dbx 1231 Graphic EQ Review

[The Guy who cares]

F

Ahh yes, OK but they were both Octave band EQ's

Funny thing is both Equalizers back around 1990 were worth around $300. Now the Yamaha sells for over a grand on eBa. That's insane for a 30 year old Equalizer, the Kenwood looked better so I suppose that 30 year old eq is much more.

 

[Rja4000]

I own this one: Klark Teknik DN9344E.
I don't have the control unit, with faders, so I've only used it remote from a PC (through Ethernet).
4 channels digital 31 bands EQ, with several KT graphic EQ emulations (including the DN360) +dynamic EQ.
AES ins and outs (+ analog if you need them)
It goes for around 600€ used.

Only issue, the PC software requires .Net 1.1, so it can't be used on latest Windows version.
So I run it in a VM on my PC.

 

[stoo23]

Nice Klark Teknik make great stuff !!
That unit looks great !!

Won't it talk with later .Net versions ?? Don't Klark offer any updated drivers ??

 

[Ted B]

F

Funny thing is both Equalizers back around 1990 were worth around $300. Now the Yamaha sells for over a grand on eBa. That's insane for a 30 year old Equalizer, the Kenwood looked better so I suppose that 30 year old eq is much more.

It does seem insane when the last EQ-630 listed on Reverb sold for $350 and the last several sales on Ebay for units in good working order hovered in the $400-600 range. Then again, unless one is a collector of vintage gear, I see no advantage in spending for a decades old consumer unit limited to 10 bands of adjustment. Additionally, details like what op amps are employed become relevant, as some of those older ICs are undesirable by contemporary standards. As such, old consumer EQs tend to be a minefield of uncertainty and a big contributor to why hardware EQ gets a bad rap.

 

[The Guy who cares]

 

[The Guy who cares]

The Equalizer works just fine. I had no issues with it. Build Quality is excellent and it has a nice weight too boot.

 

[The Guy who cares]

I love this equalizer. I keep it in front of me under the Coffee Table. Most of the time I leave it near flat.... for a avage listing but for Classic Rock I do boost 50hz up a little bit, It's an excellent equalizer. My streaming device is Amazon 4k Cube. I have the Apple cube too but never use it. The Amazon is better in my opinion.

 

[The Guy who cares]

More Sub bass with the Amazon 4K Cube., other than that its the same.

 

[The Guy who cares]

dose the dbx Equalizers give the movie theaters sound without room correction and I'd say "Yes' and even better as room correction makes everything flat and lifeless. Using an Equalizers by ears is the best way in my opinion.

 

[EJ3]

View attachment 382474dose the dbx Equalizers give the movie theaters sound without room correction and I'd say "Yes' and even better as room correction makes everything flat and lifeless. Using an Equalizers by ears is the best way in my opinion.

Flat (& perhaps lifeless) is so that you have a base line starting point that you can work from. Season as appropriate for your taste.

 

[The Guy who cares]

Someone posted that The Sony str-az7000es has hiss. I actually have that Receiver and noticed no hiss, perhaps because I'm only using it as a Preamplifier. As a Preamplifier I'm using the DBX Equalizers and no issues with 3 Rotel RB-1582MKII power amplifiers. So maybe it's something with Sony's internal power amps?

 

[KEM]

But how do you do when you fix FR with your EQ? It's fixed frequencies you change with a physical EQ, I mean ...hm are you lucky that where you need to change/ fix FR right there you have an EQ band/slider or....well how do you actually do it?

Edit:
Q values are also fixed, right?By the way, I see that Rja4000 in #8 brings up the same things.

I've been using my dBx 1231 for a few years now. I used to do an REW scan and adjust the sliders to change the FR. Then I do it over and over until I get an FR that I like. Very labor intensive.
However, I've stumbled upon a better way to use this EQ (or any analog EQ, including PEQ). First, I do an REW scan with the EQ bypassed. Then I use the EQ in REW to set the filters (I usually have 10 filters, but there could be more). I look at the wavelengths and amount of cut/gain calculated. I then adjust the sliders to get as close as possible to the desired values.
I like this method because I can create a "house curve" in the REW EQ and ask REW to match it as well as possible. So I can get "flat", "bass elevated" or "treble elevated", "smiley" or "frown" or some other curve.
After the adjustments, I do another REW scan and hand fix a few difficult spots if needed. I've found that the first scan is quite close to the house curve. Obviously, there'll be some differences because the wavelengths and bandwidths recommended by REW don't match what the 1231 can do. And of course, this method will not produce as smooth a result as a DSP EQ. But it's definitely good enough for me (no larger than +/- 4 dB match to my house curve from 20-20kHz) and maintains the "all analog path" (at least for the TT and the FM radio).

 

[EJ3]

Someone posted that The Sony str-az7000es has hiss. I actually have that Receiver and noticed no hiss, perhaps because I'm only using it as a Preamplifier. As a Preamplifier I'm using the DBX Equalizers and no issues with 3 Rotel RB-1582MKII power amplifiers. So maybe it's something with Sony's internal power amps?

Maybe they have VERY efficient speakers (where a less efficient speaker would not make a hiss)?

 

[david moran]

I've been using my dBx 1231 for a few years now. I used to do an REW scan and adjust the sliders to change the FR. Then I do it over and over until I get an FR that I like. Very labor intensive.
However, I've stumbled upon a better way to use this EQ (or any analog EQ, including PEQ). First, I do an REW scan with the EQ bypassed. Then I use the EQ in REW to set the filters (I usually have 10 filters, but there could be more). I look at the wavelengths and amount of cut/gain calculated. I then adjust the sliders to get as close as possible to the desired values.
I like this method because I can create a "house curve" in the REW EQ and ask REW to match it as well as possible. So I can get "flat", "bass elevated" or "treble elevated", "smiley" or "frown" or some other curve.
After the adjustments, I do another REW scan and hand fix a few difficult spots if needed. I've found that the first scan is quite close to the house curve. Obviously, there'll be some differences because the wavelengths and bandwidths recommended by REW don't match what the 1231 can do. And of course, this method will not produce as smooth a result as a DSP EQ. But it's definitely good enough for me (no larger than +/- 4 dB match to my house curve from 20-20kHz) and maintains the "all analog path" (at least for the TT and the FM radio).

I get exceptionally, universally praised smooth-sounding results the old-fashioned way, taking third-octave spatially averaged measurements (entails temporal averaging of course) using pink noise and an RTA set to Continuous or Average. There are several good smartphone ones; I favor the StudioSixDigital AudioTools for iPhone, but AudioTool for other smartphones is also good. You can check afterward using sixth-octave resolution to look for badly unfixed problems, keeping in mind that the ear is an averaging detector of not superfine resolution.

Anyway, move the mike (built-in smartphone mikes are plenty good enough for first cut) within a cubic yard say (can be less, like a cubic 18", to and fro, up and down, side to side) from the front of each cabinet starting about a yard away and save it. Then set out to smooth what you see using the EQ. Don't go nuts. Repeat. Then check back at the listening position, again merely tweaking, not going nuts w OCD. You can't fix your room perfectly, obviously.

Then tilt everything downward across the treble by 5-8dB or so.

I am fortunate to have and use a dbx RTA1 (precision pro unit with memories and PC interface, much more precise than any smartphone) and good quiet third-octave equalizer (also dbx, but there are others) iteratively. Simply crude octave EQ gives you the most bang for the buck from the getgo. The only room response checking I have done w impulse-based / gated-sweep systems shows good agreement although those snapshot / timeslice systems are not to be fully trusted ultimately in my experience.

 

[EJ3]

Someone posted that The Sony str-az7000es has hiss. I actually have that Receiver and noticed no hiss, perhaps because I'm only using it as a Preamplifier. As a Preamplifier I'm using the DBX Equalizers and no issues with 3 Rotel RB-1582MKII power amplifiers. So maybe it's something with Sony's internal power amps?

Or someone's speakers having 101 DB sensitivity, maybe?

 

[rwortman]

I have been using a Behringer FBQ3102HD( $150) for a few years now. It has LED lit sliders. The drawback is they don’t stay lit. They lose contact with the commutator that supplies them and you have to jiggle them to get the light back, daily. Having some lit and some out is annoying. I bought a DBX 1231 to replace it. Yes it is designed for professionals to EQ house speakers to a room or stage monitors to performers preference. The only difference between that and a home application is the size of the room. Mine has a tiny bit of mechanical transformer hum that the Behringer, due to its power supply design does not. Pro EQ’s live in equipment racks with amps that all have fans and many have humming transformers too. No one would notice this little sound . I put some damping material on the mu-metal transformer shields and it knocked it down by a lot. You can hear it if your ear is next to it but not where I sit (I’ve had disk players with louder motors). The thing that this and the Behringer has that many others don’t is a power off relay bypass. My preamp has a programmable trigger that turns it on for analog inputs and turns it off when I am running Roon DSP. When it’s off the relay connects the inputs to the output. I can have it out of the circuit when I don’t need it and I don’t have to move cables around or push buttons to do it. The only thing I like better about the Behringer was variable hi and lo cut filters and 6 or 8 segment level meter instead of the DBX’s, some, a lot, too much three LED’s. It’s functional and with home audio levels you’ll never clip it anyway, I just kind of like bouncing level meters. Things I like better on the DBX? It’s 3U instead of 2U so you get longer sliders which makes adjustment easier. I kind of prefer the sliders not being lit. Having 32 lights on the front of something in my equipment rack when listening at low light levels makes it look like a Christmas tree.

 

[david moran]

boy, I think I get zero xformer hum (or anything else) from mine

 

[Angel II]

The noise I hear is comparable to my Atoll integrated amplifier. I would say that it is physiological to hear a slight noise if I put my ear close to the device (even the PC). I do not hear transformer noise in my listening condition which is about 2.5 - 3 meters away. Excellent purchase the DBX 1231.

 

[RETSELDRIB]

I understand that the earlier DBX 1231 units suffered from large amounts of hiss but the newer units post 2022 are hiss free. Is this true? Do the latest units use quieter components ?
Thanks.

 

[david moran]

no idea, and the design is loooong after my time, but certainly not noisy my (limited) experience

I have used and still use one (well before '22) and have heard another one or two in use in the past, and zero noise,

or at least if you put ear to tweeter and switched it in and out the v faint hiss from the amp/preamp stayed pretty much the same

otoh, where's there's smoke ...

otoh2, audiophiles both pro or lay regularly misunderstand / misinterpret what they hear ....