Topic: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

Sorry for my ignorance, please forgive me if I am wrong.
  On my headphone Sony 7506, it's not enough to use 7-Band PEQ to adjust it perfectly to match the Optimum Hifi Target. At least 10 bands are needed.
  As shown, the bass can not be corrected and it should be audible.
https://tinypic.host/image/Screenshot-2 … emmx.LhlN2
  If you think what I said is right, can you add the 10-Band PEQ to it through a software update? Thank you!

2

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

Band 2 Peak 4 kHz Q 3.0 +1.8 dB is clearly inaudible. Use that one to raise the deep bass a bit.

Also check out this video: https://youtu.be/_Nq9ZGAYTwU

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

I also miss more bands in my ADI-2 DAC. I wonder what the reason is for the current band limit and if RME could add more via firmware.

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

I would be curious if we could have double the bands if they were joint between L/R channels. I know there is a hardware limitation on how much PEQ can be done by the DSP. I'm guessing "joining" the two channels doesn't actually save on math and the DSP is already at its limit?

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

antagron wrote:

… the DSP is already at its limit?

The limit is connected to the sample rate.
Below 192 kHz the DSP has spare power.

6 (edited by 66888 2023-12-12 02:43:23)

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

Sorry I just figured out how to reply to you.  Your forum is different from our country’s.
Okay, but even if the band 2 is removed, it seems that at least two additional bands of PEQ are needed to completely correct the low frequency, right?
If possible, can you increase RME to 10-Band PEQ? Of course, the Dual EQ function must be available. Even if the audio is limited to 96khz or 48khz, please.

MC wrote:

Band 2 Peak 4 kHz Q 3.0 +1.8 dB is clearly inaudible. Use that one to raise the deep bass a bit.

Also check out this video: https://youtu.be/_Nq9ZGAYTwU

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

Let’s put it this way -

Why are narrowband EQ corrections with foreign origin questionable and should be just left away?
ALL the measurement-based EQ curves from the internet are wrong above ca. 2-3 kHz, with very few single exceptions.


The measurement systems used do not supply data with a high enough VALID frequency resolution to justify narrow EQ bands.
You cannot EQ better than your measurement is.

One has to be aware of the limits of a measurement system to judge it’s results.
If you compensate above these limits you introduce errors, and leave the errors you want to compensate untouched.


• Even slight changes in headphone’s placement, on your head or the measurement coupler, yield totally different results for frequencies above ca. 2 kHz.
Which one to use then, and why?
Averaging various positions doesn’t help much, practically you don’t listen to an average, but a discrete positioning.

• The famous “Harman”- and other compensations are strongly smoothed, coarse approximations for a very certain setup, intentionally leaving out the fine details of the curve, therefore limit frequency dependent precision.

• People use Harman- or other compensations as if they were valid for other measurement rigs too, which they aren’t.

• Most compensations, except “Freefield” do use the room sound signals without any angular weighting.
Opposed to that the human brain does give a lot more weight to the direct sound from the source, above the room-reflected sounds.

• Your personal pinnae have different shapes, and therefore different HRTF (Head Related Transfer Function, angle dependent frequency response) than the measurement “ear”, coupler.

• Each human’s auditorial system permanently adapts to the sound colors it’s presented, like the eye adapts to light colors.
You have to “readjust” that from time to time with natural sounds to judge an artificial reproduction system.
The amount of ability for those adaptions is different for each individual, and there are limits.

• There are certain characteristics of a headphone or loudspeaker that are prominent and specific enough worth for correction, the famous 6 kHz peak of Sennheiser’s HD-800 comes into mind.
Even this one doesn’t annoy everybody.


Remark:
Didn ‘t you notice, all these Oratory, Auto EQ Project and most other Internet fine-tweak-EQ Setups simply sound like shit (sorry for the strong word) in the upper range?
Doesn't a simple Treble Shelf EQ or broadband Peak EQ, or a combination of both, adjusted to taste, give better results?

The measurements, BTW, can give a starting point for COARSE correction above 2 kHz, and below 2kHz measurements actually are quite valid, if your can achieve a good seal on your head.


Finally:
I do my EQs based on measurements on my own head, using my own compensation curve.
Even this is limited and has to be adjusted by taste over a period of several weeks or months at least.

8 (edited by 66888 2024-01-08 09:08:06)

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

Thanks for your reply, it helped me understand a lot.  I agree with most of your points, but I also want to share some of mine with you.

You mentioned that eq should be set based on your own feelings. I very much agree with your point of view, but unfortunately I do not have this ability, because the auditory system is likely to produce illusions.  Subjective listening is a professional course that requires training to master.  Most people are probably not trained and therefore not as professional as you.

Then you mentioned that errors will occur if there is a deviation in wearing, which is correct, but I can try to make the wearing position consistent every time, such as wearing it in the middle every time and ensuring a tight fit.Thus the impact is almost non-existent.

You also mentioned that everyone's auricle is different, which will cause certain frequency bands to sound different. This is obviously unquestionable.  But I think this does not mean that the test data is useless at high frequencies. As you said, the test data is an average, and the average is the best, or the smallest overall error.  Because if the non-standard direction of the frequency response curve is exactly opposite to the impact by your auricle, it will cause very bad effects.

Finally, let’s talk about the test equipment problem you mentioned.  I learned that frequency resolution is not a problem. They do measurements at 96 kHz sample rate with 2s sweeps, so they have 192000 samples for the IR. So maybe the word "error" is too strong.

Happy to communicate with you!

KaiS wrote:

Let’s put it this way -

Why are narrowband EQ corrections with foreign origin questionable and should be just left away?
ALL the measurement-based EQ curves from the internet are wrong above ca. 2-3 kHz, with very few single exceptions.


The measurement systems used do not supply data with a high enough VALID frequency resolution to justify narrow EQ bands.
You cannot EQ better than your measurement is.

One has to be aware of the limits of a measurement system to judge it’s results.
If you compensate above these limits you introduce errors, and leave the errors you want to compensate untouched.


• Even slight changes in headphone’s placement, on your head or the measurement coupler, yield totally different results for frequencies above ca. 2 kHz.
Which one to use then, and why?
Averaging various positions doesn’t help much, practically you don’t listen to an average, but a discrete positioning.

• The famous “Harman”- and other compensations are strongly smoothed, coarse approximations for a very certain setup, intentionally leaving out the fine details of the curve, therefore limit frequency dependent precision.

• People use Harman- or other compensations as if they were valid for other measurement rigs too, which they aren’t.

• Most compensations, except “Freefield” do use the room sound signals without any angular weighting.
Opposed to that the human brain does give a lot more weight to the direct sound from the source, above the room-reflected sounds.

• Your personal pinnae have different shapes, and therefore different HRTF (Head Related Transfer Function, angle dependent frequency response) than the measurement “ear”, coupler.

• Each human’s auditorial system permanently adapts to the sound colors it’s presented, like the eye adapts to light colors.
You have to “readjust” that from time to time with natural sounds to judge an artificial reproduction system.
The amount of ability for those adaptions is different for each individual, and there are limits.

• There are certain characteristics of a headphone or loudspeaker that are prominent and specific enough worth for correction, the famous 6 kHz peak of Sennheiser’s HD-800 comes into mind.
Even this one doesn’t annoy everybody.


Remark:
Didn ‘t you notice, all these Oratory, Auto EQ Project and most other Internet fine-tweak-EQ Setups simply sound like shit (sorry for the strong word) in the upper range?
Doesn't a simple Treble Shelf EQ or broadband Peak EQ, or a combination of both, adjusted to taste, give better results?

The measurements, BTW, can give a starting point for COARSE correction above 2 kHz, and below 2kHz measurements actually are quite valid, if your can achieve a good seal on your head.


Finally:
I do my EQs based on measurements on my own head, using my own compensation curve.
Even this is limited and has to be adjusted by taste over a period of several weeks or months at least.

9 (edited by KaiS 2024-01-08 14:12:06)

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

I have to admit that for laymen this measurement thing is hard to understand.
With headphones even experts often aren’t aware of full problematic.


The central point is the precision and resolution of the target curve, and this has nothing to do with the measurement’s sample rate.

The popular Harman Target curve is a more or less hand-drawn (really!) average with a resolution of less than one octave.
This would equal a Q-factor of an EQ-band of about 0.7 or less.

No measurement-based EQ with higher Q-factor can be justified on this base.
It will just introduce errors, instead of corrections.

And this is only one of the factors I listed above.


Tuning an EQ by listening is not that complicated.
You have to ask yourself if each EQ change is for the better or the worse, like or dislike, while listening and comparing over a period of time.

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

I understand what you mean, but according to your logic, aren't all frequency bands inaccurate?

Then you say this is just one factor.  Didn’t I give solutions to the other factors you mentioned above?

KaiS wrote:

I have to admit that for laymen this measurement thing is hard to understand.
With headphones even experts often aren’t aware of full problematic.


The central point is the precision and resolution of the target curve, and this has nothing to do with the measurement’s sample rate.

The popular Harman Target curve is a more or less hand-drawn (really!) average with a resolution of less than one octave.
This would equal a Q-factor of an EQ-band of about 0.7 or less.

No measurement-based EQ with higher Q-factor can be justified on this base.
It will just introduce errors, instead of corrections.

And this is only one of the factors I listed above.


Tuning an EQ by listening is not that complicated.
You have to ask yourself if each EQ change is for the better or the worse, like or dislike, while listening and comparing over a period of time.

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

I have seen your newly released remote control 2.0, which is very awesome. I would like to express my sincere gratitude.
Closer to home, 7-bands eq are not enough.  For example, my headphones 7506, according to what you said before, seem to require 9 segments.  What's more, I believe many people will use it to connect speakers, which requires calibration of the room. The acoustic performance of different rooms varies widely, so I think it is necessary to add a few eqs(such as 10-bands or more).  And it may not be too difficult for you, as long as it is limited to less than or equal to 96khz or 48khz. I hope you can take my advice.
By the way, I don’t seem to see the Preamp gain function in eq. Can it be added?

MC wrote:

Band 2 Peak 4 kHz Q 3.0 +1.8 dB is clearly inaudible. Use that one to raise the deep bass a bit.

Also check out this video: https://youtu.be/_Nq9ZGAYTwU

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

Is not it better to have headphones that do not need that much "correction"?

And one more important thing. What about hearing abilities of listener? Is not it often further from optimum than in case of headphones? And how precise those measurements on humas are? It is rather subjective type of measurenment.... And just a few points on frequency range....

13 (edited by KaiS 2024-03-05 14:06:01)

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

66888 wrote:

ICloser to home, 7-bands eq are not enough.  For example, my headphones 7506, according to what you said before, seem to require 9 segments.  …

The Sony MDR-7506 - if you have the original, not a Chinese copy(*1) - is a perfect example for what I said above.
I do use it in my studio quite often and:

It does not need any correction at all, as it‘s perfectly tuned to listen at studio level.
If it sounds too bright, you’re listening too loud.


The only thing it needs is replacement of earpads every two years, as their faux leather starts flaking soon, which changes their sound to non-existent bass.


66888 wrote:

I don’t seem to see the Preamp gain function in eq. Can it be added?

PEQ-Preamp-Gain is abandoned, because ADI-2 has an internal headroom of 24 dB that prevents clipping.
Simply bringing down the Volume control therefore is fully sufficient to avoid overdrive.



(*1) Regarding fraudulent Chinese copies that flooded the market for the Sony MDR-7506:
Look at the driver side (with the earpads removed) and mostly you can tell them apart.
The original has a perforated metal dome at the driver mount.
The copies often just have a flat plastic soundboard.
Another signs: the cable and the earpads of the copies are quite stiff.
The earpads miss the rubber bands that holds them in the gaps.

The Chinese counterfeits sound like s**t BTW.
I have some that I finally paid nothing for, as I forced a full refund.

https://www.expandore.com/articles/Bewa … adsets.htm

https://www.expandore.com/articles/Video/MDR7506-6.jpg

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

Yes, the 7506 is an excellent headset that has almost no rivals.  So much so that my hd800s has been idle for a long time.
The above should have proven that my 7506 is not a Chinese copy.
By the way, the one I have at home comes in blue transparent packaging.  Later, a new 7506 packaged in a white carton appeared on the market. It sounded like shit, so I refunded it without hesitation.
7506 has almost no staining whatsoever.  Some people say that the high frequency is too high. Maybe it is too loud as you said, or some individuals have deviations due to production cost factors. Because the products themselves are relatively cheap, the production accuracy is not that high. However, the amount of bass is indeed too much, it is Harman bass rather than standard bass.  This requires eq for me.
Another reason I do the eq is because production accuracy errors may cause audible changes, so I test and correct.

15 (edited by KaiS 2024-03-14 01:03:38)

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

When listening not too loud, at “healthy“ long term listening levels, Sony MDR 7506’s bass and treble sounds correct for me.

If you have too much bass, simply remove the flaky fake-leather on (not too much) worn earpads.
Rip it off with sticky tape.
The cloth underneath is comfortable, and the little sound-leak reduces the bass.

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

When you say the bass is correct, do you mean objective measurement data or your supervisor's feeling?

Because our domestic expert tested and found that objectively the 7506's bass is about 5db higher than the standard bass, which is a relatively perfect Harman Target rather than a Optimum Hifi Target. Of course, according to statistics, more than 60% of people prefer Harman bass, which is just right for them. (This statistic may only be for headphones. It should not be applicable to speakers. Almost everyone seems to like speakers with a flat frequency response, whether its high frequencies or low frequencies or others. I don’t know why. If you know more, please tell me) But I am a person who likes standard bass on any type of devices(maybe)

Therefore, when listening to some music with inherently heavy bass, there will be a strong sense of abruptness.  This phenomenon does not occur on my speaker with a relatively flat frequency response and a waveguide, and this is even without any acoustic treatment of my room.

By the way, you said before that I can take the 7506 apart and take a look. How can I take it apart?

KaiS wrote:

When listening not too loud, at “healthy“ long term listening levels, Sony MDR 7506’s bass and treble sounds correct for me.

If you have too much bass, simply remove the flaky fake-leather on (not too much) worn earpads.
Rip it off with sticky tape.
The cloth underneath is comfortable, and the little sound-leak reduces the bass.

17 (edited by KaiS 2024-03-22 07:28:42)

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

I think I already explained it:

The Sony MDR 7506 are pro audio headphones.

A pro listens much longer per day, therefore tends to listen at lower levels than the average home user.
This is essential if you choose to do audio as a lifelong job, not to have to stop it half way through the career because of loss of hearing.

Now listening lower, the 7506’s bass and slight treble boosts keep the spectral balance according to Fletcher/Munson‘s curves, think “loudness correction“.


I wouldn‘t suggest the 7506 as reference ‘phones for mixing and mastering.
But as control and editing‘phones for raw, unprocessed signals e.g. they are great.

And no, I’m not referring to measurements (from my supervisor???), but my own experience.

66888 wrote:

How can I take it apart?

Remove the earpads, then the 4 screws that become visible.

When remounting, be careful to not strip the plastic threads, don‘t over-tighten the screws.

18 (edited by 66888 2024-03-29 06:13:32)

Re: ADI-2 PRO FS R BE's 7-Band PEQ is not enough in special circumstances

I probably know the reason why headphones can't mix, because the sound image of headphones can't be correct.  Loudness does affect the human ear's perception of frequency, which I saw when I was learning psychoacoustics.
Oh, by the way, I would like to add that I heard that some batches of 7506 have almost no problems with the treble.  The batch I bought may have had a problem with the treble being too high. This could be another reason besides loudness.  So I would like to ask you if yours batch of 7506 is still available for purchase? Thank you:)
And how can I remove the earpads?

KaiS wrote:

I think I already explained it:

The Sony MDR 7506 are pro audio headphones.

A pro listens much longer per day, therefore tends to listen at lower levels than the average home user.
This is essential if you choose to do audio as a lifelong job, not to have to stop it half way through the career because of loss of hearing.

Now listening lower, the 7506’s bass and slight treble boosts keep the spectral balance according to Fletcher/Munson‘s curves, think “loudness correction“.


I wouldn‘t suggest the 7506 as reference ‘phones for mixing and mastering.
But as control and editing‘phones for raw, unprocessed signals e.g. they are great.

And no, I’m not referring to measurements (from my supervisor???), but my own experience.

66888 wrote:

How can I take it apart?

Remove the earpads, then the 4 screws that become visible.

When remounting, be careful to not strip the plastic threads, don‘t over-tighten the screws.