setting eq

[blowthemup 10+ year member]

What should you set your equalizer at and what about the loudness setting?

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[eharri3 10+ year member]

What kind of equalizer is it. Built into head unit, or separate. 2 band, 3 band, 5-10, 15-30? Graphic or parametric? Nobody could even begin give you an idea of where to start without this info except to say be sparing with the boosts, try to cut what's obscuring what you want to hear more often than you boost what you're missing, and don't overboost.

I have never used loudness on any head unit. You can if you want to, but back off on your gain and/or go easy on volume.

 

[blowthemup 10+ year member]

Its built into the head unit which is a pioneer 5900ib.

 

[eharri3 10+ year member]

7 band graphic then. I could could give you suggestions but the absolute best way to figure it out is to play something you know at moderate volume, go to each frequency. Cut it all the way then boost it a decent amount to see what it affects. The things you like, boost by only 1 or 2 db. The sounds you don't like, or which obscure the things you like, cut slightly. Try cutting things you don't like before you boost. Don't boost anything too much.

To help give you an idea of what you're listening for at each frequency google something like 'fundamental frequencies of music' or 'fundamental frequencies of instruments' and then look for a chart that spells out what aspects of each sound play in each frequency range. This helped me figure it out, as if you see someone spell it out for you it'll help you get a better understanding of what exactly you're hearing when you make adjustments.

 

[blowthemup 10+ year member]

What should it be set to when setting the gain on your amp? When you say cut do mean start at 0 or cut them completely like negative.

 

[Blue Fury 10+ year member]

DONT turn on loudness. It's a killer.

 

[eharri3 10+ year member]

I set the gains with everything flat then adjusted the EQ from there. May will tell you if you're boosting anything by alot, back off a bit on the corresponding amp. But out of 16 frequencies I boosted 3 by only 1, cut 3 by one, and I think I boosted one freq by 2 db so I didn't do any gain adjustment after the fact.

 

[blowthemup 10+ year member]

What about Source Level Adjustment (SLA)

 

[eharri3 10+ year member]

Yeah loudness is basically a V-shaped or 'smiley face' eq curve. It basically just boosts lows and highs, the areas of the frequency ranges that the human ear is least sensitive to. Meant for low volumes where those are the hardest things to pick up on. If you must use it turn it off if you crank the volume or back off on the gains.

The better solution though is to just leave it off, adjust the gains properly, and crank the volume when you want to hear it all.

 

[eharri3 10+ year member]

I have a Pioneer. I know for a fact that is explained in the manual. We can help you figure out how to logically adjust some things that but I can tell you right now you'll get flamed if you start asking one at a time about functions that are explained in the manual.

 

[blowthemup 10+ year member]

Understandable, just trying to thigure out how these affect my sub and whats good or bad.

 

[eharri3 10+ year member]

I have a DEH 980Bt. In all honesty I can tell you from experience I set my gains, matched everything up, did some minor tweaking on the EQ. That's about it. I don't like the crossover settings on the HU so I use the ones on the amp. I ignored SLA, COMBIX (or whatever it's called) and only occasionally turn on BBE but leave it at zero. Anything that plays with some form of boost will usually affect specific frequencies below or above a certain point. If your sub is crossed over to play in the range affected by a given feature, it will get louder and clip sooner if you enable it. SW controls separately affects the volume of the subwoofer and if it works the same as it did on my Alpine, this isn't a boost. Rather anything below the max is an attenuation of the sub. I prefer to set mine with it at max and cut it as necessary (though I never have to, my components are pretty well matched.) Better to do any tweeking using sub controls rather than bass boost, as that allows you to adjust bass while leaving your door speakers out of the equation. I find it better to set the gains for max output at max subwoofer level then make cuts than to the set it with the sub controls lower and risk clipping if I decide to bump it up a bit.

I prefer to adjust volume as needed myself for different sources rather than setting SLA since not every song I play on every source is at the same volume.