[Merkurio]

Why manufacturers are afraid to offer a proper alternative to the Qudelix-5K with their fantastic app and superb PEQ capabilities?

It's because an app development is too expensive or complicated for them, or they don't want to let the users to fine adjust the sound at their liking?

Maybe it's because this would wipe out most of the snake oil claims that surrounds these products between users (around sound differences) and then slow down the sales of the "next big thing"?

I dream about something with the technical engineering, design and build of the L&P W2 with the app and capabilities of the Qudelix-5K and I can't help but get depressed about the current state of the market, albeit well, I guess we get what we deserve, the same little bricks appealing to folks who prefer to imagine the sound differences instead of experiencing them with PEQ...

 

[ClieOS]

I personally see it the other way around. It doesn't speak well for other manufacturers of course, but the real point of the story is how outstanding the programming skill of Qudelix's engineer has that is still impossible for other manufacturers to catch up just yet.

There are also the bigger picture as well - read about COVID and chips shortage much? Many manufacturers are more or less trying to keep afloat as it is and not putting out much resources to develop the next thing for the very real risk of tanking the company.

 

[Merkurio]

I personally see it the other way around. It doesn't speak well for other manufacturers of course, but the real point of the story is how outstanding the programming skill of Qudelix's engineer has that is still impossible for other manufacturers to catch up just yet.

It seems to be the case, indeed.

There are also the bigger picture as well - read about COVID and chips shortage much? Many manufacturers are more or less trying to keep afloat as it is and not putting out much resources to develop the next thing for the very real risk of tanking the company.

That's a valid point too, but I guess some form of primitive PEQ would be possible nonetheless with enough interest from manufacturers, maybe not with the sophistication of the Qudelix app of course, but hey, maybe a way to import settings through a text file or using the resources from the AutoEQ GitHub repo?

What bothers me is to see that there's no progress in this regard over time aside from Qudelix, nor an apparent interest on the part of other manufacturers, which led me to speculate on the possible causes.

 

[emilsoft]

I keep raising this to different manufacturers and challenging them from Ifi, to Cayin (RU6) on their forum threads - i just get excuses from them, oh we don't believe in DSP or digital eq, or thats just no our focus blah blah... it's very frustrating. They just can't be bothered to put in the effort. The only close "desktop" alternative we have is the RME ADI2; at least there I can't say the manufacturer couldn't be bothered... the Mojo 2 has some eq but it's very basic 4 wide bands, at least something is better than nothing. Apart from this the situation is dire.

Qudelix obviously have put in some very hard work - their app is fantastic, and the good integration between software and hardware is not easy. They even provide a Chrome plugin! There just isn't anyone out there who is willing to put in the hard work, they're happy to churn out dongle after dongle. Software development effort is almost always underestimated, I can see how hardware manufacturers crap their pants if they dip their toe in multi platform software dev.

PEQ is such a huge deal, and if coupled with portable dac and amplifier it's a much more powerful tool than the minute DAC differences manufacturers churn out. Not enough people realise this but I can see Qudelix's popularity might change things.

 

[Andrew_WOT]

Don't blame them, even in audiophile community not everyone is on board with DSP. Seems more like a recent trend advocated mostly by the ill advised newcomers to the hobby.
Plus there are always options for EQ in players, UAPP even has PEQ.