[Freo-1]

I came across this application while researching potential headphone audition/purchases.  The sonarworks offers a free 10 day trial to evaluate the application.  The current list has about 331 headphones in the database. 


I wasn't sure what to expect, but so far, this application is quite impressive.  I've tried it with the two primary headphones on hand, which are Focal Elear, and Sony MDR Z7. 


In both cases, the difference is very noticeable, with significant improvements wrought across the board.  The Sony MDR Z7 is absolutely transformed with this application.  The Z7 goes from a dark sounding  sound to a open transparent see through quality that rivals the very best headphones.  The results were just as good with the Focal Elear cans.  As a result of applying the corrections, the phones sounded closer to one another than before, both for the better.  The major difference between the two after the correction is mostly the open back vs. closed back design. 


You name it, it improves, be it vocals, strings, woodwinds, drums (big improvement).  Simply amazing.  Keep in mind this is just from my computer driving the headphones (it is an alien-ware, so it has a decent sound board).


While headphone measurements are tricky, sonarworks seemed to have addressed the manner quite successfully.  I'l give this a couple more days, but will likely get this.  Will have to work out how to get this output to the dedicated headphone amp.  All headphones deviate from a flat response, so applying a correction to compensate for this in the digital domain makes a lot of sense to me. 


Going forward, will likely use this for headphone listening.  I'm amazed at the improvement this product provides. I don't hear any downside when using this at all. 






 

[Letitroll98]

I believe this was brought up previously, perhaps dbcooper?  Whoever it was they also liked the program.  Dale Thorn used to post headphone reviews where he equalized the phones to flat.  I'm going to investigate further.

[adydula]

Hello,

I have been chatting with Freo-1 about this program.

I tried it several months back and found it did not do anything for me here...and I had some email support communication with Sonarworks.

The demo lasts for a short period of time and once used you can not do the demo again, at least on the same pc.

So I got out one of my really good systems (old IBM PC engineer is software development) and loaded the demo on it.

...and I figured out how to use it and discovered good and not so good things about it.

First of all the users that play ripped music from a PC using a music player like Jriver or Foobar2000 usually take the output into an external dac then on to an external amplifier. I do this 100% of the time.

The reason for this is mostly many of strive for bit perfect data flows from the PC to the external dac to our amplifier.

We dont want Windows 10 etc to muck with the sound via any of its internal "stuff" so we use drivers like WASAPI in exclusive mode to get the original "digital bits" to flow out of the PC to or external dac to get changed into analog by it and not by the PC, PC soundcard etc with an "inferior" dac.

Then there are folks that plug headphones into a phone, using the internal dac/amp circuitry directly. No external anything.

Then there are folks that plug headphones in to a sound card or internal sound chip on a motherboard and use its internal dac/amp.

So when I first tried to use True-fi, I had no change, it was like it wasnt working at all.

Well the program was designed to work with phones at first and their eq code runs in a phone app/driver and does its eq internally and works well.

But on a PC the Sonarworks doesnt work at all when using a bitperfect flow for data, via a WASAPI driver.

The only way to get it to work in a desktop environment is using the Windows Direct Sound sound layer...and that bypass's the bit perfect method.

The reason it doesnt work with an external dac/amp using WASAPI is the bits go out via an interface (USB or digital) and then get converted via the dac to analog and its here where
the eq' would be done prior to the amplification.

To work you would have to send the external dac output back to the PC and have Sonarworks apply its eq'ing and them to the amp!

Programs like Jriver have figured out how to apply eq'ing in Bitperfect mode with WASAPI drivers...so it can be done.

Now if your going to take a line out from a pc via an audio cable to your external amp that will work, but your "double amping" here and you have to be careful not to overdrive
your external amp. The line level output has to be matched to the input of the receiving amp.

Now this is really confusing..and I am not saying Sonarworks is not a good product, I used it with Direct Sound and there is indeed a dramatic difference...and they have done a good job analyzing lots of headphones and generating custom eq curves.

You can reach the same results with eq'ing in most music players, but that takes some time and effort, where Sonarworks has done the work for you and added a "as you get older: feature, and applies eq'ing at the upper end of the audio scale based on hearing loss data as we get older. I dont know where they get this data, but you can easlily see how they apply it via a slider in there application.

So there, this one was bugging me, one because if your not careful you and try to get this to work with an external dac/amp you can select incorrect drivers in your music player and get really LOUD music in your headphones and have NO volume control at all and this scarred the heck out of me....

I dont want to scare anyone away for this neat program, IMO a bit pricey...but it does work and work well if your ok with the operating systems Direct Sound route.

I did send another communication to Sonarworks asking them how or when they would support doing their eq to work with and external dac/amp via WASAPI..

I will share the response when I get it.

Hope this makes some sense...YMMV

Alex

[adydula]

For those of you that want to know how I did get Sonarworks to work with Direct Sound to my Schitt BIFROST dac and external amp here is the selections in Jriver and in Sonarworks.
There are quite a few selections in Jriver and in Foobar2000....so be careful and select the correct one.





Alex

[adydula]

For those that dont want to spend the bucks here is how I mimic'd in Jriver to get a similar "experience":




You then can turn on and off the eq, like in Sonarworks, and get the same "WOW!" this is different experience! 

...and it works without going thru any Windows Direct Sound control..

Alex

YMMV

[Freo-1]

Well, after auditioning for a few days, I can state that it does work.  If you wanted to improve your headphone listening experience, and your source is a PC or MAC, AND you are using the analog out from the computer to drive the headphones, then this is worth looking at.  It's a bit pricey, but it does work.


I tried using the analog out from the PC to a dedicated headphone amp to evaluate if this would be a good option.  Bottom line is that is not a good option.  The analog PC out is just too compromised to make this option useful . 


Now, IF the software allowed the correction to be passed digitally to a streamer source, such as a Oppo 105, then it would be a very useful tool.  Alas, it does not support this, so its use case is rather limited.

[dB Cooper]

I believe this was brought up previously, perhaps dbcooper?  Whoever it was they also liked the program.  Dale Thorn used to post headphone reviews where he equalized the phones to flat.  I'm going to investigate further.

I did try the app and liked it but I had only one supported headphone at the time. Since my trial period almost 2 years ago, I have sold those (Shure SE535) and bought Beyer Amiron Home, so it still supports only one of my headphones (my Etymotics are pretty neutral to begin with)... It's nice, but $80 for an EQ preset, hmm.... It might be different if I had an 'arsenal' of cans, except one of the results is that it will make different headphones sound more alike, thereby reducing the incentive to have multiple headphones.

Measuring headphones is a tricky, complicated process requiring specialized, expensive equipment to do properly. I don't know how reliable Dale's data was. He seems to have disappeared along with NWAVGuy.

Mac users, you should be able to take the digital out to a DAC by way of SoundSource or Audio Hijack (both from Rogue Amoeba software). SoundSource is all you need to do it and is $20 IIRC.

[Freo-1]

Update:


Wanted to give this one more try, as I am convinced that the concept of applying corrections to headphone playback is the way to go.  Personally, I think headphone amps should be able to have a built in equalizer function to adjust the playback. 


So, tried again to route the analog out from the computer to the headphone amp.  The difference this time was that instead of selecting speaker out, selected headphone out instead, and set the volume from the computer out at 80% to avoid clipping. 


The results (for whatever reason) are much better with this setup.  The Focal Elear cans sound much better with this setup.  The issues with using the analog out from the computer pretty much disappeared when selecting the output as a headphone vs. speaker out.


Will evaluate this over the weekend, but so far, so good.  May decide to get this after all. 

[adydula]

Great that your still experimenting!

As far as headphone amps and equalization that is indeed a whole other can of worms....

So many of us want an amp that is nothing but a "straight wire with gain", and leave the eq'ing to software or external eq devices.

Schitt has a device "Loki" that folks use for this function that dont want to muck with or figure out the complexities in software stacks and drivers etc...

This way you can take "pure or raw" bits to the external dac to the Loki to the amp and to your cans....and get the closest to what the orginal recording was intended.
or at least thats the thought here!!

Alex

[Freo-1]

Great that your still experimenting!

As far as headphone amps and equalization that is indeed a whole other can of worms....

So many of us want an amp that is nothing but a "straight wire with gain", and leave the eq'ing to software or external eq devices.

Schitt has a device "Loki" that folks use for this function that dont want to muck with or figure out the complexities in software stacks and drivers etc...

This way you can take "pure or raw" bits to the external dac to the Loki to the amp and to your cans....and get the closest to what the orginal recording was intended.
or at least thats the thought here!!

Alex

The Loki looks interesting.  Need to look into this further.


Thanks for the feedback.

[adydula]

I duplicated the Sonarworks in Foobar 2000 with presets that I matched to theirs...




Sound pretty good...definitley different than the cans w/o eq'ing...

Alex

[Freo-1]

Pretty cool, Alex.  This looks promising.


IMHO, ALL headphones suffer form inaccuracies with frequency response.  Doesn't matter HOW MUCH the headphones cost, they all suffer form a suck out in frequency response somewhere between 3KHz and 10 KHz.  One simply needs to review any measurement of any headphone from inner fidelity to validate this assertion.  In addition, many headphones suffer from frequency irregularities above 10 KHz.   


Based on the above realties regarding headphone listening, it makes sense to apply EQ to correct these shortfalls.  IMHO, an entry level high end headphone can sound better with EQ than the flagship version without EQ.  I realize may audiophiles hate EQ, but in the case of headphones, EQ is required to get optimum performance. 


So, if you have a good computer with a decent DAC, and good S/W to process the data stream, a product like sonarworks can transform your headphone listening experience for the better.  IMHO, ALL headphones require EQ to sound their best.  Let the debate begin.


    

[adydula]

Started a new discussion thread on Equalizaion in general.

Alex

[Letitroll98]

dbcooper, Dale is writing for innerfidelity now as I understand it.

The corrections all look like the BBC curve with a dip in the presence region, maybe a little lower in frequency?  I seem to remember something about an ear/headphone interaction that causes some universal, to varying degrees, effect in all headphones.  I might guess that's the suckout previously described? 

Not to be a jerk, as Alex is doing a wonderful job with this circle, but I was uncertain where to place this post, should it go here or the new thread on equalization?

[adydula]

Hey guys,

I thought a new thread that speaks to equalization in general would be great....

This thread is about Sonarworks and Freo-1's sharing his experience with it...and had lead down the Eq'path....

Reason I started the EQ thread is some might miss out on this topic and thought that this would help many others understand this
most often mis-understood topic?

So lets carry on the eq stuff in the main thread...and use this for specific stuff about Sonarworks and useage, hints, tips etc..

..and thanks for the kind words!

Alex

 

[adydula]

I found this over at head-fi, several of the posters in this thread like Sonarworks:

"I am a huge fan of all the stuff Sonarworks has done. They are very underrated IMO. They have also given me a baseline to create my own EQ curves with. The only limitation with this is you can't really fix a headphone with a lot of harmonic distortion very well. You can't give the 40 mm dynamic HD 600 driver the undistorted flat bass of Audeze planar magnetic drivers. However, in terms of tonality, Sonarworks does extremely well with most headphones I've tried, and on the flat curve setting, they all sound somewhat balanced and natural. Definitely a step in the right direction."

Its post #205.

Source: https://www.head-fi.org/threads/the-most-reliable-easiest-way-to-eq-headphones-properly-to-achieve-the-most-ideal-sound-for-non-professionals.796791/

Alex

[Freo-1]

Started a new discussion thread on Equalizaion in general.

Alex

Thank you, Alex.  You've done yeoman's work with this circle.  It got me interested in headphone usage again after a long hiatus. 


I'll stick to the sonarworks app in this thread, and participate in the EQ thread.  Will likely keep the true-fi app, and pursue other EQ solutions as well.   

[adydula]

Well, I am a glutton for punishment and have spent at least 4 hours with the more expensive Sonarworks Reference 4 software the $99 version.

I did finally get it to work in my bitperfect flow, from a PC to a dac to the amp with Sonarworks applying the digital manipulation in its program inside of Windows 10.

My main issue was the Schitt Bifrost USB dac was not playing nice, I have a note to Schitt on this....all my other dacs worked!! First time!

So back to my analyis of this Sonarworks...

Here is an image of it:




I compared using their eq profiles for my Focal Clears, which have an outstanding tonal balance from the get go....one of their most positive traits, IMO...

So when eq'ing with a good set of headphones you can hurt this balance that the designers of the headphones designed....

So can the experience be made better? Yes it can.

Depending on the song and its frequency content the results can be mild or rather "different".

For my Focals, its not that great of a change, but it is a change and to my ear that is a little better.

So what I did was to play with the correction curve from Sonarworks thats pretty much an inverse of the freq curve for the Clears,

I basically matched the EQ sliders to correspond to what the correction curve in Sonarworks applied and listened to about a dozen songs, from
bass heavy, to vocals and others with lots of treble..

So after a few hours I have a custom eq curve in Jriver that I was able to directly compare to Sonarworks and they sound very much alike.

I could probably do better with a parametric equalizer if I want to spend the rest of my life eq'ing down to the n'th degree!   

Not going to happen!

So the bottom like is Sonarworks does work and work well....more so for headphones that arent that great vs some that are....but we all have opinions.

Its fairly easy to setup once you have a dac that plays nice!...Gosh that drove me crazy all morning!

So will I buy it, probably not.

I can get the same results, very similar with some smart eq'ing in JRiver of Foobar with the built in eq code.

The next thing I will try, Christmas present!! is a Schitt Loki and try to do the same thing with an external hardware eq box.

Ok back to the music!

Alex

[adydula]

This morning I tried to get Sonarworks Reference 4 to work with Foobar 2000.

This was quite a challenge for me and it took several attempts to get it to play in my bitperfect flow.

I got it to work as a VST plugin in Foobar2000.

THe installation is really poor IMO, between trying to find the VST plugin for Foobar and the Sonarworks plugin and installing and getting the function to work.

IMO this is not easy for a person who has little PC or software skills.

I had to search the net, watch a few videos etc to get the gist of how to install everything.

During this there were several "hangs" and issues that required rebooting the pc to get things to work again...

So install the VST plugin, find the Soanrworks plugin, choose the correct audio device in Windows, in Sonarworks and in Foobar2000...

Then once in Foobar2000 fnding out how to "start" the Sonarworks plugin....

Once I figured that out I was able to compare and select headphone profiles.

The plugin sadly is a subset of the standalone version, but it has the basic function to use in testing and comparison.

With my Focal Clears and T1's there is a difference, but the amount of difference IMO depends on the music content over the frequency range..
Some songs there is little difference, but where the profile adds correction there is a noticeable difference.

You have to be the judge of if its really worth it or not...and many folks really feel it is worth the money and effort.

I might add Freo-1's experience has been a good positive one, and if your not mucking with external dacs via a USB interface or other interface its a whole
lot easier to get to work...ie taking the analog out of a PC sound card or adapter into another external amp...Sonarworks installs and works rather simple in
this environment.

With the T1's I found the profile really did not help at all here, it really changed the sonic presentation and made the T1's brighter and shrill for me.

So I just uninstalled the Ref 4 version and am back to my simple bitperfect that my ear is used to and my brain likes. 

Good Mornng!

Alex

[Freo-1]

Excellent detailed report, Alex. 


After several days of auditioning, once I worked out the optimum setup. decided to get the sonarworks true-fi app.  For me, it makes both the Focal Elear and Sony MDR-Z7 sound like more expensive headphones.  I also tried to get the Foobar 2000 to match the sonarworks by adjusting the equalizer.  Although it was close, it still didn't sound as good as the sonarworks curves.  It's a hell of a lot more convenient to just type in the headphone model, and the correction curve appears. 


I haven't found one recording yet where the correction curve made the playback sound worse.   This product is highly recommended for audition. 



Will be keen to get Alex's feedback on the loki.  The product looks promising. 


Alex:  Are your T1's the open back or closed back (600 ohm).  My understanding is they sound somewhat different.