To EQ Or Not To EQ, that’s the question.

[Patrick1958]

To EQ Or Not To EQ, that’s the question.



A controversial topic in audiophile circles.



Reading this forum I come to the conclusion there is a fair amount of members/people using EQ/room, DSP for speaker listening.

So why not Eq’ing headphones. (some of you will most probably do)



There are several plugins/programs available on the net, freeware or not.



I own the Kameleon hardware based EQ with several modules (see Solderdude’s site https://diyaudioheaven.wordpress.com for more information) However I’m tied to one listening room/position (4 rooms/listening positions) in the house, it is very unpractical to de-install and re-install each time I change listening room, also the fact I own two dacs with build in HP amp and can not use the modules on these amps. So for those dacs I created/used my own eq curves.



Over the years I did some EQ’ing in foobar with the provided eq component. I felt it could be better so after searching I found another foobar 31 band component. https://www.foobar2000.org/components/view/foo_dsp_xgeq

I also gave https://sourceforge.net/projects/equalizerapo/files/1.2 a try, but I find the program too cumbersome to use. I decided to stick with the foobar2000 component.



I translated the basic eq curves to the new eq and over the past months I did some tweaking with my favorite headphones. Below some of those curves packed in a ZIP file, keep in mind that in contrast to Solderdude’s hardware based modules mine are not intended to provide a flat curve. One of my favorite headphones the Beyerdynamic Amiron Home has IMO the best low end of all my headphones so I tried to translate those characteristics to my new curves for all headphones, giving them a more fun factor to listen to. (I think Beyerdynamic engineers incorporated an adjusted Harmon curve when developing this magnificent headphone).



As a tool I use mainly my ears and carefully interpretation of the frequency responses on https://diyaudioheaven.wordpress.com and https://www.rtings.com/headphones/tests/sound-quality/raw-frequency-response were also very helpful. Most weight is giving to my ears.



Enjoy. Feel free to comment and or share your curves.

Posts below screenshots of the curves of following headphones :

- AKG 712 Pro
- Audeze EL8 open
- Beyerdynamic Amiron Home (non Bluetooth version)
- Beyerdynamic DT990 Pro 250 Ohm version
- Hifiman HE400i (second version)
- Hifiman HE400s
- Hifiman HE560
- Sennheiser HD650 (silver version)
- Sennheiser HD660s
- Shure SRH1840

 

[amirm]

Nice. Patrick, can you post some screen snapshots of the curves so that people don't have to try to install things to see what settings you have?

 

[Patrick1958]

Will grab some screen shots tomorrow and post them. Bedtime for me over here.

 

[Patrick1958]

Below screenshots of the eq curves from following headphones :

- AKG 712 Pro
- Audeze EL8 open
- Beyerdynamic Amiron Home (non Bluetooth version)
- Beyerdynamic DT990 Pro 250 Ohm version
- Hifiman HE400i (second version)
- Hifiman HE400s
- Hifiman HE560
- Sennheiser HD650 (silver version)
- Sennheiser HD660s
- Shure SRH1840

Upcoming, still tweaking :

- Sennheiser/massdrop HE58x
- Fostex TH500RP

 

[solderdude]

The last 1.5 years I have been using my Kameleon (portable amp) as an aid to control my Tinnitus and be able to still enjoy music.

One day my ears were clogged up again the day I had to give a small lecture. With one ear shut it is very hard to understand folks asking questions in a large room so used some rolled up toilet paper to carefully clean my ear.
Unfortunately some of the ear gunk touched and 'adhered' to my ear drum (seen some of it on a screen at the doc).
Haven't been able to flush it off so is still there.
Bone conduction showed my hearing still hears a lot higher than what my eardrum lets pass (imagine putting a wet cloth in the middle of a drum kit)

I developed a tinnitus at a very high freq (about 13kHz) in that ear. It grew louder over time. I used a 13kHz notch filter on 1 ear and 2 ears but did not help.
Listening to headphones gave a strange effect as on the left side the upper treble is softer.
Measured my ears and it was evident.
So... I came up with the idea to boost the softer (not missing but subdued) treble for that ear only using the Kameleon.
From that moment on I could enjoy music again and sounded 'right'.
After a few days of occasional listening I found my tinnitus became much less and unnoticeable during the day.
It grew louder when not listening to music so it has become sort of a therapy for me (an enjoyable one) but now my search is on for 'neutral headphones'
My HD800 filter was adapted so it has a treble boost where I need it. Only works for me that particular filter.
Won't help others with tinnitus as that can be of over 10 reasons.

So EQ for 1 ear has become essential and helps me. To evaluate headphones (and filters when working on one) I use 2 in series, one of them to correct my hearing.

I hate to disappoint those that have hearing loss as EQ won't help for most people having inner ear damage hearing loss.
You can't correct this that much.

So from headphone improvement to glorified earing aid. EQ has become a necessity to enjoy audio and control my tinnitus.

 

[pwjazz]

For me personally, headphones' frequency response is the most important factor in terms of sound quality. My cheap pair of RN-QT2 IEMs sounds much better with EQ than my expensive LCD2C sounds without EQ. Timbre is very important to me, and other than the mid-range Sennheisers, I've never heard any headphones whose timbre sounds completely natural without EQ (and even the Sennehisers seem to improve a tad with EQ).

 

[AnalogSteph]

So from headphone improvement to glorified earing aid. EQ has become a necessity to enjoy audio and control my tinnitus.

Tinnitus is basically a result of neurons "twiddling thumbs" and amplifying noise, so your story makes sense. Still, I find it weird that neither you nor your ENT would have been able to remove some gunk sticking to your eardrum. I'd think that plugging the ear up with warm water with plenty of soap and letting it soak for a good while should work. If you are worried about infections, which is a valid concern, I'd prime another earplug with existing wax beforehand, so your microbe communities aren't left out in the cold but infections can be kept out for a while.
Thankfully, I have generally been fine with rinsing my ears each time I wash my hair and removing earwax from the outer areas that would otherwise gunk up my in-ear tips with some toilet paper. There was this one time last year where I had to deal with a sporadically blocked ear canal - very unnerving. With plenty of rinsing it eventually went away, though I wouldn't recommend some of the more unorthodox things I tried (like dishwashing detergent)... that ear was a bit sore for a while.

I have been using foo_dsp_xgeq to EQ speakers and headphones for years now... it seems to work well as far as graphic EQs go with no ill effects (the stock Foobar2000 EQ is notorious for introducing steps in the frequency response, resulting in massive ringing).

I've done some playing around with REW and a calibrated measurement mic lately, hoping to improve my EQ settings. Poking such a mic into the earcup sideways while wearing cans seems to work decently enough (at least with the old and soft earpads on my trusty HD580s), results above ~2 kHz seem to vary dramatically depending on positioning though, so I still have to work on that. (The midrange on these Sennheisers is, however, remarkably flat.) My particular mic also isn't exactly a low noise or distortion king. I've had much better results using a lowly t.bone SC-400 (50€ cardioid large diaphragm condenser), and not just because my room isn't ideal. Even proximity effect was behaving itself... well, the speakers seem to be dropping like a rock below 100 Hz anyway.

Interestingly, I seem to prefer my speakers with the highs turned down 2-3 dB these days (note that they measure rather flat by themselves). Might be because I'm listening very close (<0.5 m) and there isn't a lot to absorb highs in close proximity. Should probably get some acoustic foam and stuff. The main obstacle in terms of early reflections would have to be my monitor though, and that's a 5:4 19", so nothing super wide at all - I'm sitting really, really close... (That square Eizo might be interesting for me. A bit spendy though. Besides, monitors that high can be hard on your neck.)

 

[Patrick1958]

Sennheiser/Massdrop HD 58X Jubilee.

Enjoy.

 

[graz_lag]

Below screenshots of the eq curves from following headphones :

- AKG 712 Pro
- Audeze EL8 open
- Beyerdynamic Amiron Home (non Bluetooth version)
- Beyerdynamic DT990 Pro 250 Ohm version
- Hifiman HE400i (second version)
- Hifiman HE400s
- Hifiman HE560
- Sennheiser HD650 (silver version)
- Sennheiser HD660s
- Shure SRH1840

Upcoming, still tweaking :

- Sennheiser/massdrop HE58x
- Fostex TH500RP

Great files, indeed.
A little drifting from the topic ... In the above-list, which one would you buy again and which not ?
I am selling my B&W P7 and was heading towards Grado, the PS500e if I will find the right deal on the second-hand market ...
I have already the K701, and have had all the DTs (770, 880, 990, both pro and standard, all versions 32, 250 ,600).
I have bought the P7 after selling the AudioQuest NightHawk.
My current amp is the Beyerdynamic HBC1.
I am 80% blues 20% jazz.

 

[Patrick1958]

Great files, indeed.
A little drifting from the topic ... In the above-list, which one would you buy again and which not ?
I am selling my B&W P7 and was heading towards Grado, the PS500e if I will find the right deal on the second-hand market ...
I have already the K701, and have had all the DTs (770, 880, 990, both pro and standard, all versions 32, 250 ,600).
I have bought the P7 after selling the AudioQuest NightHawk.
My current amp is the Beyerdynamic HBC1.
I am 80% blues 20% jazz.

Not :
- Audeze EL8
- Hifiman HE 400s
- Shure SRH1840
Again :
- Hifiman HE400i
- Sennheiser HD660s
- Beyerdynamic Amiron Home
Undecided :
- Hifiman HE560
- Sennheiser HD650
- Beyerdynamic DT990 Pro
- AKG 712 Pro

I owed the B & W P7, sold it. Still have the Audioquest Nighthawk (first edition) trying to sell it, little to no interest in the second hand market over here. Just like the Hifiman HE 560 the Nighthawks plummeted in price. I can not even sell it at half the price i paid for it new when you can buy them new for around 300 € or $.

Currently working on EQing is the Beyerdynamic DT 880 250 ohm (doesn't react well in the lower regions on EQ) and the Fostex TH500RP (reacts differently depending on type of music).

 

[Patrick1958]

Beyerdynamic DT 880 pro 250 ohm
Enjoy

 

[graz_lag]

Hi Patrick : I am going to try your K712's EQ for my K701, later today.

One point I wanted to share : with my Beyerdynamic HBC1 amplifier, I find the choice available among the different DSPs in terms of what Beyer calls : room size, ambience, very helpful to meet - that particular quality of recording, genre of music, artist, with my taste, the headphones being the same.
Alternatively, I can push the signal straight thru with the bypass mode.

Here we discuss abt. transparency, how do we place the EQ or DSP into that context of transparency ?

 

[Patrick1958]

Hi Patrick : I am going to try your K712's EQ for my K701, later today.

One point I wanted to share : with my Beyerdynamic HBC1 amplifier, I find the choice available among the different DSPs in terms of what Beyer calls : room size, ambience, very helpful to meet - that particular quality of recording, genre of music, artist, with my taste, the headphones being the same.
Alternatively, I can push the signal straight thru with the bypass mode.

Here we discuss abt. transparency, how do we place the EQ or DSP into that context of transparency ?

Good question.
I'm not familiar with the HBC1 processor, never heard it. My advice is to bypass DSP from amp, i would think DSP on top of an EQ curve could be overkill.
As a side note, the K701 is to me a different sounding headphone compared to the K701, so you might want to adjust the sliders for the high-mids to treble. The K701 is (to my perception) brighter (more hights) and less low end. As per your question i compared them both on the same amp (violectric V100, 2 headphone outputs) without EQ and with EQ simutanious. I gave the K701 to my brother (we share same adress/residence) years ago, reason why i've not created a dedicated EQ curve (yet).

 

[graz_lag]

Good question.
I'm not familiar with the HBC1 processor, never heard it. My advice is to bypass DSP from amp, i would think DSP on top of an EQ curve could be overkill ...

Yes, in fact I am going to try the EQed K701 with the Beyer HBC1 in bypass mode, so no DSP, 75 Ohms coax signal from my Weiss 204INT USB/SPDIF interface. (FLACs files)
I need first to set up my PC for dual booting "Windows - Linux", as it is now only on Linux, so that I can use your data with Foobar2K.

 

[Thomas savage]

There’s no jeopardy in trying a bit of EQ , you can try it and if you don’t like it don’t use it. Personally Iv found it fun on my hifi but ultimately distracting but do use it for headphones and my JBL boombox .

It’s entirely a personal preference so I’d not give a fig about what anyone else thinks.

 

[graz_lag]

It's a funny exercise, you easily loose yourself for some hrs. in this ...
It adds a funny 3rd option AFAIC : Straight thru, DSP, and now EQ.
The DSPs are more immediate, I have two knobs for a total of 22 possible combinations between Room Size and Ambience, but with this EQ exercise you learn more abt. how the headphones react ...

Here's the screenshot for the AKG K701 standard, not Quincy Jones's edition ...

 

[Patrick1958]

It's a funny exercise, you easily loose yourself for some hrs. in this ...
It adds a funny 3rd option AFAIC : Straight thru, DSP, and now EQ.
The DSPs are more immediate, I have two knobs for a total of 22 possible combinations between Room Size and Ambience, but with this EQ exercise you learn more abt. how the headphones react ...

Here's the screenshot for the AKG K701 standard, not Quincy Jones's edition ...

View attachment 18020

Tip : Try to keep the Volume on Auto to avoid clipping !
ps : searching for a plugin/app to translate the settings to a word document. Would come handy for incorporating to another EQ program/plugin.

 

[TungstenC]

I've been using MathAudio Headphone EQ in Foobar for quite awhile now so here's the EQ I'm currently using with my 7XX's

or with the first filter nulled

 

[Patrick1958]

I've been using MathAudio Headphone EQ in Foobar for quite awhile now so here's the EQ I'm currently using with my 7XX's

View attachment 18022

or with the first filter nulled

View attachment 18025

Interesting program, came across it when searching for a foobar plugin/component. Will most probably give it a try in the upcoming week. Thanks for sharing.

 

[Patrick1958]

It's a funny exercise, you easily loose yourself for some hrs. in this ...
It adds a funny 3rd option AFAIC : Straight thru, DSP, and now EQ.
The DSPs are more immediate, I have two knobs for a total of 22 possible combinations between Room Size and Ambience, but with this EQ exercise you learn more abt. how the headphones react ...

Here's the screenshot for the AKG K701 standard, not Quincy Jones's edition ...

View attachment 18020

Could you pack it in a zip file and upload, want to try it on the headphone i gave to my brother