[eightbitpotion]

Hey guys, I had a really hard time finding this stuff, and finally stumbled across it.  So I wanted to host it for anyone that wants it.  The credit goes to RPGWiZaRD here on Head-Fi, but the hosted files were removed for some reason.  Anyway, this is a great config, and as someone that avoids EQs, plugins, and various other gimmicky methods to make your music sound better, I wouldn't listen to my collection without this.
 
Foobar w/ Dolby Preconfiguration
 
Also, all credit and a special thanks goes to RPGWiZaRD.

 

[RPGWiZaRD]

Yea I should be updating the thread with working links, my dropbox account has been overloaded with traffic as a result.  

I've been so busy with my youtube channel promoting and mastering a lot of newcomers tracks within the somewhat more uncommon genre Hardstyle music that I've forgot about the thread. I'm almost passing 40k subscriber mark now in 1½ years. Also got a second hobby that's turned into a startup project, we're developing a PC game graphics enhancing tool. The last 1½ years or so I've got pretty much non-existant social life outside Internet and music/headphone hobby is my source for relaxation pretty much.

I'm glad you are enjoying it!

 

[erick151]

So I'm experimenting with your Foobar settings with Dolby Headphone and I was hoping to ask a couple questions.

1. Are you using DH3 with the 7.1 surround enabled?

2. What type of content are you listening to?

Thank you!

 

[eightbitpotion]

  So I'm experimenting with your Foobar settings with Dolby Headphone and I was hoping to ask a couple questions.

1. Are you using DH3 with the 7.1 surround enabled?

2. What type of content are you listening to?

Thank you!

 
1. I'm personally using DH1.  I don't like screwing with the original recording, and refuse to use EQ or anything of that nature.  DH3 adds too much air, and recesses everything under the mids, which I don't like at all.  DH1 gives you a reference profile while still maintaining the integrity of the recording.  I also disabled Electri-Q as I didn't like how it messed with stuff, but that's more of a preference thing, and I don't think it made things better or worse.  Electri-Q is VITAL with the setup, and I wrongfully disabled it..... some songs are extremely bloated without it.  I think I first disabled it when I was using the DH-3 setting, but it's a perfect synergy with DH-1 and DH-2.
 
2. I'm not sure if you're asking about what I'm listening to, or what type of data I'm listening to.  I am a musician, and listen to the stuff I create.  I also listen to acoustic stuff (like Kaki King, Michael Hedges, Jose Gonzales...etc), Experimental, Metal, Grunge, Industrial, Trance, Progressive, Electrohouse, and DnB/Jungle.  I personally make filthy Electro, and I know what the music sounds like since I created every single oscillation in my songs....every single drum, every glitch...etc, and this setup plays true to how I made it.  Outside of that, I play a rainbow of instruments, and have critically listened to my recordings with this setup, and it reproduces it properly.... just with a much wider soundscape.  If you're asking what I'm using as a format, I pretty much only do between 24-bit 192kHz and 16-bit 96kHz, so i can't really comment on lossy formats; during production of my music, I'm not using audio codecs since I don't use DAWs with samples, so while my production stuff is in it's pure form, I export them as songs, put them into foobar, and they sound exactly the same as they did in their raw data form (except with better soundstage).

 

[RPGWiZaRD]

My config uses DH-2 as it stays closest to the original recording with the least amound reverb. DH-1 adds a bit more reverb to lows compared to DH-2. DH-3 while having the largest stage affects the SQ negatively the most.

 

[eightbitpotion]

  My config uses DH-2 as it stays closest to the original recording with the least amound reverb. DH-1 adds a bit more reverb to lows compared to DH-2. DH-3 while having the largest stage affects the SQ negatively the most.

I just tried the various configurations again.  DH-2 and DH-1 are EXTREMELY close, while DH-3 is extremely different.  I re-enabled Electri-Q, and I won't take that off again.  I'm not sure what the parameters are for Electri-Q, but some songs aren't affected by it, while others are DRAMATICALLY affected by it in a good way.  One thing I noticed between DH-2 and DH-1 are that DH-2 seems to create some subtle reverb around the hi-hats range while DH-1 doesn't, and I do hear a very very subtle reverb with DH-1 around certain lows (most notable Goa drum beats).  Going back and fourth between DH-1 and DH-2, I'm not sure that I could pick out which one is enabled if I were to be given a double-blind test, but maybe that's just my setup idk.

 

[RPGWiZaRD]

I've also tried the config with latest foobar2000 v1.3 beta7 and I'm a bit on the fence. foobar2000 v1.3 seems to change the sound subtly versus 1.2.x  It also does bring improvements, especially when using these configs and listening to brickwalled EDM music, v1.3 has potential to sound cleaner in the bass, it's as if v1.3 incorporates a limiter that is always active or so (not saying it does but it sounds like that). The sound seems a little more laid-back, especially vocals and not sure I like that change. The soundstage is a bit more "speaker-like" which actually sounds pretty good but I sorta miss that forwardness of v1.2 but that's more of a personal taste, others might not feel the same. 

 

[RPGWiZaRD]

Here's with the latest foobar version preconfigured and slightly tweaked settings:

Forward setting: https://www.mediafire.com/?nt0wbwetw87r5zc

Laid-back setting: http://www.mediafire.com/download/471wi1fz4zdrlr4

6.66 MB... don't know what to make out of that haha.

 

[erick151]

Thank you both for the replies.

I DL'd the OPs link to RPG's settings and it gave me some serious hiccups while playing back FLACs. I'm using the Xonar DG with the Xonar DG audio center. Not sure if it's just too much pre processing or sync issue but it was really causing some hiccups in my system. I have a pretty beastly computer too:


Cooler Master HAF 932 Advanced
ASUS P8Z68-V PRO/GEN3
Intel Core i7-2600K OC 4.7Ghz
Corsair H100 Liquid Cooling
Corsair Vengeance 16GB PC12800 DDR3 RAM (CMZ16GX3M4A1600C9)
Corsair TX750W 750-Watt Power Supply
2x (SLI)EVGA GTX 560 Ti DS Superclocked 1GB OC
2x (Raid 0)OCZ VERTEX 3 60GB SATA III SSD -Raid0
WD Caviar Blue 1TB SATA III 7200/32MB
Asus Xonar DG Sound Card
All-in-one Memory Card Reader
Lite ON 8X Blu Ray Combo Drive
Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit

Any help with my issue would be much appreciated.

 

[eightbitpotion]

  Thank you both for the replies.

I DL'd the OPs link to RPG's settings and it gave me some serious hiccups while playing back FLACs. I'm using the Xonar DG with the Xonar DG audio center. Not sure if it's just too much pre processing or sync issue but it was really causing some hiccups in my system. I have a pretty beastly computer too:


Cooler Master HAF 932 Advanced
ASUS P8Z68-V PRO/GEN3
Intel Core i7-2600K OC 4.7Ghz
Corsair H100 Liquid Cooling
Corsair Vengeance 16GB PC12800 DDR3 RAM (CMZ16GX3M4A1600C9)
Corsair TX750W 750-Watt Power Supply
2x (SLI)EVGA GTX 560 Ti DS Superclocked 1GB OC
2x (Raid 0)OCZ VERTEX 3 60GB SATA III SSD -Raid0
WD Caviar Blue 1TB SATA III 7200/32MB
Asus Xonar DG Sound Card
All-in-one Memory Card Reader
Lite ON 8X Blu Ray Combo Drive
Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit

Any help with my issue would be much appreciated.

 
 
What do you mean "Hiccups"?  Are you saying it stutters?  You probably just need to increase your buffer size in foobar if it's stuttering, because it's defaulted to like 1000ms if I remember right, and that shouldn't be a universal number as every system is different.  System specs have little to do with actual playback.... technically that's not true, but a Pentium 3 on a gig of ram can play FLAC the same as your or my setup.  I will say that I hate Xonar, and everyone I've ever owned have had the strangest problems with everyday tasks, but I do stress them differently than most people (having 60+ instruments in a rack running through them), but I stopped buying them because of the craziest things.... like severe buffering problems at lower latency, which is vital for production as you don't want to press a key or hit a pad to only be rewarded a second or two later with the recognition.  Also, make sure you aren't trying to play 192kHz audio, because your card only supports 96kHz, therefore it's going to use extra resources to resample.  If you're trying to use 192kHz, enable the PPHS in foobar's DSPs, and set it for 96kHz.
 
Excuse me for saying this, but I can't stop myself: You need to switch to Win7 Pro since you're using 16 gigs of RAM.  While you may know that Home supports up to 16, it supports up to 16 INCLUDING your VRAM (so knock off 2GB from your 560s), and this, if I remember correctly, will disable Duel-Channel support (as you're running four sticks, not three, thus triple-channel isn't enabled atm).  This has nothing to do with anything audio, I just noticed that in your specs.  /off topic

 

[eightbitpotion]

  Here's with the latest foobar version preconfigured and slightly tweaked settings:

Forward setting: https://www.mediafire.com/?nt0wbwetw87r5zc

Laid-back setting: http://www.mediafire.com/download/471wi1fz4zdrlr4

6.66 MB... don't know what to make out of that haha.

 
Awesome, I like it better.  A little bit cleaner imo.

 

[erick151]

I don't think that the content was the problem. Must be the foobar settings,... forgive me I've very new to the audiophile world.

In reply to your comment about Home Premium, do you have a link for this? Everything I found stated the are artificial limits don't apply, neither do they include the VRAM, paging file, etc.

Thank you.

 

[eightbitpotion]

I don't think that the content was the problem. Must be the foobar settings,... forgive me I've very new to the audiophile world.


In reply to your comment about Home Premium, do you have a link for this? Everything I found stated the are artificial limits don't apply, neither do they include the VRAM, paging file, etc.


Thank you.

You're right, and I was wrong! I didn't know that got changed in win7; XP's cap included the vram, but not 7. Thanks for keeping me in check.

 

[JohnSantana]

Hey guys, I had a really hard time finding this stuff, and finally stumbled across it.  So I wanted to host it for anyone that wants it.  The credit goes to RPGWiZaRD here on Head-Fi, but the hosted files were removed for some reason.  Anyway, this is a great config, and as someone that avoids EQs, plugins, and various other gimmicky methods to make your music sound better, I wouldn't listen to my collection without this.

Foobar w/ Dolby Preconfiguration

Also, all credit and a special thanks goes to RPGWiZaRD.

THanks man, so how do I import this plugin and configure it to play the .DTS file on my Foobar ?

I never knew that this is possible with the Foobar before

 

[erick151]

I've decided to get rid of the Xonar DG as I ran into some strange bugs. Feedback a couple times and non-implementation of changes during playback. Maybe a buffer would have helped, but this card just seems to struggle. I'm going to try the SoundBlaster Z.