Blown away by Equalizer APO last night - what's next!

[Gringoaudio1]

Equalizer APO has an appallingly bad interface. There is a skin for it that someone else has created to supposedly improve the UX(User Experience). Aside from that when you set up the program you have to go into the setup configuration app for it and choose output devices. I chose my DAC annd
HDMI. Then both show up along the top strip of the main app. I sometimes have one or the other output devices … or both not work. Pretty flakey program. All that criticism aside it provides incredible power to sculpt your sound. I found the REW generated correction not so great. So I manually created sets of filters for each of my two sets of speakers as you did. I’m afraid I don’t really understand what your question was. You seem to have it working if you noticed positive changes.
I rip all my CDs into JRiver as a player for my CD collection which also is a tough program to use. It does not have a consumer level UX. You have to be an IT guy practically to figure it out. I had help. But am slowly ripping my CDs into the PC. Only 300 left to go!! JRiver is powerful and inexpensive.

 

[Doodski]

Equalizer APO has an appallingly bad interface. There is a skin for it that someone else has created to supposedly improve the UX(User Experience).

The Peace skin is nice. >>>

 

[yelloguy]

I’m afraid I don’t really understand what your question was.

I have not noticed any flaky-ness with Equalizer APO tbh. Rock solid so far. But I have noticed the UI and UX is not the best. As a software developer I appreciate the reliability more than the UI so I'm cool with that. But my question was more about playback and usability of the set up. Coming from Apple TV, Fire TV, and Spotify Connect with iPhone, I am lacking a few usability affordances. You touched upon that when you said JRiver also gives you grief.

I am exploring Foobar2000. After struggling for several days, I have just discovered the Georgia Reborn skin for it. It makes it look gorgeous and enhances usability at the same time. You should give it a try. Foobar also has a mobile app and MonkeyMote is the remote control app. I will see how it works in real usage scenarios though. I should know in a few days.

Thanks for chiming in.

I have seen Peace UI but once I completed the two changes, I have no use for Peace (or Equalizer APO). Now it is just my music and me.

 

[Jon L]

Equalizer APO is a blessing, but with DSP and Subwoofers, it's usually better to feel like one is under-doing it a bit..

 

[richardm]

OP, do you have a subwoofer? Or just two speakers at this point?

 

[yelloguy]

OP, do you have a subwoofer? Or just two speakers at this point?

I have a SVS PB 1000

 

[Smislov]

Use https://mathaudio.com/download.htm for foobar eq, and EQ Apo for else

 

[yelloguy]

Use https://mathaudio.com/download.htm for foobar eq, and EQ Apo for else

Thanks. I thought about doing that. But that is the opposite direction than I want to take. I want more general (and fewer) EQ that applies to more sources. Doing this will give me more specific EQ for each source and multiple EQ's to fiddle with.

I want to focus on the music not the set up.

 

[Snarfie]

Thanks. I thought about doing that. But that is the opposite direction than I want to take. I want more general (and fewer) EQ that applies to more sources. Doing this will give me more specific EQ for each source and multiple EQ's to fiddle with.

I want to focus on the music not the set up.

You can apply as much or less eq in Mathaudio as you want for maximal transparency with the slider and or draw your own eq target curve. Further more with the system wide solution you can use any source in Windows. I use both Foobar an the system wide solution with APO for all other sound applications than Foobar. REW for me way to complicated.

 

[staticV3]

Thanks. I thought about doing that. But that is the opposite direction than I want to take. I want more general (and fewer) EQ that applies to more sources. Doing this will give me more specific EQ for each source and multiple EQ's to fiddle with.

I want to focus on the music not the set up.

WiiM is the answer.

 

[yelloguy]

REW for me way to complicated

REW is the way to go. I would not know what to EQ without seeing the REW graph. And after I did the EQ with the graph, the sound became infinitely better. It is like magic!

I understand the EQ can be simple or more complicated. But I was talking about fewer places to EQ. For example if my AVR would let me put in these two lines, I'd be done. I will spend the money on miniDSP but I don't understand how (or if) it will work on all sources going into my AVR. That is why Dirac is nice, because it is super convenient.

WiiM is the answer.

For music, yes. It will bring the convenience of using my iPhone for controlling music with applied EQ. But it does not bring anything new or additional to the table. That said, I will get the mini as soon as it shows up in the ebay store.

 

[yelloguy]

The WiiM Pro is showing in stock. And that got me thinking. It has a Line In and a Spdif Input on top of the WiiM mini. Does the PEQ work on these inputs as well? Because if it does, then I will have the ability to EQ additional sources - for example, I can EQ Apple TV device this way

 

[staticV3]

The WiiM Pro is showing in stock. And that got me thinking. It has a Line In and a Spdif Input on top of the WiiM mini. Does the PEQ work on these inputs as well? Because if it does, then I will have the ability to EQ additional sources - for example, I can EQ Apple TV device this way

As I said before:

You can copy your manual EQ filters stright into the WiiM Home App and they'll be applied to all audio going through the WiiM.

All audio.

 

[Gringoaudio1]

To use my CD player ever again I need its signal to be processed by Equalizer APO in the PC. How do I get the CD signal into the PC? An A/D like for a musical instrument going into a DAW? Then how do I choose the CD player as my source? I need a pC based source selector with JRiver, Spotify and my CD player as Sources.

 

[Maxon]

why don't you use proven devices?

 

[staticV3]

How do I get the CD signal into the PC? An A/D like for a musical instrument going into a DAW? Then how do I choose the CD player as my source?

Get a Line in->USB out device
(or Coax/Optical in->USB out, if your CD player supports it)

Plug the device into your computer, go to the Sound Control Panel->Recording->the device->Properties->enable "listen to this device".

Make sure that input and output device are set to the same sample rate, and you should be good to go.

 

[Snarfie]

REW is the way to go. I would not know what to EQ without seeing the REW graph. And after I did the EQ with the graph, the sound became infinitely better. It is like magic!

I understand the EQ can be simple or more complicated. But I was talking about fewer places to EQ. For example if my AVR would let me put in these two lines, I'd be done. I will spend the money on miniDSP but I don't understand how (or if) it will work on all sources going into my AVR. That is why Dirac is nice, because it is super convenient.


For music, yes. It will bring the convenience of using my iPhone for controlling music with applied EQ. But it does not bring anything new or additional to the table. That said, I will get the mini as soon as it shows up in the ebay store.

With minidsp you are independent to use any source or OS (besides doing the measurements in REW). If i would use vinyl ( which i don't) think minidsp is the way to go.

 

[yelloguy]

How do I get the CD signal into the PC

I think the easiest way is to buy a USB CD drive for your PC. I mean technically it is not using your CD player. But I don't see why you would want to use the CD transport in your CD player and make your life more complicated. You can also get the WiiM Pro and feed your CD Player's output to the Line In or Spdif on the WiiM Pro.

why don't you use proven devices?

What is that?

minidsp is the way to go

How would miniDSP EQ the signal I am feeding to the AVR via HDMI? All my sources (Amazon Fire TV stick, Apple TV 4K, CD Player, PS3, are connected to the Marantz AVR using HDMI. I connect my TV to the AVR using HDMI eARC. And done.

Now, to play music, I was using Apple TV 4K, or DLNA/uPnP on the AVR until last week. I have since plugged in a PC Tower using HDMI to the AVR. I am still considering buying a WiiM mini/Pro, a mini PC from Amazon, or a used laptop. But I am not sure if there is a more flexible route that would give me EQ on all those other sources I mentioned in the previous paragraph.

 

[Snarfie]

I think the easiest way is to buy a USB CD drive for your PC. I mean technically it is not using your CD player. But I don't see why you would want to use the CD transport in your CD player and make your life more complicated. You can also get the WiiM Pro and feed your CD Player's output to the Line In or Spdif on the WiiM Pro.


What is that?

How would miniDSP EQ the signal I am feeding to the AVR via HDMI? All my sources (Amazon Fire TV stick, Apple TV 4K, CD Player, PS3, are connected to the Marantz AVR using HDMI. I connect my TV to the AVR using HDMI eARC. And done.

Now, to play music, I was using Apple TV 4K, or DLNA/uPnP on the AVR until last week. I have since plugged in a PC Tower using HDMI to the AVR. I am still considering buying a WiiM mini/Pro, a mini PC from Amazon, or a used laptop. But I am not sure if there is a more flexible route that would give me EQ on all those other sources I mentioned in the previous paragraph.

I mentioned when i use vinyl minidsp is the way to go. So do a rew measurment upload the corrected result into the minidsp connect your vinyl record player (pre-amp) to the analog input of the minidsp an connect the analog output of the minidsp to your aux input of your amp. https://docs.minidsp.com/product-manuals/2x4-hd/basic-operation/playing-audio.html

You can figure out how to do that with AVR an connected devices in the link above.

 

[yelloguy]

You can figure out how to do that with AVR an connected devices in the link above.

Thanks for the link. I guess it has a toslink input for a digital source. I can have Apple TV go into the toslink for audio.
I think I will get the WiiM Pro and do the same for less $ especially because I have a filter that I like.