. you can have just bass and nothing else or just highs and nothing else, this shit was hilarious even if your not going to use it practically. even said that I do use it practically but on;y when actually listening to songs. its a bit of a hassle to open every time for gaming or just watching videos
I didn't know much about EQing, then got into it first when custom tuning a set of earbuds using a free app. The earbuds were unlocked (i.e. EarFunFree Pro 2) and able to be tuned with my Android phone (Samsung GS10+) using an app called "AirReps15 6x" to establish a persistent 10-band default tuning. Before doing this, I first found a Pink Noise site and used my headphones to identify my personal resonant ear canal frequency (i.e. 6000Hz...I am over 50...so the frequency is on the low side, I suppose). Once I had my resonant frequency as reference, I used third party presets from another TH-camr (Oluv's Gadgets). In any event, the earbuds went from sounding like crap to sounding terrific.
This set me on a path to discover how I could do this using my PC as the music source and also able to deliver lossless quality. As I use a Windows 10 Pro PC, I needed a proper solution and chose the FiiO BTA30Pro, which has TX, RX, and DAC modes...so I can use it wireless OR wired.
When wired, I choose DAC mode to feed an AMP (Yamaha CR-420 receiver or Nakamichi SR-2E receiver).
When Wireless, I set the BTA30Pro in TX mode and settle for AptX Adaptive (codec) using my IEM BT5.2 earhooks (KZ AZ09 Pro's). The earhooks I marry to a variety to IEM's (e.g. S12, T3+, Oilna, HeartMirror, etc.). However, here I need to leverage EqualizerAPO with Peace (a user friendly GUI), both are free EQing software. I have taken presets from GITHUB's AutoEQ for most of my IEM's plus my planar headphones (HE400se, when cabled to my receiver) and it works like a charm. The instructions are simple for a non-programmer and the setup was pretty fast.
Using an EQ, I can confirm that Shure IEMs can play frequencies above 10 kHz. Who knew?
I used to be one of those people who believed that if I had to EQ I bought the wrong product. Now I see it as "fixing the engineers' mistakes". Dead-neutral with a bass boost (what I prefer) seems hard to do right on an engineering level but the end-user can pick up the slack with minimal effort.
Oh man I love eq peace gui apo all day long I love it to death complete game changer for all my media consumption needs with my Ifi zen stack and lcd2 and cascades love it love it love it
I have a set of the akg n400s and use EQ because I like a little more bass than they come with. I've always been a fan of EQ make bad head phones decent, decent headphones good, and good headphones great.
Most useful video crinical ever made!
Me: sounds neat. Probably don't need it because i don't care about sound THAT much. But maybe i'll humor him and use the literally free app.
Me 10 minutes later: ... Forgive me for ignoring your bday present to me for 3 months. I am unworthy.
Thanks for giving EQ its due respect. More should be delved into such as testing and compensating for our left and right ear capabilities with all frequencies. Especially since left and right ears can be significantly different we require stereo EQ. I would care more about what a so called non EQ using “purist” reviewer thinks if I knew their individual hearing capability profile… for both ears. THEN we can talk.
Just curious: how would I be able to figure out my own "individual hearing capability profile… for both ears?"
"testing and compensating for our left and right ear capabilities with all frequencies". You really need an extra hobby, dude. You've gone too far, and it's high time somebody told you so. Pull back from the audio a little and try something new for a while. I think it will be good for you.
i'm nowhere near audio expert or an audiophile but EQ really turn my cheap speaker to something different lol, like it's muddy and bloated bass, it doesn't even good for watching movie, but after EQ-ing and turn that High freq slider a little bit high and lower the bass freq a little bit (using Walk Through the Park for reference), it become "listenable" and pretty good for watching movie. but if you really have a pretty bad shit like for once i try to use $1 earphone, no matter how much you turn that EQ slider up or down, it'll still sound like dogwater :D
Thanks, my HD6xx now feel...the same, but a small bit more clearer? Neat.
If you’re on iOS buy a Qudelix 5k and use the equalizer in app. Really the only option you have.
This is the best EQ video ever!!!!
I always have a inner conflict with myself when crinacle uploads I want to listen to music but I want to watch his video hmmmm the winner today is crinacle
Nice Food for Thought video for experimentation! Thank you
Holy fuck. This greatly improved my sound quality. Thank you so much!!!
I usually do EQ by ear so hi-fi music and movies sound perfect to me. I mix music a lot so I hear what needs tweaking for my taste at least. I just did EQ on my audio-technica ATH-E40 and the 4 kHz range ( I cut -13 dB) which was the biggest problem. It sounds much more realistic now. That standard high midrange boost probably made it easier to hear if on a loud stage, but in the studio it should not be there...
good points you made but I still find EQing or using Auto EQ profiles kind of a hassle. When I change my headphones I have to change my profile too and I usually forget that. Also reliability of measurements or unit variance is a thing. Not every 8k peak is a 'peak' for example. In this sense Resolve's video touched these topics better. In the end I think you find a headphone you mostly like and try to change the little things you don't like with eq. Trying x band eq to see what each frequency does to your particular headphone is a good idea and a big step to EQing by ear.
Measurement is not a problem unless you have crin, oratory etc. Also i trust yours yoo because they look more stable allways to me. This eq completely changed the buying behaviours. For example if i was in this hobby 10 years before, i would be just care about tuning and comfort. Now im just looking for distance from the target on iems and headphones(no peaks or cuts bigger than 10db). If they give more technicalitites, who cares about the tuning?
It's about time someone did a video on this subject. Well done.
There's one thing you mentioned that isn't clear to me. That part about not boosting past your gain. How do you figure out what that value is? With a "audiophile" device like a dongle or dac/amp (be it desktop or portable) or a DAP, there's probably a datasheet or something? But what about a basic device like your phone?
P.S. - Also, props for linking to your suggested EQing tools. Haven't heard of the ones you suggest for Android. I've been using one that AFAIK is just called "Equalizer". Ten bands, but the bands are fixed i.e. you can't customize the wavelengths, but you can make your own custom EQs using those fixed bands. Seems to work well enough.
Almost at 100k again, it really is meant to be
The hatred towards EQ of traditional audiophiles was probably "manufactured" by the high-end audio industry to keep die-hard audiophiles in the rabbit hole of never-ending quest for perfect gear and hence constant buying. 😂. But seriously now, I'm not old enough but I've read that the analog EQ of decades past had unwanted "side-effects" on the sound, so there's that. But present-day EQ is in the digital domain, but I guess some people have been stuck in the past, so to speak. It's not unusual for me to hear people say "not a fan of EQ" without any specific reason. If these folks want to spend big money on expensive tweaks and worse, snake oil, well it's their money, who are we to tell them what to do with it.
Let the fools be fools
I like using EQ with software like voicemeeter banana, it's just too bad I can't get EQ working with this program in the video. I import an EQ file and it sounds exactly the same.
i use a frankenstein- wall of sound audio system. all loudspeakers have volume control, so i can set the tweeters, mids, sub, transient favoring and steady tone favouring speakers independantly and adjust their positioning independantly.
I've used Poweramp since 2014. By far the best equalizer and player I have ever come across for Android. I highly recommend getting it and it's super easy and customizable.
Do you use the parametric mode? Should it be set to "envelope" or "cascade" when using autoeq? I can't find anything online about this
@@MondayMoustache use the envelope
@@Mishael_Agyei-Boamah i thought other parametric eq's were cascade so i was confused by envelope being default, ill need to find out which one is more accurate to autoeq curves
As an audio engineer, EQ is pretty much on everything so I’ve never really cared about people EQing
damn I just appreciated my DT990 more. thank you so much!
I have been using a personal approach to equalize my headphones or earphones, I used it before I knew that the AutoEQ existed and still use it for models that are not in the database. First I create a file with white noise, e.g. in Audacity, and then separate it into individual bands using 31 band EQ, i.e. attenuate all bands except for one and save multiple files. Then I scan these files with a Replay Gain which should make the perception volume of these files pretty equal, I guess this step may be omitted if I used pink noise instead. Then I play these individual band limited files of noise and compare them in terms of loudness to each other and change the level of each frequency band respectively, the result is often pretty good, though it is not as accurate as using appropriate measuring techniques and using a parametric or a graphic 127 band EQ. (I prefer the AutoEQ to this technique if the phones are in the database.) I also use it sometimes to the addition of the AutoEQ if I replace my original earpads which also changes the sound signature, they sometimes provide more EQ profiles for some headphones with different earpads.
God Damn this Video Just made my Headphones sound sooo much better. I have the Roccat Syn pro air and it was bothering me how the highs sounded :)
A smaller graph database but with noncapped graph amount is squig link
Yo, this was a God send, thank you so much.
I used while doing work and I enjoyed it to a point I was nodding and head budding.
Poweramp all the way! It Fixed my phone to car speaker interface!
I might have to check out your program.
It's pronounced Yaakko. Jacko was a completely different dude.
doing this made me realize my headphones came perfectly tuned to my liking as default
I am actually pretty annoyed with myself for not, at the very least, doing the braindead steps for EQ. This is truly opened my headphones, and soon IEMs. THANK YOU papa Crin. Fuck o--
EQ creates phase distortion.. Issues I have is it changes the phasing and I can hear it, best bet for me personally is find a setup I like that does my idea naturally but sometimes EQ can be fun to mess with! :)
I love his take on audiophiles and their feelings on EQ when he is the absolute biggest and most virulent attacker of EQ and headphones being trash until you EQ them. A lot of headphones don’t take to eq at all and some are marvelous. But the out of the box tuning was trash so the whole thing is trash lol this man just likes to trigger folks and I’m one of those triggered. Lol I subscribed just so I can hear his takes and get mad.