How to equalize your headphones: A Tutorial

[MaciekN]

It would be nice to have such a base but unfortunatly everything plays it's role in audio playback You could probably use these EQs as a starting point but honestly I think it would take less time to make one yourself, suited to your gear and hearing.

 

[EYEdROP]

Many are missing an important point of this thread: WHEN YOU EQ, USE YOUR OWN EARS, not a graph, not your buddies settings. EVERYONE HAS DIFFERENT HEARING!!! If you want a quick and dirty eq job (not recommended), just use a graphic equalizer.  
 
The peaks are usually at 2500-3500, and 6500-8800. There is a big difference between those frequencies, in the order of thousands. By using someone elses eq settings, its likely you will actually degrade the SQ. You will end up putting huge dips where they dont belong, which will actually highlights the peaks that matter most.  

 

[bcasey25raptor]

i will subscribe to this thread.
 
just a question when you eq headphones should you try and set all frequencies to zero? for example say a headphone is colored. or will this screw up the sound quality?

 

[MaciekN]

Make one frequency your reference one, I personally equalize everything by comparing it to 1kHz but it's symbolic. Then you adjust other frequencsies to make them sound as loud as your reference. At the moment you notice no differences in loudness during a 20Hz-20kHz sweep you may say that your headphones as just as flat as you can hear on your actual gear. After that you come across another question: do I like flat (theoretically correct) or coloured (theoretically screwed up), well there are other threads discussing this problem.

 

[jerg]

How do I narrow the Electri-Q bands? Can't find any options to do that...
 
edit: nvm just had to double-click the dot.
 
Here's my adjustments for my ATH-M50 (not finalized but should be in the ball-park)
 

 

[jerg]

Here are my (for now) mostly finalized settings:
 

 
 
 
 
I must say,
 
HOLY COW, the cans sound infinitely better now (I was really skeptical before I tried this 2 hours ago).

 

[MaciekN]

You can really hear 0.5dB peak right after 10kHz and same little dip at ~800Hz that needs adjusting? Congratulations on your perfect hearing

 

[RPGWiZaRD]

 
Quote:

You can really hear 0.5dB peak right after 10kHz and same little dip at ~800Hz that needs adjusting? Congratulations on your perfect hearing

You'd be suprised what your ears are capable of, it's very difficult to distinguish difference in sound of small adjustments but at least I find it more easily to notice if I concider it better/more enjoyable or not sounding when really trying to listen carefully even from very small adjustments why I personally rarely not just take care of very obvious annoying dips or peaks but tweak the whole range for the headphone to make it sound that little better. I mean why wouldn't you wanna strive for best possible result especially when it's free?
 
Having said this I just finished tweaking the EQ settings for my XB500 when I went to my parents place for the easter holiday and brought the XB500 with me and my parents use an Audigy 1 soundcard and I personally use an Audigy 2 ZS and both cards have kX Audio drivers installed so I can use the same EQ. However if I load the same setting I use for the Audigy 2 ZS card I notice a very distinct difference in sound/overall balance and was very dissappointed with what I first heard so had to make adjustments to it to make up for the DAC differences and after adjustments it's sounds very similar (Audigy 1 still loses in SQ to Audigy 2 ZS a bit but it's not a huge difference with the corrected EQ settings) I found especially 250~500Hz range to be quite a bit less emphasized on the Audigy 1 card as well as 2 - 16kHz while bass was on a similar level. Quite funny when you start EQing your headphones not just by headphone but also with the DAC in mind.
 

 

[jerg]

Quote:

You can really hear 0.5dB peak right after 10kHz and same little dip at ~800Hz that needs adjusting? Congratulations on your perfect hearing

Well they were more like 1.5~2 dB deviations from mean; I did not want to make the sound completely flat (love the M50 sound signature) so most of my adjustments were ~50 ~ 75% of potential full equalizing. I did try the full equalizing to flatness (took a long long time) but that sounded freakin' boring.

 

[MaciekN]

Small tweaks are OK but the rule of measuring frequency response in +\- 3dB range did not come out of nowhere. 3dB as far as I remember is the smallest distinguishable change. I, for one, could't tell a difference between 0.5/1/2 dB adjustments. It may come as a difference of flavours in music, close to placebo, but it was undiscerable for me if checked on a single frequency, which is how we find what needs to be adjusted, no?

 

[RPGWiZaRD]

 
Quote:

Small tweaks are OK but the rule of measuring frequency response in +\- 3dB range did not come out of nowhere. 3dB as far as I remember is the smallest distinguishable change. I, for one, could't tell a difference between 0.5/1/2 dB adjustments. It may come as a difference of flavours in music, close to placebo, but it was undiscerable for me if checked on a single frequency, which is how we find what needs to be adjusted, no?

I never check with single frequencies, that wouldn't provide any noticable differences I guess as what you're doing with EQing is to balance(or unbalance) the frequencies for the whole range so you'll want to hear how it sounds like with all kinds of sounds or instruments going on to check if there's an certain range that sticks out too much or so. I do my EQing all with music, for me that always tells the best to my ears what sounds best and small changes are noticable as that's what I WANT to listen to and if music sounds great ofc it'll be great sounding. I also tried with pink noise a couple of times but that didn't help me much as I can't enjoy pink noise and I might not even want a perfectly flat line either (I like highs to be a little bit recessed compared to mids for a warmer sound).
 
EDIT: Here I included some interesting comparision between the 2 soundcards (Audigy 1 and Audigy 2 ZS) how different the DACs themselves can affect the result of the frequency response where both curves are tweaked for sounding optimally (similar in my ears) using 2 different settings, one for minimalistic tweaking only for better balance and the other for maximum fun sound and emphasized bass (yet very reasonably balanced) which is something that only sounds great on this EQ in particular and I've tried like about 20 other EQs and none could handle such without sounding simply plain horrible:
 

 

 

[MaciekN]

To equalize I sweep audible frequency range using sinegen, then I note which frequencies stand out and then take care of them. When applying the results to ElectriQ I of course adjust certain bandwith unless there is a problem with one single frequency, which happens. Only after that I check the results with music. Doing it backwards is more like fetishizing than anything else since with no reference sound your ear can not tell what's wrong. I lied, actually it can but you have to be either a so called trained "critical listener" or have perfect hearing.
 
To sum up, if you read the first post of this thread you will know that it speaks of EQing headphones more or less flat using certain methodology. If you want to discuss whether you prefer your "fun" signature over "flat" then there are other threads dedicated to this topic.

 

[RPGWiZaRD]

I think there are more people than you'd think that probably don't think a perfectly flat frequency response is the optimal sounding (perhaps even unaware of it) which is why aiming for flat by using the method you described might not be any better than simply go by what sounds best with your music, then you will adjust it according how you want it to sound like, if you simply try to go for as flat as possible across the whole range using sweeps you might not in the end have the optimal sound in your ears/preference. 
 
I don't concider either of the methods being the definitive right way to go, at least you should give it a try by equalizing by ear to music to check if flat response really is your thing or not because I don't think THAT many people actually wants a perfect flat response but thinks they do after reading online or due to not properly testing it out what their actual preference is. My preference is biggest emphasize in the bass and then a little in the mids and least in the highs, we're not talking by any huge amounts here though and I also think most people also want small derivations from a flat sound if not a perfect flat sound is the optimal.
 
Just saying "flat" sound might be overrated and something blown out of proportions as being the definitive right way to go, my theory is strictly letting your ears decide what is to your liking and disregard the theories.

 

[MaciekN]

There is a reason why more expensive gear tends to be flatter proprtionally to price. Have you tried to equalize your 'phones flat? If not, please give it a try, say, 3-4 days and then judge. I liked the music I had on my headphones and speakers but after applying some equalization I like it even more. Why? Because I get more detail, sounds are more accurate to each other, better soundstaging aswell. After seeing what was lost in the colouration I now enjoy my music much more, sometimes I turn EQ off and get a feeling "Heck, how deaf was I to enjoy music this way, bottom is boomy and highs are screaming, I loose sooo much of the music itself".
 
You prefer to hear music the way you like but what about hearing it the way it was intented to, how can that be overrated? Nothing really personal but your method has a weakness that disqualfies it from the very begining- it has no reference sound you could tune to. You are blind in your tuning since what may seem to you desirable at first is usually just adding more colouration. That is why it is so important to first get rid of biggest overexaggerations and only later optionally apply taste correction. I myself did this on my 'phones: I first adjusted the reponse to as it should be according to sinegen test and after listening to music changed it slightly.
 
Believe me as I went through this myself, your ears as well as mine and many other fokls' lie. You never really know what is bad untill you hear it right, which is why giving more or less flat equalization a try is so important.
 
PS. All the above mentioned arguments apply generally to music with real instruments. If your preference is towards techno/trance/house or alike then yes, you don't really gain much if anything.

 

[jerg]

Quote:

There is a reason why more expensive gear tends to be flatter proprtionally to price. Have you tried to equalize your 'phones flat? If not, please give it a try, say, 3-4 days and then judge. I liked the music I had on my headphones and speakers but after applying some equalization I like it even more. Why? Because I get more detail, sounds are more accurate to each other, better soundstaging aswell. After seeing what was lost in the colouration I now enjoy my music much more, sometimes I turn EQ off and get a feeling "Heck, how deaf was I to enjoy music this way, bottom is boomy and highs are screaming, I loose sooo much of the music itself".
 
You prefer to hear music the way you like but what about hearing it the way it was intented to, how can that be overrated? Nothing really personal but your method has a weakness that disqualfies it from the very begining- it has no reference sound you could tune to. You are blind in your tuning since what may seem to you desirable at first is usually just adding more colouration. That is why it is so important to first get rid of biggest overexaggerations and only later optionally apply taste correction. I myself did this on my 'phones: I first adjusted the reponse to as it should be according to sinegen test and after listening to music changed it slightly.
 
Believe me as I went through this myself, your ears as well as mine and many other fokls' lie. You never really know what is bad untill you hear it right, which is why giving more or less flat equalization a try is so important.
 
PS. All the above mentioned arguments apply generally to music with real instruments. If your preference is towards techno/trance/house or alike then yes, you don't really gain much if anything.

True. Strong colouration, especially in hps priced low to medium range, tends to "shine" at first if you equalize the phones to fully flat and compare that to original unequalized sound, because of all the sparkly trebles and booming basses that seems to be lost via equalization. But after a while (say, 5 hours of listening to equalized phones), your ears can finally realize that those 'sparkly' trebles are actually 'screechy' trebles, and 'booming' is 'bloated' and 'uneven'.
 
Still I liked the 75% flattening better than 100% full response equalization. The phones lose character if you completely remove sharp response peaks.