[Machiventa]

Quote:

1) Simply play from my playlists, by artist, by album, by genre...etc without any fuss. Just as if I was playing from the normal iPod player. 
 
2) No need to import songs--just use the EQ as a real-time DSP processor as it should be. 
 
3) Easily create custom EQ settings and switch between custom settings on the fly without problems. 
 
4) Does not drain the battery too fast. I can accept something like a 20% faster drain, but beyond that it would be unacceptable.
 
5) Does not push the CPU through the roof constantly.
 
6) Stable. Crash-proof.

 
With the latest updates:

1) Only Equalizer in Complex Playlist mode will do this (it has a similar layout as the iPod). In Simple Playlist mode Genre is missing but it sounds like Tibor (the dev) is looking into adding Genre. One major benefit to Complex Playlist mode is you can queue your music, whereas in simple (or EQu) you can't queue up on the fly. EQu only has Playlist, Artist and Album to select from.
 
2) Both
 
3) Both (for me EQu is easier to get the EQ settings I want, it takes a bit more tweaking with Equalizer)
 
4) Equalizer seems a bit less battery hungry. Not by much though. 
 
5) Both appear equal to me, but they're definitely using more CPU usage than your typical apps.
 
6) When multitasking both sometimes crash, and both will occasionally skip or stutter. When only using the apps they're very stable.
 
 
There was a new update for EQu yesterday and it fixed a very annoying bug where it would occasionally skip to the next track and play a second of it, then skip to the next track and keep repeating the process until it would finally play a song.
 

 

[Achmedisdead]

Quote:

 
With the latest updates:

1) Only Equalizer in Complex Playlist mode will do this (it has a similar layout as the iPod). In Simple Playlist mode Genre is missing but it sounds like Tibor (the dev) is looking into adding Genre. One major benefit to Complex Playlist mode is you can queue your music, whereas in simple (or EQu) you can't queue up on the fly. EQu only has Playlist, Artist and Album to select from.
 
2) Both
 
3) Both (for me EQu is easier to get the EQ settings I want, it takes a bit more tweaking with Equalizer)
 
4) Equalizer seems a bit less battery hungry. Not by much though. 
 
5) Both appear equal to me, but they're definitely using more CPU usage than your typical apps.
 
6) When multitasking both sometimes crash, and both will occasionally skip or stutter. When only using the apps they're very stable.
 

In regards to 3) if you are experienced with the Rockbox EQ, then Equalizer is quicker to get your preferred sound, IMO. Tapping at the top of the screen allows you to type in what frequency, gain, and Q value you want to set for each of the seven points....much easier for me than with EQu, where a stylus would be easier than a fingertip....again, IMO.

 

[Machiventa]

Quote:

In regards to 3) if you are experienced with the Rockbox EQ, then Equalizer is quicker to get your preferred sound, IMO. Tapping at the top of the screen allows you to type in what frequency, gain, and Q value you want to set for each of the seven points....much easier for me than with EQu, where a stylus would be easier than a fingertip....again, IMO.

I've never used Rockbox so using exact frequencies, Q, and gain was new to me with Equalizer. Once I got used to playing around with each setting it's definitely quicker now but it's still easier to make a quick adjustment with EQu for me.
 
I love both apps a lot and after using them for a couple months now I would easily pay $5-10 for em.
 

 

[Achmedisdead]

Quote:

I've never used Rockbox so using exact frequencies, Q, and gain was new to me with Equalizer. Once I got used to playing around with each setting it's definitely quicker now but it's still easier to make a quick adjustment with EQu for me.
 
I love both apps a lot and after using them for a couple months now I would easily pay $5-10 for em.
 

Agreed, they really make a world of difference.....well worth the money indeed!

 

[oclafcire]

Shameless promotion for a relevant thread http://www.head-fi.org/forum/thread/545503/equ-equalizer-users-let-s-see-your-curves

 

[Lunatique]

I still haven't decided on which EQ to get, but in the meantime, I just spent the whole night trying to EQ the Shure SE535 and Westone 3 to match the best headphones I have (as well as my referencce studio monitors). You can find the settings in this thread:
http://www.head-fi.org/forum/thread/546077/my-meticulously-tweaked-eq-settings-for-shure-se535-and-westone-3#post_7362316
 
I don't know how close you can get with EQu and Equalizer, but since I used as few bands as possible, you should be able to match my settings with Equalizer at least. EQu would be harder since it's linear phase, which means it's incapable of really narrow bandwidth (but it's also higher quality). For those of you that don't understand the significance of linear phase DSP processing, it's basically a higher quality algorithm because it does not alter the phase response of your audio, and is kept as transparent as possible. Most of today's mastering quality plugins are linear phase, and EQu is linear phase, which means it is inherently higher quality than Equalizer. But linear phase EQ's also don't allow really narrow bands because those tend to cause problems and are more destructive than transparent.
 

 

[Lunatique]

Okay, I got Equalizer in the end because it allowed narrower bands, and I need that for surgical EQ'ing, since I'm not EQ'ing to shape the music, but to remedy the shortcomings of specific headphones. From what I tell EQu doesn't allow narrow bands due to being a linear phase design (if I'm wrong, please let me know).
 
I was able to reproduce the EQ settings I created in EazyQ on the computer with Equalizer, and finally, for the first time ever, I was able to enjoy my IEM's at a level that's much closer to my full-sized headphones.

 

 

[RPGWiZaRD]

Linear phase EQs are great for people like me that prefers to find the optimal shape of the entire frequency curve for headphones as it provides a more accurate tweaking while a 7 or 10-band EQ for example can be great for people that finds a very obvious peak somewhere and just wants to remove that one for example but you can get very great results of these too for more serious EQing, it depends how it's coded/implemented quite a lot too and the sound quality you get varies a lot depending on EQ you use.
 
Usually I find nearly all headphones can be improved to sound more to your liking even expensier ones even if you don't really concider anything missing, it's just hard to imagine IT COULD sound better for most people and many think expensier headphones are supposed to sound great without any need for EQing so they don't even bother testing but IMO that's just pure luck if everything happens to sound pretty much optimal to you without any need of tweaking. It even suprises me many times how most people may just use it to remove a peak in the highs for example and not bother even trying to EQ the whole range for the headphones, I thought this was a place for trying to get maximal listening pleasureness?

 

[Inks]

I gotta say that I really like Equalizer's interface after the latest update. That and because the fact that the sound is just a tad more accurate than EQu, it's become my equalizer of choice. There's still stuff one can add like frequency bars/ui stability, etc. But overall it is very solid where it's at. 

 

[franklyshankly]

I think this thread is really important! It saved me so much money, prevented me from thinking I needed an amp, and has made listening to music on the iPod a real pleasure. I can only speak for the EQu, and while it's not perfect, it's really amazing. I guess people will find this if they are looking for a solution, or maybe they knew to look for an app right away, but for me the thread was immensely helpful, and I want to be sure that all touch/iphone users know about these apps! Thanks for creating this.

 

[Jeffreybar]

I just wanted to post to encourage folks to try both apps if they're not happy with one or the other.  Based on the many glowing reviews here and elsewhere, I picked up eQu with my new 4th gen ipod touch.  And there's no question that it sounds very good (especially relative to the base apple player) and is hugely customizable.  But it also crashed a ton and I found its setup as a music player to be very difficult to use effectively -- and really once I get my equalizer set, I don't want to mess with it...I just want to play music, as straightforwardly as possible.  Even if I could get it to play several songs in a row without crashing, switching between albums or queueing up songs was very clunky.  As a result, I went back to the (now even more terrible-sounding) apple player, and was considering returning/trading my touch for something else.
 
But on a whim I decided to pick up Equalizer too -- after all, it's only $3, right?  I had a much easier time getting an EQ curve I liked right off the bat with Equalizer, and more importantly, I find the it's-all-a-playlist approach to music playback to be much easier to use and less-nonsense than even the base apple player (and it reminds me a bit of my X5, and even my old iHP-140 which could queue any song to play next from any other song -- whether you were in a playlist or not).  And to my ears, Equalizer sounds possibly better.  It's not as easy to get ridiculously-alien sounding settings (with eQu, you can make your ipod sound like literally anything), but it's easy to get a setting that sounds good, and then it's easier to actually use the thing to play music.
 
Anyway, not trying to dig on EQu...it's got a ton of potential, and it does sound good.  Just not my thing (at least in its current incarnation).  But I wanted to add a voice of support for Equalizer, and encourage folks to try both to see which is right for them.

 

[Achmedisdead]

Quote:

I just wanted to post to encourage folks to try both apps if they're not happy with one or the other.  Based on the many glowing reviews here and elsewhere, I picked up eQu with my new 4th gen ipod touch.  And there's no question that it sounds very good (especially relative to the base apple player) and is hugely customizable.  But it also crashed a ton and I found its setup as a music player to be very difficult to use effectively -- and really once I get my equalizer set, I don't want to mess with it...I just want to play music, as straightforwardly as possible.  Even if I could get it to play several songs in a row without crashing, switching between albums or queueing up songs was very clunky.  As a result, I went back to the (now even more terrible-sounding) apple player, and was considering returning/trading my touch for something else.
 
But on a whim I decided to pick up Equalizer too -- after all, it's only $3, right?  I had a much easier time getting an EQ curve I liked right off the bat with Equalizer, and more importantly, I find the it's-all-a-playlist approach to music playback to be much easier to use and less-nonsense than even the base apple player (and it reminds me a bit of my X5, and even my old iHP-140 which could queue any song to play next from any other song -- whether you were in a playlist or not).  And to my ears, Equalizer sounds possibly better.  It's not as easy to get ridiculously-alien sounding settings (with eQu, you can make your ipod sound like literally anything), but it's easy to get a setting that sounds good, and then it's easier to actually use the thing to play music.
 
Anyway, not trying to dig on EQu...it's got a ton of potential, and it does sound good.  Just not my thing (at least in its current incarnation).  But I wanted to add a voice of support for Equalizer, and encourage folks to try both to see which is right for them.

I would also urge people to try both. I have them both, but find it much quicker and easier to set up an EQ profile with Equalizer than EQu. I generally prefer Equalizer overall, but either app is a good purchase.

 

[jefierro]

Greetings all, first post (and a long one).
 
I'll like to share my experience with earphones, equalizers and my ipad-ipods, i'm not in any way a human sound analyzer like lots here but I can distinguish some quality in the sound so I like to say.
 
My experience has been limited to one stile of headphones, in ear being my preferred method for licensing to my music, I like the portability and the fact I don't look like a 70s news reporter (wait for it), also I sometimes fall to sleep with my headphones so they must be very conformable, some of my earphone collection in chronological order are:

1. Sony fontopia(wow the base)
2. Shure E2c-n(first quality treble, wow is that a new instrument),
3. UE SuperFi 3(broken lasted a short time),
4. Bose in ear (very disapointing, had base),
5. Shure ES210 (finally some quality and some base)
6. And my new acquisition Monster Dr. Dre Beats Solo. (Hold it!!, take a breath, count to 10 & wait for it).

 
Yeah my first on ear experience and I must say I hate it, I hate the bulk, I certainly hate the sound (thanks Monster) I bought this solo's looking for a better base, going for quality base would be to expensive to keep the in ear route, so I went for my first set of on ear's, I went to my local Radio Shack here in Mexico ( Yeah we have those here) and out of shear impulse I bought the beats solo, what a joke, I'll have to admit I haven't enjoyed the base since my sony's mud monsters, but every thing else was gone with this solos, the clarity the rings and clashes the fine instruments, instead I had this ugly gong ringing in my ear every time I hear for mids.
 
Enter the equalizers. I mostly at this time listen to my music on the ipad since is a very nice platform and the battery, well, last forever. my experience with equalizers died with the use of the E2c-n and my late ipod G4, when i needed to pump some base the earphones would distort the sound in those shure's, so I learned that a flatten equalizer would be the way to go with "quality earphones" so I forgot every thing about equalizers since.
Now simply disgusted with the beats, also unable to return the product for refund,( remember i'm in Mexico) I had to do something, I don't want a new paperweight, so I started to play with the equalizer in the ipad, and found that eliminating some of the base, it intermediately start to sound better to my surprise. A quick app search delivered the EQu app, I quickly downloaded and I play with it for the last 3 days, and i must say I have a new set of earphones now, The sound now is much better, allot better now, I can say the monsters are worth it (naa! that's to much, they are not!) but none the less I can live with them now, actually I enjoy the base rendition on this phones after the EQu keeping the rest of the music clean, clear and enjoyable.
I'm making my peace with on ear phones looking seriously for some HD 595 for the near future.
 
So you can see the ammout I had to take away.

 

 

[Br777]

in the interest of keeping this thread on the up and up, i have decided to take one for the team, spend $3 and buy an app called "3-D music player pro".  I will be demoing and commenting shortly. 
 
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/3d-music-player-pro/id429155233?mt=8
 
here is a screen shot from the app store listing its features. 
 

 
well i have some good news and bad news. .initial tests have all but failed.  the app does not seem capable of handling lossless files.. large clicks and pops proliferate the music.. however, this app really did just come out yesterday, so i emailed the company just now and have asked them to fix it.  I told them i would love to recommend this app on head-fi
 
that being said im going to test it on what few non lossless files i have. - NOW!
 
 

 

[Achmedisdead]

Quote:

in the interest of keeping this thread on the up and up, i have decided to take one for the team, spend $3 and buy an app called "3-D music player pro".  I will be demoing and commenting shortly. 
 
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/3d-music-player-pro/id429155233?mt=8
 

Interesting! Sounds like a lot to tinker with, and although the "3D" effect I've heard in other players sounded very fake to me, looks like this app has much more to offer than that.