Headphone Measurements Using Brüel & Kjær 5128 HATS

[solderdude]

I do not understand why we need to compensate to the harman target curve?

One doesn't have to use the Harman target. This target is determined by looking at the average preference of listeners.
This consists of a bass boost (several theories exist why) and a gentle slow roll-off for the higher frequencies.
It has similarities to other 'room curves' except a bit more bass boost than others.
The steep slope of the boost prevents elevated bass to 'bleed' into the lower mids which sounds muddy. As long as there is no dip there the bass still integrates nicely. That's why people prefer it. I know research has shown that this is universally liked but I am probably one of the few that prefers a little bass boost but not as much as 'average' people do.

So we don't NEED to target that curve but since it has become a standard and that's what others use more and more as well for comparisons it is wise to use a target. This is the 'best' one so far.

 

[Jimbob54]

I do not understand why we need to compensate to the harman target curve?

Do you mean compensate? as in what Amir and co have done here, show how far off the measured response is from a known target? If you dont measure them against something, how can you compare them against another? You could just compare them to flat, but that doesnt help much as none are flat nor would many try and EQ them to flat.

Or do you mean why do we EQ to the target? - We dont need to, at all- see solderdudes response to you.

 

[thewas]

I know research has shown that this is universally liked but I am probably one of the few that prefers a little bass boost but not as much as 'average' people do.

Trained listeners prefer less bass boost, I also prefer the trained listeners bass target to the all listeners or even worse untrained listeners targets:

Source: https://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=17839, red "0 dB reference line added by me.

 

[Soniclife]

Trained listeners prefer less bass boost, I also prefer the trained listeners bass target to the all listeners or even worse untrained listeners targets:

View attachment 78443

Source: https://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=17839, red "0 dB reference line added by me.

That's the speaker curve, not the headphone curve, they are quite different. IEMs are different again.

 

[thewas]

That's the speaker curve, not the headphone curve, they are quite different. IEMs are different again.

I know that, but wanted to show with it that the preferred levels in bass differ between experienced and not experienced listeners.
The headphone targets mainly differ at the absolute bass level possibly to compensate missing structure-transmitted sound.

 

[solderdude]

Not incomparable to, perhaps, a chipped or broken tooth. The tongue continually scans the interior of the mouth creating a 3D 'picture' of it in the brain. If left untreated, after a while the chip is no longer noticed as an anomaly, but as an integral part of the 'picture'.

So, while the shape of our outer and inner ears may differ from person to person, do our brains calibrate in such a way as to allow us hear more or less the same things?

I expect the effect to be similar. We pick up all kinds of sounds all day long. Our brain retrieves location information based on what is heard and what is seen. It doesn't care about fidelity, just about the information it can use. Arguably the eye isn't full color and equally sharp as a sensor. Yet, to us it appears as though the eyes are full color and sharp to the edges (assuming no glasses are needed), despite the blind spot we all have we don't see it. The brain makes something from this that doesn't appear to have the actual shortcoming the eyes have. Likewise our hearing also isn't 'flat' either. The brain knows what everyday sounds sound like. When you combine this with eyesight it is even better.

For instance, look at someone playing the piano on a TV. When you only listen to the sound it probably sounds like crap. When you see the piano and thus also see where the sounds are coming from the piano sounds a lot better.
With audio only the quality and accuracy needs to be better. Not to sing along with a tune or enjoy the 'art' but to create a mental map the cues must be 'better'.

So regardless how different the hearing is and the eardrum receives the sounds it doesn't matter. The brain knows how it should sound. This is the self-calibration part. Also the brain can get used to a 'presentation' and learn to accept a certain sound character. In some cases this doesn't happen and after a while we buy other speakers/headphones and decide we don't like it, while other folks have no problems 'believing' the sound.

 

[testp]

41.000.. i dont get it.. Does it drive a car by itself. Tesla would do better in this price, no?

 

[Racheski]

Lately more effort is done by HATS manufacturers to use HATS for headphone measurements as well. People started using them this way despite the fact that they weren't specifically designed/intended for this application.

This really shows. For 41k the HATS software should have some sort of headphone specific calibration mode that helps the user adjust the cans to find an optimal seal, and a mode that auto-averages a series of measurements and provides a variance score.

 

[Nango]

One doesn't have to use the Harman target. This target is determined by looking at the average preference of listeners.
This consists of a bass boost (several theories exist why) and a gentle slow roll-off for the higher frequencies.
It has similarities to other 'room curves' except a bit more bass boost than others.
The steep slope of the boost prevents elevated bass to 'bleed' into the lower mids which sounds muddy. As long as there is no dip there the bass still integrates nicely. That's why people prefer it. I know research has shown that this is universally liked but I am probably one of the few that prefers a little bass boost but not as much as 'average' people do.

So we don't NEED to target that curve but since it has become a standard and that's what others use more and more as well for comparisons it is wise to use a target. This is the 'best' one so far.

Question: How do we take from the charts where or when the bass bleeds into the mids pls? How do we learn that?

 

[Thomas savage]

Reading through this it's clearly of great value BUT I think given this system can't give universal and definitive results we must consider it not worth the ,$ 40000 for us at least .

My conclusion is if we are going to measure headphones it will be to show the terrible and highlight the ' worth a listen ' .

You can do that for $5 it seems .

How about given Amirm has more money than sense we give a team of members $10000 for developing a HP measurement rig and I get $20000 for this idea , still $11000 under budget and no less effective.

Also I won't be spending the next few years combating people coming here highlighting measurement inconsistencies and have to read the same shit over and over ...


Win win

 

[Racheski]

Reading through this it's clearly of great value BUT I think given this system can't give universal and definitive results we must consider it not worth the ,$ 40000 for us at least .

My conclusion is if we are going to measure headphones it will be to show the terrible and highlight the ' worth a listen ' .

You can do that for $5 it seems .

How about given Amirm has more money than sense we give a team of members $10000 for developing a HP measurement rig and I get $20000 for this idea , still $11000 under budget and no less effective.

Also I won't be spending the next few years combating people coming here highlighting measurement inconsistencies and have to read the same shit over and over ...


Win win

Add 2 zeroes to the $10k and maybe you will get somewhere.

 

[Jimbob54]

Question: How do we take from the charts where or when the bass bleeds into the mids pls? How do we learn that?

Look at Amir's post here https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...-using-brüel-kjær-5128-hats.15352/post-486346 and the EQ he implemented. He put a low shelf in of 3db on freqs under 74hz. You will note that slopes back down to nothing before the midrange (lets say 250hz and over. Had he put a far more gentle Q value on that shelf and /or a higher lift on the shelf, that boost would be encroaching on and muddying up the midrange

 

[solderdude]

You can measure time using a cheap crystal or mechanism. When scientists really want to measure time exactly they won't use those devices despite them keeping time good enough for everyday use. That 'extra' bit scientists want/need costs a LOT more to achieve.
One can also measure audio equipment using a soundcard. Scientists really want a bit more accuracy and want to look a bit deeper.
Here too, that extra bit of accuracy and quality costs shitloads more. Certainly if it also needs to be calibrated and spit out standardised info.
Likewise with a HATS. Those devices are designed to measure sounds coming from around it and does so in a quite similar way as the physical hearing (up to the eardrum) does. This too is acc. to a standard and must adhere to that and be calibrated.

For all the above you also need to be aware only a few will be sold and there is a tremendous amount of research gone into it and manufacturing acc. to standards and highest performance. This means ... very very expensive.
Is that accuracy needed for everyday usage or even to EQ to a standard is the question.

I am pretty sure all the HATS will give proper measurements when speakers are measured in front of them or if SPL needs to be measured in places where humans are. These devices will have near perfect accuracy. The question is how well these measurement devices work in circumstances they aren't particularly designed for but are expected to have 'reference quality' as well. This is what is interesting in this test from Amir.
How well does it do compared to other HATS. The second question is how well correlation is in all circumstances with all headphones.

Not sure what Amir's goal in the end will be. Merely reporting measurements made acc. to a standard and add some plots not seen before or seeking the highest 'accuracy' so people can get reliable EQ from it.

 

[solderdude]

Question: How do we take from the charts where or when the bass bleeds into the mids pls? How do we learn that?

Listening and playing with EQ. The result can be verified with measurements. The rig is not so important upto 1kHz as long as it is calibrated.

 

[Jimbob54]

Reading through this it's clearly of great value BUT I think given this system can't give universal and definitive results we must consider it not worth the ,$ 40000 for us at least .

My conclusion is if we are going to measure headphones it will be to show the terrible and highlight the ' worth a listen ' .

You can do that for $5 it seems .

How about given Amirm has more money than sense we give a team of members $10000 for developing a HP measurement rig and I get $20000 for this idea , still $11000 under budget and no less effective.

Also I won't be spending the next few years combating people coming here highlighting measurement inconsistencies and have to read the same shit over and over ...


Win win

Just think, the speaker stuff is massively hard for numbnuts like me to understand, but relatively few people outside of hi-fi geeks care. Every man and his dog gets a pair of 6xx from Drop, thinks they are headfi gurus and will flock to Amir's HP measurements. It will be like all DACs sounding the same , magnified thousands of times over.

 

[Thomas savage]

Just think, the speaker stuff is massively hard for numbnuts like me to understand, but relatively few people outside of hi-fi geeks care. Every man and his dog gets a pair of 6xx from Drop, thinks they are headfi gurus and will flock to Amir's HP measurements. It will be like all DACs sounding the same , magnified thousands of times over.

Yea , time for witness protection for me I think lol

 

[Jimbob54]

Yea , time for witness protection for me I think lol

There's a danger you'll start earning your pay.

 

[PeteL]

Reading through this it's clearly of great value BUT I think given this system can't give universal and definitive results we must consider it not worth the ,$ 40000 for us at least .


How about given Amirm has more money than sense we give a team of members $10000 for developing a HP measurement rig and I get $20000 for this idea , still $11000 under budget and no less effective.

Also I won't be spending the next few years combating people coming here highlighting measurement inconsistencies and have to read the same shit over and over ...


Win win

Lol, how many products have been reviewed here since it started? thousands? I can guarantee you that absolutely NONE of theses products, even the most basic headphone amp has costed less than 10 k to develop..... Add a couple zeros to your number, and maybe, just maybe, someone could achieve what you ask.

 

[Jimbob54]

Lol, how many products have been reviewed here since it started? thousands? I can guarantee you that absolutely NONE of theses products, even the most basic headphone amp has costed less than 10 k to develop..... Add a couple zeros to your number, and maybe, just maybe, someone could achieve what you ask.

That DAC, with the rats nest inside it. Homegrown thing. Dangerous. Cant remember the name.

It probably cost as much to "develop" as the value of the parts inside. $10.

 

[Thomas savage]

Lol, how many products have been reviewed here since it started? thousands? I can guarantee you that absolutely NONE of theses products, even the most basic headphone amp has costed less than 10 k to develop..... Add a couple zeros to your number, and maybe, just maybe, someone could achieve what you ask.

Well our budget is $9995 over @solderdude effort.

I think if we keep our goal clear , wheat from chuff and even if we get ambitious and want something reliable enough for developing EQ we have $9995 to throw at that ..