Question for the DSP Experts - how often do you DSP?

[Keith_W]

Methinks thou are a tad harsh on the AVR and microphone. While yes, I've heard some truly awful setups, but they were done by people with zero knowledge of what they are doing, often with grossly inadequate rooms, speakers and placement.

IF good sound is a priority - after it's still radio with pictures - and they are willing to take advice, the same AVR and mic in the hands of an experienced driver may create an excellent sound experience.

I can not see how software that has been slimmed down enough to run on an AVR can do an adequate job of automated design of DSP filters. As any of us who do manual DSP know, we need to take correct measurements. Then we need to carefully interpret those measurements. Then decide what we want to do - and a lot of decisions need to be made. At the end of it, we listen and go back and make corrections.

At minimum, automatic DSP design software should run on a PC or a cloud-based computing platform. There are simply too many decisions to be made. And I don't like those automatic things either, but I recognise they have a place.

 

[klettermann]

I can not see how software that has been slimmed down enough to run on an AVR can do an adequate job of automated design of DSP filters. As any of us who do manual DSP know, we need to take correct measurements. Then we need to carefully interpret those measurements. Then decide what we want to do - and a lot of decisions need to be made. At the end of it, we listen and go back and make corrections.

At minimum, automatic DSP design software should run on a PC or a cloud-based computing platform. There are simply too many decisions to be made. And I don't like those automatic things either, but I recognise they have a place.

The question though, is what's "adequate?" And to whom and for what purpose? At ASR the focus seems strongly tilted towards 2ch audio, and with a highly technical slant. That's a very different crowd from the HT/AVR/7.4.4/Atmos/etc/etc crowd over on AVS. In my mind the AVR Ausdessy-type DSP is more about just configuring the AVR with all the speakers than optimally setting up the sound. I've been doing that for years with a series of AVRs and ever-more speakers. Maybe I'm alone in this, but I never really cared how accurate or realistic it sounded. Who knows anyway? So many soundtracks are sizzle-boom we'd never know. I just positioned the speakers as best I could and ran Audessy. It always sounded fine to me. Family and others agreed, and that was the end of it. For HT/vdieo setups I think most people probably do something similar. Or maybe it's even worse than that, given the thumping, exagerated, multi-sub pounding that many seem to enjoy.

The 2ch cohort, at least towards the "audiophile" and "high end," is a very different beast IMO. Whether fans of DSP or not, there's often an often obsessive drive for ongoing improvement by one means or another. Look at the constant equipment chase, to say nothing of the snake-oil stuff that peolpe hope will make a difference. Obsessive DSP is perfect for this crowd! It dangles the endless hope of some perfection that can never be quite achieved or forces one to say "enough already, good enough." I'm probbably nearing that point, though I've discovered DSPis interesting enough and hard enough to become a hobby itself. Just a few random thoughts on the topic.... Thanks and cheers,