Can't you just correct any problems in sound signature with EQ??

[helicopter34234]

Everyone compares headphone X to headphone Y and says that X is brighter, more emphasized mids, etc., I prefer using headphone X for classical and headphone Y for rock, etc. Well if a particular headphone does not emphasize the treble or does not emphasize the bass, can't you just "fix" this sound signature with your equalizer. Now I do understand that if a headphone is incapable of producing lets say really low bass (like cheap buds) you can turn up the bass all day and all you will get is garbage. Or if the headphone legitimately has problems at certain frequencies then turning up the volume at that frequency isn’t going to fix it. But I would imagine that any expensive set of headphones should be capable of quality reproduction at every audible frequency and the difference between headphone X and Y is their difference frequency response curves. Well if you set your equalizer curve to be the inverse of the frequency response curve shouldn’t you get a perfectly flat response from your audio. Or if you want to emphasize the highs for one particular genre of music then you can do that, why would you need to change headphones??

I was just playing with the EQ on my Zen Vision to significantly change the sound signature of my SA6’s. Now granted I know the EQ on the Zen probably isn’t the best, you can only set values at like 6 different frequencies (I imagine they interpolate in between then values) but to me I could set it to where I really enjoyed the music more.

I know that you probably couldn’t take one headphone and make it sound exactly like another headphone by tweaking the EQ’s but I would bet that you could get pretty damn close. Am I wrong???

 

[catscratch]

In theory, you should be able to adjust FR using EQ to fix specific problems if your EQ was perfectly accurate. But in practice, it doesn't really work that way. You need a very accurate EQ to model the inverse of the FR irregularities in your headphone, and more importantly, you also need to know the FR irregularities in your headphones, and measuring headphone FR accurately is very difficult. Headphone FR isn't equivalent to speaker FR, and a headphone that sounds flat to you (let's not forget that headphones do sound different to different people) will not measure flat, if somehow you get your hands on a perfect way to couple a microphone to a headphone. You also need an EQ that doesn't add any distortion to the signal, which simply doesn't exist for the most transparent, resolving headphones that can easily let you know the sound of your signal path. You may also be dealing with a lot of problems that don't stem from FR irregularities - i.e. slow impulse response, poor energy dissipation, poor resolution, soundstaging capabilities, imaging, etc. These aren't problems that an equalizer, even a theoretically perfect one, would solve.

Also, if you think that all high-end headphones are free from basic issues with sound reproduction, you've got an unpleasant surprise coming. Some high-end headphones are certainly flawless enough to fit into that category, but not all.

Equalizers are more of a band-aid fix than anything else. Though I'm a self-confessed minimalist when it comes to system building, I'm not opposed to equalizer use when the system calls for it. But, IMO it's easier to put together a rig that doesn't need EQ in the first place.

 

[helicopter34234]

But you don't necassarily need to perfectly match the inverse of the FR curve, couldn't you just tweak it by ear until it doesn't sound any difference than your other set of headphones. I know thing like soundstage and imaging can't be solved (I guess this has to do with abilities in the phone accurately reproducing phase information also, but I'm not sure) but I brought this up after reading reviews of people comparing my SA6's with other IEMs in the price range and saying that this IEM you can hear vocals better, etc. I would guess that you could play with the EQ where the average person then couldn't tell the difference in sound signature.

 

[s4nder]

Exactly. There's much more to sound than just frequency response. You can't create details or a soundstage with an EQ when there aren't any in the first place. I'm a little bit of a purist so for me EQ is the devil and I'll never use it. It's so flawed.

 

[moogoob]

Some headphones don't like EQing as much as others. Grados, for example. My older Sennheiser DH280 Pros, on the other hand, would take whatever you threw at them. Unfortunately, the EQ settings I had were apparently trying to make them sound like Grados.

 

[ourfpshero]

i agree w/moogoob. i had hd280s and agree that they take whatever u throw at them, the same with some audio technicas. however, my akg240 does not like a lot of eq-ing, neither do my older senn hd565s.

 

[b0dhi]

Quote:

Originally Posted by helicopter34234 /img/forum/go_quote.gif But you don't necassarily need to perfectly match the inverse of the FR curve, couldn't you just tweak it by ear until it doesn't sound any difference than your other set of headphones. I know thing like soundstage and imaging can't be solved (I guess this has to do with abilities in the phone accurately reproducing phase information also, but I'm not sure) but I brought this up after reading reviews of people comparing my SA6's with other IEMs in the price range and saying that this IEM you can hear vocals better, etc. I would guess that you could play with the EQ where the average person then couldn't tell the difference in sound signature.

It is possible (google Smyth HRTF for example) The problem with this is that it would take an assload of effort to do it manually. You could use a high quality EQ with, say, 512 or 1024 bands, and do a sine sweep as you correct each band so it sounds perceptually flat. I plan on doing this when I get some time. Should be very interesting.

 

[wavoman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by catscratch /img/forum/go_quote.gif ... You also need an EQ that doesn't add any distortion to the signal, which simply doesn't exist for the most transparent, resolving headphones that can easily let you know the sound of your signal path. You may also be dealing with a lot of problems that don't stem from FR irregularities - i.e. slow impulse response, poor energy dissipation, poor resolution, soundstaging capabilities, imaging, etc. These aren't problems that an equalizer, even a theoretically perfect one, would solve...

Well said! This is the reason that the Smyth system uses Stax -- you need a good (very good) headphone to begin with, then you can play with EQ.

You will react to resolution and transient response far more than a flat FR. Sure, roll-off of bass or treble before your hearing rolls off is annoying, and so are pronounced regions of emphasis in the mid-range, but when I give non-headfi'ers my cans to listen to, their mouths drop open at the details and the sharp transients, not the flatness of the FR. Not even the additional bass really impresses them, since they are so used to boosting that with EQ on their crappy rigs.

Here's an experiment: take say a 701, with its superb detail and transients, and skew its FR on purpose with your EQ machine. Kill the bass and treble. Listen for a while so your brain groks the new frequency emphasis (or lack thereof). You'll find you soon love the music again, way more than a cheap HP that now matches the (altered) FR of the 701, but is defective in these other ways.

Honestly, try it. I have. You will be amazed. It's the resolution and the impulse response that makes for great listening.

 

[helicopter34234]

I guess I have a lot to learn (be corrupted by). I have yet to hear a good headphone hi-fi system first hand. I grew up with a hi-fi dad with about $10K of electrostaics speakers abd good amps/pre yet I never paid much attention (maybe its in the blood). I was previously listening to bose IE’s (was a gift, not my idea) and Senn SD497 (gift from dad) and recently I bought SA6’s (I maintain that this was a good first purchase as most of my listening is portable through a zen vision M in a very noisy environment), My next purchase I predict to be a Zero DAC/Amp after realizing that my motherboard+built in sound card has optical out ports.

 

[Shahrose]

having been a member on head-fi for 2 years and a reader for 4, i have to tell you, if you have a technically capable headphone and a good software or, preferably, a good hardware eq, it's an excellent method to reduce/remove a headphone's flaws. i'm not looking for perfect accuracy (whatever that means), i'm looking for the most natural sound. to this day i eq all my headphones (the less you have to eq the better) and try to make the headphone sound like what i would hear in real life (which is what i mean by having natural sound). for the most part, i've been able to achieve this. it took a lot of time to get the most natural sound but it was a journey well worth the result.

furthermore, i've made my dt990 sound like an hd650 by carefully comparing their 2 FR on headroom, and their sounds were actually quite close in the end. and no, there was no quality degradation or distortion i could hear, and i'm a stickler when it comes to that. i've tried DSPs, crossfeed and other such features, and found that they all hurt sound quality in some way (reduce dynamics, constrict soundstage etc) but using a good equalizer and having some prior experience will yield very favourable results with no quality loss.

i have to stress though, there are bad equalizers out there (on ipod/dap and primitive software eq's) that don't give you enough control, or add some distortion to the sound. another point that needs to be emphasized is that the headphone needs to be very good technically. if you're trying to make it sound like another headphone, you'll need to have the same or better dynamics, extension, openness, impulse response etc. moreoever, some headphones respond to eq'ing better (dt990/hd650) than others (grados).

also, as a sidenote, when using an equalizer, don't boost the frequency bands you want more of, instead, reduce the other ones. so for example if you wanted to increase treble, you wouldn't touch the treble bands, you would reduce the midrange and bass. so cut down, don't boost up, otherwise you'll get clipping and other distortion.

 

[wavoman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shahrose /img/forum/go_quote.gif ... it took a lot of time to get the most natural sound but it was a journey well worth the result. ... i've tried DSPs, crossfeed and other such features, and found that they all hurt sound quality in some way (reduce dynamics, constrict soundstage etc) but using a good equalizer and having some prior experience will yield very favourable results with no quality loss. ... you'll need to have the same or better dynamics, extension, openness, impulse response etc. ... also, as a sidenote, when using an equalizer, don't boost certain frequency bands, instead, reduce the other ones. so for example if you wanted to increase treble, you wouldn't touch the treble bands, you would reduce the midrange and bass. so cut down don't boost up. otherwise you'll get clipping and other distortion.

Four great points! I've cut-and-pasted into my permanent "hints" doc. Thank you!! Now -- the all important question -- what Equalizer did you use??

 

[Shahrose]

Quote:

Originally Posted by wavoman /img/forum/go_quote.gif Four great points! I've cut-and-pasted into my permanent "hints" doc. Thank you!! Now -- the all important question -- what Equalizer did you use??

i actually used the 18 band foobar equalizer through my soundcard (listed in my sig...one of the best soundcards available for music). now i know what you're thinking..."software eq with a soundcard, that wouldn't sound so great" . however, i've compared it to my friend's Behringer 15 band equalizer through his stereo music amp and, honestly, it didn't really make a difference in sound quality compared to the foobar software eq.

(in going from an 18 to 15 band eq and a different amp, the sound was slightly different in tonality as the exact same level of adjustment couldn't be made on both, but i got it sufficiently close to be able to compare)

 

[JamesL]

EQ'ing your music is like photoshopping a picture. If it's too dull, you can saturate it, and bring out the color, but if you're looking at the picture through a 1970 television set with flicker or interlacing, it still won't look it's best.
Like previously noted, it's a good way of sorta 'hiding' a headphone's flaws.. but you won't get the kind of resolution you would get from a high-quality headphone setup.

 

[Shahrose]

Quote:

Originally Posted by JamesL /img/forum/go_quote.gif EQ'ing your music is like photoshopping a picture. If it's too dull, you can saturate it, and bring out the color, but if you're looking at the picture through a 1970 television set with flicker or interlacing, it still won't look it's best. Like previously noted, it's a good way of sorta 'hiding' a headphone's flaws.. but you won't get the kind of resolution you would get from a high-quality headphone setup.

agreed. eq'ing will never add to the sound quality. all it does is tailor the tonality/frequency response to the listener's preferences.

 

[moogoob]

This thread's got me to go buy new pads for my HD280s, as the old ones have been falling apart. They sound really great with just a little EQing in iTunes, and this is from a guy who's been used to SR325is for the last fer months. Their mids are still grainy, but some decreasing in volume clears up their honkiness. This way, these phones beat my 325is in bass quantity and quality. It's highs, though, they couldn't touch.

Still great closed phones for the price.