TOPIC: FIR Designer news and Averager

Hi Everyone,

My apologies for being so quiet on the forums; we've been extremely busy! Here's an update on our applications.

FIR Designer 1 was discontinued late last year but we're still rolling out bug fixes, as necessary, and it's now up to version 1.31.14
eclipseaudio.com/fir-designer-1-release-notes/

At the same time FIR Designer 2 replaced FIR Designer 1 and it is the focus of ongoing development. All versions output FIR filters as 32bit floating point files for MiniDSP and IIR filter coefficients in the MiniDSP text format.

In response to requests, we just released a stand-alone measurement averaging application called Averager. (No surprises there.) It can load an essentially unlimited number of loudspeaker measurements and combine them with five different averaging modes, including full complex and power with minimum phase.
eclipseaudio.com/averager/

And coming soon .... the new multi-way FIR Designer....

Kind regards,
Michael

Very cool update Michael! Keep it up.

DevTeam

Hi Michael,
Very interested in the new Multi-Way version of FIR Designer you mentioned coming soon...

Q1.) So will there also be coming soon a new Multi-Way FIR Creator EX version likewise?

Q2.) How are the Multi-Way version results / workflow superior to just running the normal version three times over for your woofer, midrange and tweeter, while using the appropriate matching crossover settings for each? The results would surely be identical anyway.

Q3.) Any other new interesting features that the Multi-Way adds beyond what we've seen before in the existing packages?

Q4.) Any chance the Multi-Way FIR Designer could please have a "one-time payment" purchase rather than "annual subscription" only?

Kind regards,
Richard

Hi Richard,

>> Q1.) So will there also be coming soon a new Multi-Way FIR Creator EX version likewise?

There are no plans for this right now. We are slowly rolling features from FIR Designer into FIR Creator, but the development focus is still FIR Designer.

>> Q2.) How are the Multi-Way version results / workflow superior to just running the normal
>> version three times over for your woofer, midrange and tweeter, while using the appropriate
>> matching crossover settings for each? The results would surely be identical anyway.

True. Having all channels present speeds up much of the design process by showing the total system response at every step of the workflow, and by showing the effects of relative delay between channels - which is particularly useful in maintaining relative time alignment when output channels have different sample rates. It also simplifies pushing all settings to, for example, the Lake FIR 3-way module.

>> Q3.) Any other new interesting features that the Multi-Way adds beyond what we've
>> seen before in the existing packages?

More comprehensive target response design, plus both an overall system target and individual channel targets.

Having all channels present is also a necessary first step towards possible future features such as more advanced crossover optimisation.

>> Q4.) Any chance the Multi-Way FIR Designer could please have a "one-time payment"
>> purchase rather than "annual subscription" only?

All I can say is pricing is TBD. We plan to put the new version out to beta-test shortly.

Kind regards,
Michael