[autoteleology]

After a lot of lurking around this site, I've seen nearly no mention of Stereo Tool (or really, any other digital sound processing programs).
 
I know that, once you get to the real hi-fi sound systems, you're not supposed to need to do that sort of thang, but people seem to rely almost entirely on equalizers and amps to adjust music/audio to their headphones.
 
http://www.stereotool.com/
 
This program was actually what got me into the audiophile scene, back when I was still using a Skullcandy gaming headset for music. It can make a massive, massive difference in the sound that comes out of your system, especially if you're still using unamped audio with a computer (not having owned a DAC yet, I'm not entirely sure if a separate DAC would bypass this).
 
Does anyone else on Head-Fi use this program too? And if not, what about using a DSP in general?

 

[nicoX]

This is the best thing out there. It's free as well, don't know why people don't mention it here.
 
I started using it with Winamp after extensively looking for good DSP, ended up finding Stereo Tool that beat all other in so many ways.
 
Now I use it with Aimp3 as Winamp has been off for a while.
 
Getting it with Aimp3: http://www.aimp.ru/forum/index.php?topic=43889.0
 
Install directory: AIMP\Plugins\dsp_stereo_tool

 

[Blackbart]

Try iZotope Ozone for playback only. I use Foobar 2000 with George Yohng's VST Wrapper and then attach Ozone as playback. You can use Wasapi or ASIO playback. The Equalizer in Ozone is worth the price of the program alone.
 
Here is a link to the manufacturers website:
https://www.izotope.com/en/products/master-and-deliver/ozone.html

 

[abm0]

The Declipper module is how I found out about StereoTool, as I needed to fix some tracks I bought off Google Play Music that are victims of the Loudness War, and this thing does a fan-tastic job of fixing them - with the right settings (even with the defaults) it leaves no audible clipping distortion whatsoever, even though the distortion was only on the voice track in the mix, I think, and it didn't coincide with the full track's peak samples.
 
Of course, this is one of the parts of StereoTool that are not free, but I fully understand why.

 

[ironmine]

After a lot of lurking around this site, I've seen nearly no mention of Stereo Tool (or really, any other digital sound processing programs).

Does anyone else on Head-Fi use this program too? And if not, what about using a DSP in general?

I use it. I discovered Thimeo Stereotool a while ago and it became part of my DSP arsenal. I use it as a VST plugin sometimes, it runs in real time in my Foobar player when I listen to music through speakers or headphones at home. All the quality settings are set to max, and I use two sections only: DeClipper and Natural Dynamics.

I also apply this VST effect in Adobe Audition when I process audio files. I declip them first and increase dynamics a little bit and then apply a crossfeed effect before copying them into my portable player.

It's amazing that so many audiophiles in this forum complain about Loudness Wars, but there is no discussion of this amazing tool - it's a real weapon against clipped and dynamically narrow music recordings.

I use these settings:

Processing:
Attenuation: - 3.1 dB
Clip Output (no)

Declipper:
Maximum Restored Peak Level - 3.0 dB,
Stop Declipping if peaks did not increase above 90%
Stop Declipping if texture did not increase above 90%

Natural Dynamics:
Effect Strength - x0.3
Flat Band Tops (yes)

I may modify these settings above, depending on the audio material.

 

[ForSerious]

I have been using Stereo Tool for few years now.
Sure you can set it to actively process your music as you listen, but mostly I only have time to listen to music away from my computer. So I create processed copies of most of my music for my mobile player.
The declipper is awesome. For the really bad tracks, it makes them more bearable. For mildly clipped stuff (98% of my music), it makes it so playback at loud volumes sounds less like noise, and more like music. For non-clipped reasonably dynamic stuff, it makes no difference that I can hear. I feel safe running the declipper on songs that I know don't need it.
The AutoEQ feature may not be for everyone, but I really like it. I has the ability to make old moldy recordings sound more like 80s recordings. This feature is hard to configure though. I picked some of may favorite sounding songs and painstakingly tuned it to not do anything to most all of them. It would be better if it scanned the whole song and applied one EQ change to it, but it's made for the radio station scene where that approach is not realistic.
As mentioned by others, it has a Natural Dynamics feature. I tried it for a bit but could not figure out any settings that didn't make esses and drum beats sound unproportionally loud.
There is also an Absolute Highs feature. It adds (missing, lost) frequencies. From my tests with it, I didn't notice any adverse affects. It seems to do a good job, but I haven't used it past 24kHz, because I only have headphones that even go up past the standard 20kHz.