I'm a little confused about the "loudness" feature on the Empeg. My understanding of loudness was that it's a boost of some lower frequencies that the human ear doesn't hear as well normally. So how is the loudness setting different than say, bumping up a few of the lower bands on the equalizer? Doesn't using both EQ and loudness confuse the whole process? Or, said better, what's the point of having loudness when you have a fully parametric EQ?

-Tony

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080000554, soon to be in my 1999 Mustang

Or, said better, what's the point of having loudness when you have a fully parametric EQ?

The original purpose of a loudness control is to increase the low frequencies when the stereo is being played quietly.

When you turn down the volume of a stereo, you lose the low frequencies more quickly than the high ones- especially in a car where there is an everpresent low frequency noise floor when you're driving.

The idea is that you'd have your EQ set up properly for normal listening, then you would turn up the loudness when you're driving and turn it down again when you're listening while parked. It's an easier control to access than the EQ.

But to be a true loudness control, what should happen is that the loudness should decrease as the volume increases. I have brought this up in another discussion, but I think it deserves to be at the top of its own Wish List item. I'm going to head off and do that now, thanks for reminding me.

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Tony Fabris

I believe the current empeg setup *is* for "dynamic" loudness, which does decrease as the volume increases. The DSP does this automatically. A long, long time ago we had static loudness, but I think those times are long gone...

Hugo

I believe the current empeg setup *is* for "dynamic" loudness, which does decrease as the volume increases. The DSP does this automatically. A long, long time ago we had static loudness, but I think those times are long gone...

Yikes. I didn't think it did... I'll play with it some and see what I can come up with.

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Tony Fabris

So how did the test go? I'm interested in hearing the result.

Calvin

So how did the test go? I'm interested in hearing the result.

Jeez, you gave me what, fifteen minutes before posting that?

I haven't had a chance to mess with it in the car yet (where I have decent bass response). But a quick peek at the DSP specs does state that it has a dynamic loudness feature.

I'm wondering why I assumed the Empeg's loudness wasn't dynamic. Maybe the DSP does it too subtly? I wonder if the parameters for the feature on the DSP are adjustable?

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Tony Fabris

It appears to adjust the loudness with volume.

Plugged in at home I have the volume at 0dB and if you adjust the loudness it makes no change to the output. Where as if you crank the volume down (and adjust with the external amp) changing the loudness does have the desired effect.

I didn't realise this until I played with it. Damm cool if you ask me! Here I was worried about tweaking the loudness up in car.

Plugged in at home I have the volume at 0dB and if you adjust the loudness it makes no change to the output.

Actually, it did for me. At 0db, the loudness still does affect the output a little bit. Perhaps your in-home speakers just don't have a lot of bass response?

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Tony Fabris

The parameters for how loudness varies over the volume range are programmable, but we've not paid much attention to it - I think it runs with their suggested setup.

If you have any suggestions on how to change it, suggest away.

Hugo

Perhaps your in-home speakers just don't have a lot of bass response?

Actually I was listening to it on headphones (nice Sennheiser ones) through an SB Live at the time. I guess I should have a listen on my real amp at home.

If you have any suggestions on how to change it, suggest away.

Maybe exposing those parameters to the user like you did on the EQ?

Naaaaaah, that'd be mega-overkill.

What parameters are adjustable? I assume upper and lower cutoffs for a start. Do you have a choice as to whether the taper is linear or logarithmic?

If you have a way I could alter a parameter file on the developer image, I could play with it and get back to you. Or heck, better yet, just have it read the settings from config.ini, with the current parameters as the defaults. Then weirdos like me could go in and change them from the bash prompt if we really needed to.

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Tony Fabris