What is the next step ? - Newbie

[winsome]

Hello folks, greetings, new comer here, so please be gentle with me

I came from headphone background, around 10 years ago I sold all my gears which is mainly TOTL electrostat rig and medium end portable rig as well. Settled with bluetooth IEM and headphones for the sake of convinience. About two weeks ago, I ventured into realm of hi-fi office setup. Currently I have Elac Connex DCB-41, SVS SB100pro (just bought last week), stream from my laptop to Fiio Bta30pro using A2DP software to enable the AptxHD. My home office is really small, roughly around 5x2m only. Currently the speakers are mounted to wall.

So far happy with the sound. Been lurking in this forums for around 10 days. So for newbie like me, what would be the upgrade path that any of you can suggest into the future ? (short of upgrading the ELAC and SVS) DAC ? better streamer ? higher res streaming like tidal ? currently on Spotify. Not interested on going to passive speaker route. Prefer to retain the convinience factor.

Thank you in advance

 

[staticV3]

I'd recommend you measure your in-room frequency response using a UMIK-1 and REW, use that data to properly set up your SVS's PEQ, Phase, LPF, then remeasure and let REW calculate EQ settings for your Elac's, and finally apply those settings using Equalizer APO.

 

[winsome]

Thank you. Seems like all the items you mentioned are all software implementation. Will check it out.....

 

[HiMu]

So for newbie like me, what would be the upgrade path that any of you can suggest into the future ?

One of the most significant and long lasting upgrades to a sound system is basic acoustic treatment, after measuring your room and fine tuning your system, like staticV3 mentioned above.

You can DIY with materials "field tested" by other members in audio community or buy from a manufacturer who provides lab test results of their products. Avoid the 1-2" foam products from ebay, those are rarely useful on the frequencies we're wrestling with.

 

[winsome]

thanks, indeed I'm looking to soundproof my home office as well, as to prevent sounds leaking out too much and bothering the neighbour

 

[winsome]

I'd recommend you measure your in-room frequency response using a UMIK-1 and REW, use that data to properly set up your SVS's PEQ, Phase, LPF, then remeasure and let REW calculate EQ settings for your Elac's, and finally apply those settings using Equalizer APO.

Let's say I buy or borrow the UMIK's , what I do is to use this to measure the room and input the results to REW software that will churn out numbers which I'm going to apply to the speakers and sub settings. Then remeasure again and get REW to calculate EQ settings and apply it using Equalizer APO ? Is this pretty much the broad steps ?

How do I integrate this equalizer APO result into spotify or any music streaming client ? As my understanding is that this EQ settings needs to be applied somewhere.

Then I assume if the numbers churned out by REW cannot be achieved by changing the settings at the speakers and sub then some kind of room treatment needed to be done? So the process of measuring needs to be done repeatedly until I hit the bullseye or close to bullseye?

Apologies, I'm totally blind on this DIY approach of room treatment. Coming from headphone background, which is a lot simpler, this kind of make my head spins

 

[staticV3]

How do I integrate this equalizer APO result into spotify or any music streaming client ? As my understanding is that this EQ settings needs to be applied somewhere.

Equalizer APO applies your EQ settings to all system audio, including Spotify, YouTube, Video Games, etc.

 

[winsome]

Thanks again. Seems to me it's kind of long journey and lots of trial and error.

Bit OOT, my approach/principles in the audio world are
1. Sound is extremely subjective
2. More expensive doesn't mean better.
3. Confirmation bias is a bitch in this hobby
4. Not buying into cable, interconnects, power conditioning.
5. Not a critical listener. Critical listening is mentally exhaustive at least for me also dangerous for the wallet

Adhering to my principles above have been very useful to save my wallet in the past. And that's why I also like most of members of this forums, seems to me that their principles/train of thought mostly matched mine.

 

[Joe Smith]

I found that I didn't like using the Equalizer APO in my workroom system, it didn't improve the sound for me, but others here swear by it. But then I'm happy with two-way speaker level of bass without subwoofers.

I did find a slight noticeable sound quality difference between Spotify/Tidal/Qobuz/Amazon streaming with a good basic DAC (JDS Atom+), but since my wife loves using Spotify, I am still with them, and hoping that some distant day in the future, they will finally have a competitively-priced hi-res tier available.

I think your principles above are excellent guidelines for not getting pulled down the rabbit hole and just enjoying the hobby!

 

[winsome]

Hi Joe, thank you for the compliment and yes I'm waiting for Spotify to come up with Spotify hi-fi which they have been promised in implementing for couple of years.

As for room tuning suggested by static, I will eventually do it, in the meantime I'll stick to what I have first which is IMHO works for me.......

 

[Plumbus the Wise]

I'd recommend you measure your in-room frequency response using a UMIK-1 and REW, use that data to properly set up your SVS's PEQ, Phase, LPF, then remeasure and let REW calculate EQ settings for your Elac's, and finally apply those settings using Equalizer APO.

Any good guides or videos on this?

 

[winsome]

Any good guides or videos on this?

https://audiosciencereview.com/foru...t-microphones-and-the-like.49838/post-1785911

Here you are

Also I have been toying again with the idea of changing the Fiio Bt30pro that is now feeding the speaker from my laptop through bluetooth to a music streamer, something like Cambridge Audio mxn10 or Arcam ST60. Would this change the sound for the better ?

 

[Plumbus the Wise]

https://audiosciencereview.com/foru...t-microphones-and-the-like.49838/post-1785911

Here you are

Also I have been toying again with the idea of changing the Fiio Bt30pro that is now feeding the speaker from my laptop through bluetooth to a music streamer, something like Cambridge Audio mxn10 or Arcam ST60. Would this change the sound for the better ?

You rock, thanks man!