How to equalize your headphones: A Tutorial

[EYEdROP]

Should I be removing the peak at 2khz-3khz?

 

[nikongod]

 
Quote:

Should I be removing the peak at 2khz-3khz?

Try it both ways
 
I prefer the sound of my headphones with this peak EQed down.

 

[EYEdROP]

Yeah, it seems like EQing it down helps it sound less like a "telephone" or tin can. But I noticed it is easy to eq this range too much. I cut mine 1.8db, just enough to hide the resonance.
Quote:

 

Try it both ways
 
I prefer the sound of my headphones with this peak EQed down.

 

[Elio]

well all our ears share the same big design, but all are different on the small and refined details that possibly would explain the 5-7KHz that everyone is hearing the spikes. 
 
I like the peak between 3-4 KHz EQed, guitars  sound fuller. finding the right db takes time...still at it.
i had my friend listen to a song he knows well with EQ on and off  he said the EQ is better ( he didnt know when the EQ was on) so i guess we had close resonance Freq ... (my Girlfriend heard small differences to none...)  

 

[hdufour]

Holy cow Batman!  I've been reading this all day long, and finally hit the end, but one glaring thing was missing - Mac users.  
 
I'm no genius, but I did find a setting that might throw a few of you into a fit - negative EQ.  It seems that when you reduce some of the levels rather than add to them, you can get a fantastic response.  Here is the more technical response I found in another board (scroll down for the better stuff).
 
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Equalizers in both the analog and digital realm do subtractive filtering far better than additive filtering. When pulling the EQ down you are not creating the additive comb-filtering necessary to boost frequencies that do not already exist, so using this kind of approach is leaves more of the original audio intact and does not add as many artifacts to the signal.

Of course an FFT digital EQ can overcome this (which is why the Weiss products are so expensive but popular), but iTunes most certainly does not hog the processor by using FFT algorithms for it's EQ.

What would be more appropriate, and also avoid unnecessary distortion, is to do all of those adjustments subtractively, then making up the gain difference with the slider at the left. This is why the slider on the left exists, in case you were wondering.

 
Now I know nothing about the science behind this - but I will say this:  I've done this to my home iMac w/ DT770 Pro's and in a live sound system (Mackie 24/4 mixer -> 32ch EQ -> BoseActive processor -> amplifier -> bose loudspeaker) and it also sounds wonderful.  The magic seems to happen by bumping up the preamp a bit to compensate for the lower volume level (cause of the EQ cutting, vs adding).  
 
Ok, long and short of things is simply this.  I cut the EQ in iTunes (yeah, I know) and bumped the preamp slider.  My DT770's sound amazing and I hear things that a flat EQ cannot produce with these cans.  If you have a Mac and know how to use AppleScript, try this:
 
 
 
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[size=12px][color=rgb(159, 45, 0)][font=Monaco] tell application "iTunes" set the current EQ preset to EQ preset "Manual" tell EQ preset "Manual" set band 1 to -8 set band 2 to -5 set band 3 to -2 set band 4 to -4 set band 5 to -5 set band 6 to -6 set band 7 to -4 set band 8 to -2 set band 9 to 0 set band 10 to -3 set preamp to 6 end tell end tell[/font][/color][/size]

 
As with all things audio - YMMV...I've had to tweak my settings as my cans are still burning in (they got a bit boomy).  It takes a while to get the ol' noggin thinking in a negative eq mindset, but I've been doing it now for almost a year and am happy with the results.  I'm sure you can find a way to do this on a PC too, or just with iTunes.  I would suggest that you take a minute to look at that article I noted above since they spend a bit of time on the Mac end of things, as well as some of the application of it.
 
I'm done.  Flame away 

 
H

 

[Br777]

yea, part of eq-ing is reducing, as well as adding, its always better to reduce than add... but congradulations on improving your sound.  another satisfied customer

 

[leeperry]

one thing's for sure, it's very hard to EQ a phone w/o a proper reference...but now that I've heard the very balanced cd900st, EQ'ing my other phones is dead easy!

 

[Br777]

Quote:

one thing's for sure, it's very hard to EQ a phone w/o a proper reference...but now that I've heard the very balanced cd900st, EQ'ing my other phones is dead easy!

actually the best way I know of to eq a phone is with a sine wave and white noise.. comparing two phones could give you... well.. comparison, but a flat wave is a flat wave...

 

[leeperry]

I've located the two spikes I wanna kill(6400/9700Hz) through SineGen. But it's always been hard for me to know how much I must remove....after listening to a very balanced phone, I can use it as a reference to know how much the trebles should sparkle. The cd900st doesn't sparkle whatsoever.

 

[EYEdROP]

It helps to use pink noise when figuring out how much reduction a particular frequency needs, because all frequencies are playing at the same time at equal volume. What I do is boost the peak, just to see what the resonance sounds like in the pink noise.. Then I turn the slider down till the resonance is gone. I also flip the eq on and off to compare.
 
Quote:

I've located the two spikes I wanna kill(6400/9700Hz) through SineGen. But it's always been hard for me to know how much I must remove....after listening to a very balanced phone, I can use it as a reference to know how much the trebles should sparkle. The cd900st doesn't sparkle whatsoever.

 

[Br777]

i usually just listen to the sine wave again for flat sound...

 

[Max F]

This helps to explain why I'm not having much luck EQing the HD650.  I can hear the peaks with the sine sweep, but when I EQ them out, it just sounds so dull.  It definately looses some magic in the sound - especially in vocals.  I even tried lowering the bass hump at 120 hz with a wide bandwidth (2-3) at -3 db, but didn't like that either.  I guess I like all the "flaws" of the HD650!
 
Quote:

Sennheiser said that the "dips" in the treble response on the HD650 was done specifically to combat some funky inner-ear resonances which is a big part of why these methods work so well. It would not surprise me that Sony tried something similar in the CD900st.
 
Quite a few people who have posted their EQ numbers take a few db out at around 5-7.5Khz, and notch in the ~10-15Khz range.
 
I would speculate that once you factor out non-linearities in FR of each headphone used I think things will average out to close enough for everyone that a generic solution is achievable which explains the Hd650 and probably CD900st. I wonder if we could find some common ground to test this idea on. I have thought of bringing my setup to a meet and trying this on a bunch of people to at least remove the headphone variable.
 
Something else that I think is interesting is how the EQ's that people are posting have the notches almost exactly 1 octave (double or half the frequency) apart.

 

[Kobayash1]

Is anyone else finding a resonance peak in the mid 8000's?  I find this one is more prominent for me than the peak in the mid 12000's and even the low-mid 6000's.
 
I'm trying to EQ a pair of Pana HJE900's.  It's my first time.  :/
 
EDIT:  Okay, so here's what I found for my resonance freqs amplitudes:
 
6350 hz to -7.5dB
8650 hz to -8.5dB
12530 hz to -9.5dB
 
I have not yet played with Electri-Q to determine my notch widths, but the idea is I'm wondering if anyone else has that mid-8000's resonance.
 
EDIT 2:  Man, these phones sound better flat than compared to my EQ settings!  :V  Either I toned down the freqs too much, or they really do perform better flat.  Need to mess with it more...

 

[Lubanja]

This is what I have for my (new) grado 225is. for some reason the bass is really light so I have to turn it up. That said, my AD700s have about 20 times the bass than these grados it seems like. Burn in necessary?

 

[ironmine]

Guys,
 
If you try  to find peaks, as this tutorial suggests, with SineGen and, as you move the frequency slider up and down, if at any particular moment (probably in the 7-8 kHz region) you hear that the center of volume "rolls" from one ear to the other, instead of being dead centered, it means that your ears differ from each other and they must be equalized separately.
 
This is how I myself found that my left ear has a different peak compared to my right ear:
 
Left:

Right: