TOPIC:

Hi,  audiophiles seems to be a bit hesitant to aggressive room correction.  I'm an audiophile and I was wondering if one could apply a "mild" form of correction that works up to a couple of hundred hertz, just to mend all the dips and boosts of your room.
A assume the Dirac series uses fir-filters to put together "inverted impulse responses". picked up by a measurement mic.  But if those algorithms are working too high up in the frequency, the whole thing will probably be very "jittery". That is, if you are located in e precise spot, all pieces may fall together and a "holographic" experience will emerge - some centimeters away and the whole thing will collapse.
People who like high end stuff usually are skeptical to most "correcting" techniques.  Amplifiers should not have too high negative feedback, etc.  The theory is that a correction usually is very hard to maintain when the frequency is high enough. The correction comes slightly out of phase, and worsens the situation.  
I think audio engineers that needs to analyze the sound image carefully, etc, mostly benefits from heavy corrections. But for someone who listens for pleasure, corrections just makes the sound sterile. 

So, I thought that some kind of "in between" approach would be nice. Use FIR-filters up to some hundred hertz only, just to iron out the worst bass problems. I have made some experiments with IIR EQ-ing the room, but that fails miserably for me. Each new EQ correction just introduces other strange peaks or dips some other place in the frequency. And it does nothing for the resonances.

Is this feasible with this kind of equipment?

Furthermore, is it possible to process the signal and send it to a high end DAC?

@ hifinisse

Sure, not a problem you can indeed decide where the "CURTAIN" will apply Dirac room correction. Check out the manual on p41
www.minidsp.com/images/documents/miniDSP...%20User%20Manual.pdf
It's part of the target curve editing. You just decide which range/section of the audio spectrum you want to apply Dirac to. The rest will be bit perfect in this case. 

Have you tried Dirac Live before? If not, worth a trial as well. You may realize that it's not as harsh as others and indeed can be made to make your whole sound system a whole lot better.  

DevTeam

hifinisse wrote:

Hi,  audiophiles seems to be a bit hesitant to aggressive room correction.  I'm an audiophile and I was wondering if one could apply a "mild" form of correction that works up to a couple of hundred hertz, just to mend all the dips and boosts of your room.

Yes - I do this myself.

hifinisse wrote:

A assume the Dirac series uses fir-filters to put together "inverted impulse responses". 

The following article is the best source I know of if you want to get a better idea - it's not as simple just using FIR filters:

www.dirac.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09...lization-filters.pdf

hifinisse wrote:

Furthermore, is it possible to process the signal and send it to a high end DAC?

Yes. Note that the SHD Studio is a digital-only model, whilst the SHD has both one set of analogue inputs and 4 independent DAC output channels (like having two stereo DACs in the box). The SHD only has SPDIF (RCA) digital outputs whilst the SHD Studio has AES/EBU outputs as well.

Hi,  audiophiles seems to be a bit hesitant to aggressive room correction.  I'm an audiophile and I was wondering if one could apply a "mild" form of correction that works up to a couple of hundred hertz, just to mend all the dips and boosts of your room. 

Yes - I do this myself
-—————————————

I’d be interested to have your thoughts on the difference this has made to the sound quality (compared to full frequency Dirac correction).  Reason I ask is that I’ve applied the full frequency Dirac default curtains and am largely impressed by the overall audio improvement (tighter bass, better imaging), but there are times when I perceive that the treble can be a little lacklustre (not massively but noticeable).  I’m wondering whether a more restricted sweep might alter this?  I will of course try for myself, but would appreciate your observations and rationale for the way you’ve used Dirac.

Bialymn wrote:

I’d be interested to have your thoughts on the difference this has made to the sound quality (compared to full frequency Dirac correction).  Reason I ask is that I’ve applied the full frequency Dirac default curtains and am largely impressed by the overall audio improvement (tighter bass, better imaging), but there are times when I perceive that the treble can be a little lacklustre (not massively but noticeable).  I’m wondering whether a more restricted sweep might alter this?  I will of course try for myself, but would appreciate your observations and rationale for the way you’ve used Dirac.

I think it would be a better test if you try it first, rather than my comments potentially biasing your findings. I would encourage to you to give it a go though, to see what you prefer.

  Spoken like a true politician!  I will test when I get some time but thought it might be interesting to have some more of your thoughts on why you set Dirac up the way you did (I think you've alluded to Schroeder frequencies previously) and how you think it benefitted the overall sound quality.

(PS I do value your input and advice on this forum - learnt a lot, so thanks).

Bialymn wrote:

  Spoken like a true politician!  I will test when I get some time but thought it might be interesting to have some more of your thoughts on why you set Dirac up the way you did (I think you've alluded to Schroeder frequencies previously) and how you think it benefitted the overall sound quality.

At low-bass frequencies the measured frequency response with a microphone represents what we hear well, and so making adjustments ('corrections') based on such measurements works well. At higher frequencies our brains to some degree distinguish between the sound traveling directly from the speaker drivers to our ears from signals reflecting off walls etc, in a way that a microphone measured frequency response does not. This means that the measured frequency response doesn't completely accurately represent what we hear, and so applying what may appear to be 'corrections' at higher frequencies may actually make the sound worse. When it comes to Dirac Live the question then becomes how well does it handle this complexity, which it uses multiple measurement points to try to help address, as well as to some degree distinguishing early arriving signals as seen from how it improves the impulse response.

In practice the only way for anyone to decide what is best for them is to experiment, and preferences will likely vary not only from person to person but may also be heavily influenced by the room too. 

I know people who've experimented and prefer the full-frequency range correction and others who prefer to limit adjustments to the low bass region.

With an SHD we have added flexibility over many Dirac users, in that we have the option to use Dirac just at low frequencies but then make other adjustments at higher frequencies using the plugin features (e.g. a treble lift or roll-off).