Hmmm, I was re-wiring some equipment and just realized something. The more HP’s I own, the less desire I have to use my solid state equalizer and tone controls. I know some folks use digital equalization to smooth out specific frequency bumps and dips, that’s not what i mean. I’m talking about tone controls and cheap 4-5 band eq’s.
When i only had a few budget HP’s and i switched genre’s I would use my tone controls to bring the headphone in line with the music. Now i just swap out headphones and mate them with the genre. Also, i finally own one or 2 HP’s that perform acceptably to me, across the music spectrum, and just no longer feel the need to mess with the sound signature they provide as tuned. It took my a while to understand how so many folks didn’t ever need or want to EQ, i guess i get it now.
I’m afraid to use EQ. with some headphones it just doesnt sound good i think. i’m worried it takes away from the quality of the headphone. I have an Arya and i would love to use something to take down that treble. but when i tried to use foobar EQ it just seems to damage the sound. The Arya sounds fantastic, and i would hate anything to interfere with its performance.
Yeah I’ve never been the biggest fan of eq for headphones.
Back when installed an old system in my car I eq’ed the shit out of that so I understand how to do it just fine(long and tedious process lol) but yeah not so much with headphones and I dint think there are any I have that I would want to. I do know to never play certain songs or genres with certain headphones though haha. I learned that early on when I only had a few pairs. Now when I first hear a new headphone for a few minutes I can usually quickly estimate what I wouldn’t like on them. And I usually test it just to check. Usually I’m right but I’m surprised sometimes ha.
that makes sense, TBH lately i’ve been eq’ing my hawks with certain tracks. i just listen to alot of trashy pop lol so it helps. I don’t have good ears but i seriously can’t tell a degradation in sound from any range so it’s been a blessing. i never felt comfortable doing it specially since i would worry about degrading the sound signal without me knowing it but i’m pretty confident now
I only really EQ bass, if I have to mess with the mids or treble ive prob already chucked the headphone tbh. And also imo but I think providing a few db low in the range is much easier to do without messing up the sound.
I feel the same way, but I think it is because it took me five plus years to learn what l like. After 20 pairs I have finally gotten to where I want to be. Now with the Beyer’s on the way out, the EQ (Loki) is pretty much just commited to the Koss ESP/E95X system
I tip roll for that, flatten treble peaks… Go with the spirals…need DAT bass…go with the Final Audio E tips. Need tube weirdness and warmth…go with the horns
So typically small eq tweaks are a ok, but when you start doing large eq tweaks like that you typically do see a drop in fidelity, I personally wouldn’t recommend doing that, just get a different headphone instead at that point
Just like a segment of enthusiasts are currently under the hallucinatory spell of ASR numbers, so another segment has bought into Harman target = FR panacea. In particular, Metal was a serious Tyll Herstens devotee and Tyll was infatuated with the Harman thing before he retired.
May as well respond to your question in the Currawong thread:
Lol. Even that would be better imo than the wild west free-for-all currently happening. And I vote we re-name the Harman Over-ear Headphone Frequency Response Target to the Harman Whatchamacallit.
I would highly recommend exploring eq with things like peace apo. i use a bunch of settings created by oratory1990 to help bring them closer to the harmon curve and they just work for me. only so much the factory can do with materials and padding. sometimes you just need those subtle tweaks to bring out the real magic
I think tools like EQ and DSP are more appropriate for speakers than headphones where they can be an important part of room set up.
I had a pair of AKG N90Q headphones with various tricks built in, they were good headphones and I liked the cross feed function but cross feed is something different.
For headphones I tend to leave them with the stock tuning and quite like the fact that different models have different tuning.
I am not a fan of the Harman curve hype. Don’t get me wrong, if it works for you then great, however it is just based on statistical analysis of listener preference. Some present it as if headphones not following that curve are badly designed and there is something wrong with them. No, they’re tuned differently and a preference is just that. People who prefer a different tuning are no more right or wrong than those who like the Harman curve.
There is a sense on some websites that scientific method and analysis is a uniquely Harman innovation which is nonsense. I remember someone dismissing Etymotic for being unscientific and wrong because they don’t follow the Harman curve, right so because Etymotic have done their own work which is different from Harman they must be wrong.
I mean some of my technically “best” headphones I own are dsp based (warwick aperio system), and they sound excellent. DSP isn’t a bad thing if it is done well whatsoever imo
