Solving The EQ Problem

[Elvenking]

I am kind of an old school Car Audio enthusiast from the 80's for sure. I got a new Alpine deck for my car and just couldn't stop there when my original CD player stopped working. Picked up a couple of amps and threw a nice set of comps along with a sub. It didn't sound brilliant when I picked it up, but thanks to the 9-band EQ on the Alpine head unit, I am able to sculpt the sound enough so that I can get it loud without hurting my ears. Always the holy grail of audio adjustment....sound quality.

Firstly, I notice that these days....a lot of the new CD's simply do not sound great at high volume. The lack of dynamic range created by brick-walling the levels just really comes out at high volume. You can hear the effects of compressing the bass kick with loud guitars and the whole thing just comes off as pretty messy next to say a pre mid 1990's source. (I was just playing some older Billy Idol Vital Idol remix CD in my car this morning that sounded so damned great by the way....but I digress) I like a lot of heavy metal and hard rock too, so I am up against a really big mess with those genres.

Anyway, so the EQ is kind of an essential piece of the system for me. I was able to take a frequency sweep and adjust down all the ones that sound shrill to the ear and that made a drastic overall improvement to begin with. However all CD's are not created equal for sure...and you still like to adjust on the run. Bringing me to my point of how much I miss a decent tactile EQ on a head unit. In fact, I once had a 9+ band tactile-slider EQ unit mounted below my head-unit back in the days where I could simply reach down and adjust up in a hot second. No more of that. Headunits now have digital EQ's that take no less than 20 clicks to get the adjusting done. Yeah...I am really **** about sound quality and need my hands on it.

The question is, how do I solve my problem? For an EQ geek like myself....how do I get the joy I need in tight control of SQ? I was thinking of getting the Kicker 30 Band EQ to adjust the car flat, and then just using the head unit for the small additional adjustments need for individual CD's with mix deficiencies...but still that is pretty convoluted. Looking for suggestions. Thanks.

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[trumpet 5,000+ posts]

Installing your component tweeters so they're in the upper forward area of your doors or in the sail panels can help to give you a bit easier time of correcting the sound to your liking with your EQ. There are other ways to help out with making your system sound better without getting into EQ, but EQ is essential to correct for errors in the sound and to reshape it to how we prefer it to sound for most common installations. If you're going all out with custom speaker locations and fabricated mounts then I imagine you wouldn't be asking this question.

A 30-band EQ would help, but your money would be better invested in a DSP that gives you separate control over each channel. This would also let you power each driver individually. JBL MS-8 takes a great deal of work and finishes it off automatically in about 10-15 minutes. I use MS-8 to help me get my vehicle sounding phenomenal. This is in addition to many hours of acoustic treatments, thoughtful speaker selection, positioning and aiming, and learning what to listen for.

 

[whitedragon551 5,000+ posts]

Why not run something like the Audiocontrol Three.2 or CLarion EQS746 in a 1/2din spot in your dash?

 

[calebkhill 10+ year member]

Time alignment and proper tuning with a dsp will help.

There are head units out there can get the job done without an external dsp.

80prs

Cz702

 

[calebkhill 10+ year member]

Also make sure your speakers are wired in correct polarity

 

[trumpet 5,000+ posts]

Doesn't Alpine use parametric EQ? If so, get some seat time with an RTA and learn how to use it more effectively. You can do quite a lot with a parametric EQ.

 

[Elvenking]

Installing your component tweeters so they're in the upper forward area of your doors or in the sail panels can help to give you a bit easier time of correcting the sound to your liking with your EQ. There are other ways to help out with making your system sound better without getting into EQ, but EQ is essential to correct for errors in the sound and to reshape it to how we prefer it to sound for most common installations. If you're going all out with custom speaker locations and fabricated mounts then I imagine you wouldn't be asking this question.
A 30-band EQ would help, but your money would be better invested in a DSP that gives you separate control over each channel. This would also let you power each driver individually. JBL MS-8 takes a great deal of work and finishes it off automatically in about 10-15 minutes. I use MS-8 to help me get my vehicle sounding phenomenal. This is in addition to many hours of acoustic treatments, thoughtful speaker selection, positioning and aiming, and learning what to listen for.

Most music doesn't give me much of a problem...but heavy metal easily gets shrill in the 1.2K, 2.6K and 4K ranges in my car so those bands are already taking serious cuts when I play something like new 'brick-walled levels' rock CD's or just CD's where the mixing and mastering isn't top quality. I am just a real control freak when it comes to my music. I have treated the doors of my Sentra with Dynamat and replaced the factory speakers with Morel Tempo 6's...bloody awesome comps. They are aptly powered by a JX360/X2. The Tweets are up in the pillars, but I might want to remove the factory covers that were there for the stock premium system...they don't seem as transparent as they should be. And for now a Polk 12" powered by a mono Kicker Amp. Looking to replace that with a Sundown Audio 12 soon. I get awesome sound out of the rig I have...it just takes a sit down with the EQ sometimes, and I would like that to be a bit more handy.

I am looking at the MS-8 now and yer giving me a new problem...now it looks like I might dream about this thing until end up with one....looks f'in way cool! I will look at that more...but it looks like the ticket for an SQ guy for sure.

 

[Elvenking]

Time alignment and proper tuning with a dsp will help.There are head units out there can get the job done without an external dsp.

80prs

Cz702

Also make sure your speakers are wired in correct polarity

I certainly wouldn't have hit the advanced forum if I had a problem identifying mixed polarity on my speakers...that sounds like absolute crap. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/wink.gif.608e3ea05f1a9f98611af0861652f8fb.gif

 

[Elvenking]

Why not run something like the Audiocontrol Three.2 or CLarion EQS746 in a 1/2din spot in your dash?

I actually was looking at that little 7-band Clarion unit and it was nice looking because it would be reasonably low cost to try out. I just have to look around in my Sentra for a good mounting place. Maybe it could go where the old factory 5 disc changer is right now. Another good option...thanks.

 

[Elvenking]

Doesn't Alpine use parametric EQ? If so, get some seat time with an RTA and learn how to use it more effectively. You can do quite a lot with a parametric EQ.

I know...but I want to make adjustments on the fly quickly. No problem getting good sound, just need to bring ease to making the adjustments I need. Alpine has a 9-band parametric EQ built in....but until you navigate the menu to use this thing...you don't know what I mean. Lots of clicks and backing out. I have gotten fast...but it is still frustrating. I have been out there with an RTA and freq gen for a while for too geek style for sure. They even have a TuneIt app.....links to the phone and you can adjust it that way...they managed to make that one convoluted too. Very hard to keep switching f'in screens and siting there all day doing what it would take seconds with using a tactile interface. I need an all in one view adjustment system....or tactile adjustments. The App Keeps breaking too while they are trying to get it right and getting the phone out everytime is not exactly convenient. So I am just feeling around for options.

 

[trumpet 5,000+ posts]

I only adjust the master volume and subwoofer level on my system. That's regardless of what I'm listening to. On-the-fly EQ adjustments become less needed when things really come together well.

 

[hispls 5,000+ posts]

Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I don't think there's anything that you'll just throw up in the dash to do on-the-fly EQ adjustments that'll be worth using.

I'd think that the MS8 or similar processor would help you dial things in nicely, and I'm sure you'd get your money's worth of enjoyment out of them. I'd tend to agree with others that if you have things really set up right you should require no poking around regardless of source material.

 

[Elvenking]

I only adjust the master volume and subwoofer level on my system. That's regardless of what I'm listening to. On-the-fly EQ adjustments become less needed when things really come together well.

I am really happy for you.

 

[Elvenking]

Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I don't think there's anything that you'll just throw up in the dash to do on-the-fly EQ adjustments that'll be worth using.
I'd think that the MS8 or similar processor would help you dial things in nicely, and I'm sure you'd get your money's worth of enjoyment out of them. I'd tend to agree with others that if you have things really set up right you should require no poking around regardless of source material.

I hear what yer saying. I will read more up on that thing. It looks fantastic and I can't find a negative thing about it. With 31 bands and that much cut, you should be able to achieve anything. I don't think I am getting the level of cut I need in some frequencies in order to achieve higher volumes with SQ using the built in alpine 9-band

 

[Elvenking]

Time alignment and proper tuning with a dsp will help.There are head units out there can get the job done without an external dsp.

80prs

Cz702

That 80PRS looks sweet.