Auto-EQ low end on headphones

[jmfreeland]

Hello all. FIrst time poster here! I've taken the plunge on a pair of MiniDSP Ears and the pro REW software. I produce and record music in my spare time, and I'm constrained to headphone 99% of the time, so I figured I should start measuring and comparing headphones, because clearly I didn't already have enough obsessive musical interests...

I've successfully measured my set of DD880s (attached), and I'm pretty pleased with how well it's done. I haven't received my upgrade key yet, but I'm looking forward to testing both sides to see how well they're matched, as the driver on these was replaced at one point.

In trying to generate an EQ to a flat target on these, I've found that I can't automatically flatten out the low end. In the manual this seems to be a specified behavior (listed as not done by default), but I haven't found a setting that will allow me to allow for correction in the bass/sub-bass. Is this something I can enable? I'd rather have it generate a couple well-chosen EQ points than try to do this manually.

Looking forward to testing and sharing.

 

[John Mulcahy]

Your Pro license code was sent an hour before that post Josh, at 8:24 pm. It isn't required to make measurements with EARS, you can just change the input channel to measure each side individually, but it may be more convenient to measure both at once, of course. If you don't require the Pro upgrade let me know and I'll send a refund.

REW won't boost a response below the lowest frequency at which it drops below the target, you could get around that by applying a manual shelf filter to lift the response above the target and then let REW apply filters to match the target more closely.

 

[jmfreeland]

Thank you John. I hadn’t even checked to see if I’d received the license, so it wasn’t a complaint. I’m till getting used to navigating the software at this point. I don’t mind supporting it even if there is a workaround to do both sides.

I will experiment a bit more tomorrow. Looking forward to testing headphones for mixing. Unlike most of the hifi reviews I read, I’m definitely shooting for flat response across the board for translation across different speakers/headphones.

 

[jmfreeland]

So I’ve had a go and figured out how to manually add a couple shelves and then correct to a flat curve after manually adjusting the low end. I think I should be good to go from a practical perspective.

Is there any chance of a future version allowing for automatically correcting even down to 20Hz? It’s pretty standard in the pro audio headphone correction world to do so (Sonarworks, realphones), and I’d like to see what the simplest or cleanest way to get to a flat response is vs. my completely novice choices.

 

[carsound]

Headphone can't use EQ to flat, you can search ERP DRP and free field.

 

[ddude003]

Not sure if any of you are aware of this... https://github.com/jaakkopasanen/AutoEq