BEST crossfeed plugin for foobar 0.8.3??

[Azultra]

I can't live without bs2b

.

And no, crossfeed doesn't only reduce fatigue. There's an audiofool myth that says that only old recordings benefit from it, while in fact almost every music recording you'll hear in your whole life is stereophonic thus not made for headphones. Perception of the same sound is different whether your hear it from "free" and distant speakers or from headphones ( see the bs2b main page ). In fact noone should use headphones without crossfeed.

 

[cooperpwc]

Foobar really needs a programable crossfeed like one finds on Rockbox. I stopped using the naivesoftware crossfeed once I got my DT880s. It was great with cheaper headphones but it was killing the soundstage on the Beyers.

This Dolby processor look interesting, I'll try that when I get back to my headfi system.

 

[hew]

I have a pretty decent rig and I was very pleased with the sound I was getting until I started playing around with plugins and realize the potential. A properly implemented plugin can make a world of difference and the Dolby
Headphone wrapper is darn close IMO.

 

[Alleyman]

I must say I came in here ready to denounce the Dolby wrapper because I had tried it earlier. However I added the stereo>4 channels and the 50% amp in the mix and I must say I like what I hear.

Bs2B still holds the forte in presenting a closer to source mix but Dolby comes darn close in speaker representation. Now I plan to just switch between the two presets depending on my mood

edit: Those looking for a legal way to get the 'dolbyhph.dll' file can download the trial version of Nvidia's PureVideo decoder and scrounge the dll out of the program folder.

 

[hijodeltiger]

I tried the Dolby trick hew posted and liked what I heard. I have one gripe against it, Equalizer doesn't want to play nice. Where do I place it?

I say this because I tried playing track 7 of the Ultrasone CD and some weird clipping issue appeared at the beginning of the song with the deep bass.

 

[hew]

Did you set the amp at 50% as suggested? It seems, this should prevent clipping at a small loss of resolution. If this did not help you may want to read/post your question to the ongoing thread on hydrogenaudio:

http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/...howtopic=39404

 

[DDF]

Quote:

Originally Posted by hew /img/forum/go_quote.gif Try Dolby Headphone Wrapper DSP, foo_dsp_dolbyhp in Foobar2000.

I just gave this a try with stereo cds and found it to be a pretty impressive bit of processing. It really takes the ambience naturally found in the recording and removes it from the direct sound, placing it more naturally as a room signature. You really notice this on vocals, I've never heard Satch sound so good. Its a bit of a self-contradiction, in that detail is less in the hifi sense, but for small ensemble, the over-all sense of clarity of the performance as a whole is higher, more realistic.

It does have some side effects, especially on classical where string sections become the proverbial giant violin, and it softens the tonal balance, adding quite alot of warmth and removing micro-detail.

Still, for non symphonic music, this is a keeper. Thanks for posting it.

A bit off topic, but is there a freeware DVD player that could accept audio dll plug ins? I'd love to hear this work on real 5 channel audio.

 

[Alleyman]

I would also suggest users to try out the "live room" setting. IMO it brings the vocals forward a bit.

 

[musicmind]

Quote:

Originally Posted by hew /img/forum/go_quote.gif Try Dolby Headphone Wrapper DSP, foo_dsp_dolbyhp in Foobar2000. Here is the thread on Hygrogenaudio forum: http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/...howtopic=39404 It goes beyond what the standard crossfeed tries to do in that "it makes you think you are hearing a five-speaker home theater system, when in fact you are listening over ordinary stereo headphones." The concensus is that in Foobar2000 the order Convert to 4 channels ---> Dolby Headphone is the best configuration. In the plugin itself set room as DH1, Amplification at 50% and point it to dolbyhph.dll version 1.10.0.270 on your computer if you have a software based dvd player like PowerDVD installed. This dll was developed by the Lake division of Dolby Labs. See this link for more on the concept: http://www.dolby.com/consumer/techno...one_story.html What this plugin does is not subtle and so far I have not pinned down anything significant that it does wrong - no muffling of images, loss of detail, narrowing of soundstage width or frequency range. The soudstage is moved outside your head to such an extent that it now resembles listening to a good surround sound system. Listener fatigue is nil and I now find it hard to remove my headphones. I have not heard any of the hardware based crossfeeds but IMO it is far better than bs2b, which I first tried.

Hi

Thanks for posting this
I just gave this a try and I'm really enjoying the results

Really brings out acoustic double bass beautifully and adds pleasant ambience without being overpowering.
I was using bs2b with winamp but this foobar setup is really lovely to listen to with my HD595s.

For those needing the file "dolbyhph.dll", this link might help :

http://www.down-dll.com/index.html?f...d/dolbyhph.dll

Cheers

 

[cjs]

I suggest removing the "0.8.3" from the thread title since Skipyrich has a Channel Mixer version for foobar 0.9 and Chungalin's dolby headphone wrapper works with 0.9.

I have been playing with different settings and I think a very good result is possible when using the DH wrapper which includes the option to disable dynamic compression (see page 4 in the hydrogenaudio thread).

I will post my settings a little later.

 

[musicmind]

The storeandserve.com site kept giving me "permission" errors when I tried to download.
If anyone else if having that problem, you can also get the file (foo_dsp_dolbyhp) here :
http://pelit.koillismaa.fi/plugins/show.php?id=132

 

[hijodeltiger]

Can anyone try a little something I found out about the wrapper and EQ on foobar?
Enable the equalizer and raise 15dB (or 10, if you don't feel like going that high) on the 55Hz. Try putting the Equalizer before and after the Dolby wrapper. Do you hear the difference?
Before, it sounds like the volume is lowered in the moment of bass impact.
After, i get clipping.
What are your thoughts on this? I ask because I like using foobar's EQ (though not at the levels aforementioned) and I started to wonder how much sound I'm losing by doing this.

 

[cjs]

Quote:

Originally Posted by musicmind /img/forum/go_quote.gif The storeandserve.com site kept giving me "permission" errors when I tried to download. If anyone else if having that problem, you can also get the file (foo_dsp_dolbyhp) here : http://pelit.koillismaa.fi/plugins/show.php?id=132

Unfortunately, the storeandserve.com link is the only one with the version which includes the "dynamic compression" flag.

 

[cjs]

Here are my best settings. Links to all necessary components are in previous posts (special note to musicmind's link to dolbyhph.dll version 1.10.0.270).

Of all the software crossfeed solutions I have tried, this maintains the highest fidelity. What do you think?

 

[Alleyman]

Below are the settings for the 5.1 conversion that sounded best to my ears. Using the configuration posted above, the center channel was lost, giving a very wide stereo image. IMO that would defeat the purpose of crossfeed since it induces listener fatigue. Just some options to try

Ps: Delays are optional, the upmix is the most important bit anyway.