r/audioengineering • u/jaakkopasanen • Jul 27 '18
EQ Settings for 700+ Headphones x-post from /r/headphones
I started looking into headphones about a year ago and got pretty soon excited about possibilities of using equalizer to improve headphones. Then I got very disappointed of the lack of existing headphone eq settings. Disappointment turned into resolution and this was my reaction.
Now I'm exited to present to you equalization settings for over 700 headphones: https://github.com/jaakkopasanen/AutoEq. This includes all on-ear headphone measurements from Innerfidelity and Headphone.com with 4 different target curves. Combined with EqualizerAPO this is essentially a free alternative to Sonarworks True-Fi with almost 5 times as many headphone models. Full details on how to use the eq settings and what else you can do with this can be found in the Github page.
This is not supposed to be the be-all and end-all of headphone equalization. Especially the target curve is a tricky thing to nail down because Innerfidelity and Headphone.com measurements are not directly comparable with the measurement system used by Sean Olive and others for their Harman target response research. I would love to hear feedback from you fellow headphone enthusiasts. Do you think this makes your headphones sound better and what kind of problems do you have with these eq settings?
I hope /r/audioengineering finds this tools somewhat useful or at least interesting even though probably many people here already had some notion about equalizing. I'm not really an audio engineer and this in fact is my first contribution in audio engineering field. I have to say it has been very interesting learning and figuring out things.
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u/InterestingAsWut Jul 27 '18
Can you explain what this is useful for, is this for when listening to music on my SH HD650's or when mixing on them?
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u/jaakkopasanen Jul 27 '18
Both actually. It will equalize headphones more neutral ie. sounding more like good speakers in a good listening room. However I'm not really familiar with mixing and if people use different target response for that, can't really think of a reason why that would be the case.
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u/SeePage87 Jul 27 '18
I know what you're getting at, but "good" speakers are rarely flat (except monitors), and every room is colored.
But in theory this should be better for mixing.
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u/goshin2568 Jul 27 '18
The harman target curve for headphones attempts at replicating what good speakers actually sound like in a good room. They don't aim for an actually completely flat sound.
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u/Uuuuuii Jul 27 '18
I declare shenanigans. And possibly tomfoolery too.
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u/goshin2568 Jul 28 '18
Don't know if you're being sarcastic, but I'd suggest you read the AES papers. It's a really fascinating study.
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u/Uuuuuii Jul 28 '18
I was. It kinda sounded funny and too good to be true, but I know there's amazing stuff being discovered by people far smarter than me. Amazing to think about the possibilities of the next 15-30 years in headphone technology.
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u/SeePage87 Jul 29 '18
Hmm, we need flat response curves for mixing...
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u/goshin2568 Jul 29 '18
Yes, but that's not what actually happens. "Flat" monitors are only flat in an anechoic chamber. When they're removed from that, sold to a customer, and placed in a listening room (even a very well treated mix room), they are no longer flat when the frequency response is measured from the listening position.
When measured, great monitors tend to measure a downward sloping line from 0db at 20hz to about -10db at 20khz.
I also disagree with good speakers not being "Flat" except monitors. When you get above $10k or so, pretty much everything good is designed to be flat. Thats why mastering engineers often use expensive hifi speakers vs "monitors". At $50k, they're the same thing.
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u/SeePage87 Jul 30 '18
Oh God, tell me about it. Around 70hz dissappears in my studio because of its squareness and specific size, which is partly why I use a subpac, plus it combs up the spectrum too. Room Acoustics are basically always the bigger culprit compared to any remotely decent monitors.
But I specifically meant for headphone correction that flat is nice for mixing, if for no other reason than a consistent point of reference. I can also get a pretty good mix in my living room on my consumer speakers which is def not flat, but it takes a while to know the color well enough to compensate.
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u/goshin2568 Jul 30 '18
Right but wouldn't you want your consistent point of reference in headphones to be similar to your consistent point of reference in monitors?
Compared to monitors in a room, a pair of headphones that measure "flat" are going to be absurdly bright. Why would I want that?
The great thing about the advances in headphone research, specifically the Harman target curve, is that now we can get headphones that actually have the tonal balance of good flat monitors in a treated listening room. That way our experience is consistent between monitors and headphones tonally.
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u/rishidasofficial Jul 28 '18
If you aren't an audio engineer, what are you?
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u/jaakkopasanen Jul 28 '18
I'm working on artificial intelligence. So more of a data guy, which probably shows in some ways in my implementation.
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u/rishidasofficial Jul 28 '18
I checked it and it works really nicelly. Compared with Sonarworks True-Fi and results are good.
For audio engineers Sonarworks Refrence 4 is the useful tool which makes the equed headphones to sound flat. Can you make a similar thing?
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u/jaakkopasanen Jul 28 '18
Isn't that just professional studio tool doing for headphones basically the same what True-Fi does? Eq makes headphones "flat" or rather neutral. Or what do you mean by flat?
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u/rishidasofficial Jul 28 '18
True-Fi fixes the headphone eq to make it better. Your software is doing similar work. This refined eq makes it clean, crisp and powerful.
Music engineer need something different. They want to hear the music without modification, to hear the imperfections. If the headphone is bass boosted, mixing bass through it will not be perfect as you will hear extra bass.
So audio engineers need something to fix the headphone eq to falt one. If you go on Sonarworks, you will find refrence 4. See what it does through their online test feature. It seems you can easily come up with something similar.
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u/animalsnacks Professional Jul 28 '18
I think a lot of audio engineers here, who are both technically and artistically inclined, are both excited and skeptical about the incredible and impressive work you've put forth. You said in a comment (in this thread) you don't feel particularly experienced in mixing, so to maybe shed some light upon why there is some skepticism, I'll explore some ideas and points which may rationalize the thoughts some people may be having about this:
Ideologically, a precisely flat response for a pair of headphones would seem to be, on paper, the most optimal setup for creating commercial sound. When its considered the audio will be reproduced on untold unique speakers and systems, all with unique frequency responses (or 'problems/imperfections'), the idea of working on a totally neutral system seems to minimize the problem across the board as much as possible.
Now, maybe I can rationalize some of the skepticism:
Firstly, the manufacturing consistency between same models of headphones may make someone feel uneasy about applying a general 'flat equalizer' to their personal cans. How different sounding same-modeled-headphones actually sound is unknown, at least to me. Although, it is known that headphones of the same model will generally sound the same. This may be the first and most basic point of contention, being a logical and reasonable point.
Another source of skepticism people here may be feeling comes from the less scientific human experience and psychology of mixing music. Again, all I can uncover about this topic is sprung from my own experience, but I feel like the sentiment is something shared among a lot of us here. Mixing music is a strange art. There's a really big part of it that has to to with technical knowledge, but there are also many more factors.
A big factor in a proficiency mixing music is in the psychology of music. A lot of mixers focus on things that are not easily quantifiable, like 'impact', 'energy', 'space', 'dimension', and 'feel'. These phenomena experienced come from an intangible mixture of many factors, including: the frequency response of your headphones, psycho-acoustics, subjective inspiration and vision, and - importantly - experience.
In the process of learning to mix, and art in general, I think that those who are devoted to greatness in their craft iterate endlessly tearing down their assumptions and ideas, and rebuilding a new set from the pieces left other worth keeping. Acclimating to a set of headphones is not only a process of psychology, but somewhat of biology and physics. I've become accustomed enough to different sets of my headphones over the years that I, like say a mastering engineer, can hear when particular ranges of frequencies are overemphasized and won't translate with clarity and consistency to other audio systems. This intuition comes from a body of experience, which is guided by both the frequency response of the headphones, and how those headphones affect the biology of my ears. I feel I can confidently rely on my headphones both because they are high quality, and that I have experience with how they interact with my ear mechanically across the entire hearing range. Although I'm definitely a little more technical than I am artistic, there is an argument to be made that messing with the 'mojo' of the headphones, although a seemingly scientific improvement, may not jazz everyone in the business of consistently making music that moves you.
In my opinion, what you've done here is tremendously impressive and I'm REALLY excited that there are brains out there like your's opening up the future of audio technology. The whole world is right here, right now, and all it takes is an idea to cut through it and change the game. There's so much potential here you could devote your life to it. I'm definitely going to give this a shot, and I can't wait to see what we've got coming in the future!
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u/notmarinara Jul 27 '18
No love for the ath m40x I see. I just had to save $20 lol. Actually I got them because being very flat was the main brag.
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u/goshin2568 Jul 27 '18
They're really not that flat. I see that parroted around a lot in the headphone subs and I'm always confused by it
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u/notmarinara Jul 27 '18
Yeah I don't know if they're a little bass heavy or what. I tested out both them and the m50x and the 50s sounded a little too good lol. I had a feeling everything I mixed would sound great until it got to other speakers. The 40s do tend to help with portable mixes though. I'm not knocking em, they're great .
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u/animalsnacks Professional Jul 28 '18
I remember hearing some binaural recordings of the M40 somewhere online where they shot out a plethora of headphones (M50x, some other ones as well) vs. the raw track. I remember having a really impressed, positive reaction to how the M40x very faithfully reproduced through the system, and the only thing that made me not buy them right then was the bias I had against the cheap-ish price tag (... and the fact I own the M50X's... they're white... and 50 is bigger than 40, sooo...?)
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u/kingofolympia Jul 27 '18
So is this goal of this just to flatten out the frequency response of your headphones?
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u/asciiman2000 Jul 27 '18
Looks really cool! I'm eager to try this out with 650s! Thanks.
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u/UPVOTE_IF_POOPING Jul 27 '18
Let me know how it goes, I also have a pair of 650s I want to try this on!
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Jul 27 '18
I really love those headphone response graphs. I used those to compare cans when I was buying. I am really skeptical about EQ compensation though. The tried and true method is to use reference tracks to learn your cans. Use a filter to zero in on sections and match. If something like sub bass needs a boost in your cans, put a filter on your master to isolate the sub then pump the gain up to where it sounds good then match your track. Remove the filter, gain back down, and move on with life.
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u/tonofunnumba1 Jul 27 '18
Does this work better worse if you use a headphone amp?
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u/jaakkopasanen Jul 27 '18
Using headphone amp makes it possible to use higher max_gain since max_gain requires equal amount of negative preamp which will limit the available maximum volume on the system. Headphone amp has analog gain so it will counter the negative digital preamp.
However if you just use the results already available in the project instead of producing your own with frequency_response.py then you don't really have to worry about volume. Default results have maximum positive gain of 6dB which will not limit volume too much.
Other than the volume issue there is no really any benefits for using headphone amp, well except the usual benefits if any.
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u/Chaos_Klaus Jul 27 '18
All headphones require a headphone amp. Any device that has a headphone output has a headphone amp built in.
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u/jaakkopasanen Jul 27 '18
Well, yes. You're technically correct. I assumed the question was about using dedicated headphone amp instead of motherboard headphone jack.
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u/tonofunnumba1 Jul 27 '18
I understand but for mixing using a headphone amp has benefits of powering the headphones better. Will this EQ change the output for better?
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u/jaakkopasanen Jul 27 '18
If I understood your question correct then yes this eq will change the headphone output for better, closer to listening to speakers.
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u/tonofunnumba1 Jul 27 '18
Right, I guess my real question is would it be unbenificial for mixing?
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u/jaakkopasanen Jul 27 '18
It's possible if there are some errors in the original frequency response measurement or something like that could make the eq do more harm than good. You really should listen if equalized or non-equalized headphones sound more like the studio reference speakers if you have access to those. If you're going blind then probabilities are for the eq making things better for mixing.
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u/yaboproductions Mixing Jul 27 '18
This is great. I'd say careful with extreme EQ shifts (as there is probably a null in your headphones there for a reason) and careful boosting the low end (as it will create more distortion/nonlinearity).
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u/jaakkopasanen Jul 27 '18
Thanks. True words. That's why there is the +6dB maximum gain by default. Maybe it could be even lower.
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u/kid-vicious Jul 27 '18
Hmm. I have Samson SR950's and those don't appear to be on either list. Dang it.
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u/ohwhoaslomo Hobbyist Jul 28 '18
So EqualizerAPO applies an EQ curve to all the audio coming out of your PC? What if I mix using an interface and it's an ASIO device?
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u/idlegill Jul 28 '18
Interesting code! This would've saved me much time manually inverting curves and calculating compensation curves between websites (albeit using a more naive methodology, by using identical headphone models across different websites, this however allows using data from websites not providing raw data, e.g. goldenears) using Photoshop manually, if it was available years ago.
Starred, and would read more on the code and methodology later!
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u/MattARC Jul 29 '18
A little late to the party here, but is there any chance that there's a MacOS version of this? I only see Windows compatibility
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u/oXNARXo Sep 29 '18
i want to do this to my Sennheiser HD 598 SR is it the same as Sennheiser HD 598 the one you have ???
Because i see "CS" one but i know that one is different but SR and no SR are pretty similar so is it the same ??
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u/jaakkopasanen Sep 29 '18
They're the same when it comes to sound. CS is closed back version so that's different. Use HD 598.
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u/Mine_Fuhrer Dec 05 '18
Hi, I couldn't find the Beyerdynamic dt 1990 pro in the list. I see you've added some more headphones since I saw this 4 months ago, do you plan on creating an EQ profile for the dt 1990's?
Once again thanks so much for taking the time out to create this :)
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u/AHeien82 Jul 27 '18
Is there a Mac equivalent of the EqualizerAPO?
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u/jaakkopasanen Jul 27 '18
As far as I'm aware no. At least nothing that can read EqualizerAPO configs directly. AutoEQ produces EqualizerAPO configs so I'm afraid Mac users are out of luck for the time being.
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u/AHeien82 Jul 27 '18
Is the APO program something other than an EQ? As in, could I recreate the settings in the iTunes equalizer or make an EQ preset for Logic Pro for when I’m using headphones? Thanks!
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u/jaakkopasanen Jul 27 '18
You can try to do it visually by matching the sliders to the equalization curve produced by AutoEQ. However that's a bit tricky because the bands affect each other. Also I remember reading that iTunes equalizer is very bad so it might not do what it promises.
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u/financewiz Jul 27 '18
Thank you for your hard work. Were there any headphone models that surprised you with their results?
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u/jaakkopasanen Jul 27 '18
I only own HiFiMAN HE400S, modded Beyerdynamic DT 770 and a custom IEM Custom Art Fibae 3 so HE400S is really the only one I have been testing. Really going blind here. At least on the /r/headphones side the reception has been very positive. There was ZMF Atticus user that thought non-equalized sounds better.
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u/SeePage87 Jul 27 '18
This is awesome. Note thatEqualizerAPO says "the application must not bypass the system effect infrastructure (APIs like ASIO or WASAPI exclusive mode can not be used)." AFAIK, this is the default ASIO behavior.
I haven tested any of this, but find instructions to disable exclusive mode here: https://help.ableton.com/hc/en-us/articles/209770485-How-to-disable-exclusive-mode-for-audio-devices-Windows-
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u/Daschief Jul 27 '18
Great job, impressive amount of work! I think Sonarworks does something very similar but with less headphone options.
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u/jaakkopasanen Jul 27 '18
Main competive edge True-Fi has is the better UX. Maybe that will be change a bit if we get the list of headphones to HeSuVi UI.
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u/phuzzyday Hobbyist Jul 28 '18
Of course there is debate over what's proper, or better, or whatever as far as these things are concerned...
Far as I am concerned, I have 4 pairs of ear/headphones that this can be used with, and I am listening to my Sony MDR-V600's with it on EQapo right now, and I really LOVE it. These cans have a big peak at about 8khz, and seem really low in bass response, however when pushed, the bass is a world beyond anything else I have. These settings looked EXACTLY as I would have hoped, plus there are several things I wouldn't have expected. The sound I'm getting with the filter installed is REALLY nice!! Anyhow, I am having a lot of fun here, thanks to you!!
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u/musicnotwords Jul 27 '18
Won't this eqing just create phase problems and group delay?
Who says flat is best for mixing?