How to TUNE your headphones (the easy way!) 

Play with my tools crinacle.com/graphs/iems/graphtool (for IEMs) crinacle.com/graphs/headphones/graphtool (for headphones)

"If you are on iphone... Go fuck yourself" the way he said it got me lolling. Excellent.

My upmost respect on all the effort put into this tool! But I gotta say Crin, your website is pretty unusable on mobile browsers......

11:52 Small correction - Mastering engineers don't usually get all the instrument tracks (multitrack). They get a single stereo track from the mixing engineer. It's a common mistake to think mix and master is the same thing. (note - i know stem mastering is a thing, i'm talking about the traditional mastering process)

listening through laptop speakers: ah yes hmmm the nuances of the profiles are really coming through

Didn't know Wavelet was such a universally recognized tool for EQing on devices, and graph tool on your website is very useful as well, thanks!

With the help of this video, I've been tuning my iem with your frequency target as the base, and now I have my own personal target, which I've successfully match with my other iems/headphones. Really huge thanks to you, and also those who are involved to make the frequency measurements and AutoEQ possible for everyone else.

as someone who hasnt tinkered much with EQ, i really appreciate the side by side comparisons. i kind of which it was a longer loop, just to have more time to think about the nuances, but hey thats why youre walking us through how to do it ourselves

Dude, you have no idea how helpful your video is for me as a beginner. This is EXACTLY what I've been looking for. You're awesome, keep up the good work!

When I learned how to master when I got a audio engineering education I learned that the basis to master a track is to never ever add gain to any frequency unless you absolutely have to. You find the issues and remove them. Most masters are 90% dips (the good ones, that is).

Thank You so much for this video. Literally breathed new life into my headphones and made me enjoy some older pairs much more. Using your tool and spending a couple hours playing around i've managed to get a much more 'me' sound that I never would have been able to figure out without this.

The reason EQ gets a bad rep, aside from the psychological aspect of potentially having gotten the wrong headphones and needing to admit error and correct them, is the fact that older digital EQ technology really wasn't all that great. But nowadays, it's pretty damn exceptional. Of course, this still assumes that the drivers in your headphones or earphones are competent enough to take it. Some aren't, most will, and some of the ones that will can handle it really well without any noticeable signs that they've been EQ-ed. While it's still worthwhile to hunt down your sets such that EQ isn't necessary, it's really nice that you can now use parametric EQ with a variety of different models for each point to completely reshape your sonic experience.

Dang. It really improved the quality and clarity. Thanks man! And thanks to the people behind this project. 🤟

I just wanted to thank you for your insight and recommendations. Your blog really helped me put into context the value of certain headphones on the market, mostly because most other headphone "reviewing" websites spread false information/don't have an objective evaluation system in place. It helped me a lot.

Another important caveat would be to watch out for ear canal resonance. This will be different on every ear and measuring rig. IME, this makes anything past 5K kind of a crapshoot. A sine wave generator and careful listening can assist when manually eq-ing in this range

Yo Crin. Thanks a lot for your work! You just made my day mate.

I'd like to have measurements (and maybe even a review!) for the HD58x in the graph tool as well.

Crinacle I have not been here since finding my first pair of headphones but that intro got me so good you're great at content creation

I really enjoy your work. Thank you for your thoughtful and concise teaching!

Super helpful video, really been loving your info as I'm getting started on this audiophile journey, they've been super helpful.

Excellent video. I actually discovered the equalizer function on your graph tool last weak and have been messing with it since then. While there are things that EQ can’t really fix (like imaging) but this is definitely a way to experience your headphones/IEMs in a different way.

The explanation on the different frequencies was really helpful, Thanks.

Poweramp EQ has evolved a lot since this video. You can now pretty much EQ any app with 2 adb commands, also you can enable a mode that also detects apps that may not be detected otherwise. It has so much tuning methods. I found it better than Wavelet, as I can tweak more, especially in the low bass range. It is not bug free and sometimes it does not switch to the right headphones automatically, but if you don't need AutoEQ or your headphones are not in the Database of Wavelet and you want something with more control, Poweramp EQ is in my opinion better. Wavelet is easier, but I personally want more control.

Just found your channel this past week... love your humor and knowledge man! We would be great friends!! keep grinding.

I was looking at videos on your other channel then got sad when I had seen you had no activity in couple months. I got lucky and found your new channel through your Twitter. You might get more subscribers if you release a short video announcing the channel change. glad to see your still going at it.

Easy and straightforward instructions. Thx a lot !

Yes, EQ is the most misunderstood tool, specially 'high end' freaks turn around if you start talking about EQ. But even with ALL high end speakers I had, EQing was necessary for room correction. So let'm walk away and enjoy yourself. For iPhone, KaiserTone got nice EQ tools, sure, for music only. Listening with normal 15$ dynamic inears, I do (measured) correction up to 2 kHz, 2-12 kHz by ear (to much individual components, that can't be measured good enough). The cheapies EQd sound better than a bunch of real expensive iems with non eq. At the end it's still a individual thing, but never got lucky with the harman curve, I guess they did a sort of restroom acoustic.

Marvelous! So far I am doing that using the RME ADI-2 DAC FS. Now it would be going to full control and greater easiness.

This tool is so dope. I now have a profile that matches the Dusk to the B2 (just to see what it sounds like) and also a Harman 2019 v2 Dusk curve that is VEIL REMOVING imo. It's revealed a few mistakes on some songs that I never heard before haha

Awesome! I have been using APO since your previous video and it has been very helpful (my current headphones are very muddy), and this is more of a tutorial on how to actually do it yourself. Thanks!

Thanks man. I'm not an "audiophile" but I spent like 20 minutes on this and now I know my headphones sounded like shit without Peace APO. Some background... I bought my headphones for battery life because its mostly for gaming (the battery literally lasts 2 weeks), so I got the Sennheiser GSP 370 and I used the autoEQ for the GSP 600.

Im fairly new to this and this helped me a lot! best video ever thanks!

Been using it for a few days and the sound quality is great.

I love this guy! I bought my kz zs10 pro for gaming and I could not use it to listen to music, I auto eqed with some extra sub bass. THANK YOU!!

Nice Food for Thought video for experimentation! Thank you

Wow thank you! Looked at the database of the AutoEQ, and it has all of my earphones and Headphones. Pretty complete database

Laying in bed watching this on my newly received ZS10 Pros as my first IEM. And WoW I have a lot to learn, I really appreciated playing the shifts in frequencies, thanks!

This is one of the most “must see videos” of RU-vid

Just found out your old channel got aliven't, finally made it back to audio dad

Most useful video crinical ever made!

Very interesting and informative video, Crin! I just wish I could capitalize on your insights and advice, but I’m limited by hearing loss [as a consequence of age and, 50+ years ago in the US Army, a sustained period of having to endure close and unprotected exposure to some very large boomsticks!]. Nevertheless, I’m grateful for the chance to learn more about what actually happens when I try to fiddle around with the souundstream that’s fed to me by my headphones, IEMs, and hearing aids. Thanks! {Full Disclosure: I’m an unapologetic IOS guy (iPhone & iPad) when it comes streaming most music . . . and I use a CD player and a Schiit Loki Mini Equalizer and Magni 3+ amp for enjoying classical music. I hope this doesn’t disqualify me from being a subscriber! ;^) }

the absolute moment i decide to go on the journey of using autoeq this drops and i consider this a sign from god

Holy cow wavelet is great, thanks!

as someone who just bought a pair of KSC75's, i can 100% confirm that if you try to push anymore bass into them it sounds like dogshit. I just tried casually producing some music on them to see how they would work and hoo boy, if you crank the lower frequencies at all it gives you a brand new meaning to bass bleed. everything is like clipping *and* muddy at the same time it's incredible.

S12 EQd to IEF Neutral is absolutely fantastic. Everyone that owns that S12 I believe should do this it turns into a borderline endgame IEM.

This is the best EQ video ever!!!!

Thank you very much :) For a long time now I have had a problem that certain frequencies create a resonance in my livingroom. But now with this windows EQ that is fixed. I have been in the dark for years :(

Thank you, Wavelet helped me a lot. The default tuning of the Sony WF1000XM4S sucked. I tried fixing it myself using the EQ built into the Sony app, but Wavelet did it much better with AutoEQ.

Yo, this was a God send, thank you so much.

I usually do EQ by ear so hi-fi music and movies sound perfect to me. I mix music a lot so I hear what needs tweaking for my taste at least. I just did EQ on my audio-technica ATH-E40 and the 4 kHz range ( I cut -13 dB) which was the biggest problem. It sounds much more realistic now. That standard high midrange boost probably made it easier to hear if on a loud stage, but in the studio it should not be there...

Love your work! Thanks! Just starting to understand some things. It's amazing how little I knew a few years back, and most people know almost nothing about sound. Just like me in the past, believing my Razer Kraken Pros were good for music, and after that I got a HyperX headset and was amazed and hated Razer and their intense marketing. After that I learned a few things here and there and got myself Audio Technica ATH-M50x. The difference was amazing and I fell in love. Sadly, my dog chewed those to pieces. Now after 2 years I managed to gather the funds for the BeyerDynamic DT 770 Pro. I am very happy. I don't believe they're necessarily the best but they are more than enough! I hope I keep learning and in the future look to myself right now as ignorant!

I can't give enough thumbs up. I have the Pixel Buds Pro (shame on me 🤣) and recently discovered that in the audiophile community they are pretty "disliked". I don't have any good audio gear and always wanted to listen to "well sounding" headphones. Just imported the harman eq for my buds and didn't hear any difference at first. But then I realized. What on earth are these high hats?! They suddenly sound like real ones and not those weird ishhsss and zzzzss' that I heard before. This video saved me from asking, what I could miss and if its worth buying some more expensive headphones or not. Best tutorial I have seen for eq with all the demos and descriptions you made at the frequences so far.

Thank you for this. Very informative.

nice review! thanks for sharing

Extension is just how I like it. Instruments like cymbals just sound amazing.

I'm using Wavelet on my Android for a year now, really love it!!!.. I don't need to EQ everything, most of the time I just crank the Buffer size slider to max at 8192 samples and not using EQ at all.. And boy it make a big difference, in a good way.. yeah the latency for bluetooth device will be bad, but it's still good for music or movie, and I'm using wired IEM most of the time anyway.. Well I'm a noob in term of EQ or audio, so if I want to use auto EQ, for bass tune I'm using Grado Hemp or Ibasso IT04 for mid range, and done with it.. lol

I've been use the EQ like you did in the later half since 15. I'm over 30 now and with a lot of trial and error, articles and videos, I kinda understand now what each frequency does and what boosting/cutting them does. But this video of yours is the shortest and most comprehensive and well demonstrated video on this subject. I wish I found something similar when I was 15.

It's about time someone did a video on this subject. Well done. There's one thing you mentioned that isn't clear to me. That part about not boosting past your gain. How do you figure out what that value is? With a "audiophile" device like a dongle or dac/amp (be it desktop or portable) or a DAP, there's probably a datasheet or something? But what about a basic device like your phone? P.S. - Also, props for linking to your suggested EQing tools. Haven't heard of the ones you suggest for Android. I've been using one that AFAIK is just called "Equalizer". Ten bands, but the bands are fixed i.e. you can't customize the wavelengths, but you can make your own custom EQs using those fixed bands. Seems to work well enough.

Love the description XD.

Thank you very much, excellent explanation.

I have been using a personal approach to equalize my headphones or earphones, I used it before I knew that the AutoEQ existed and still use it for models that are not in the database. First I create a file with white noise, e.g. in Audacity, and then separate it into individual bands using 31 band EQ, i.e. attenuate all bands except for one and save multiple files. Then I scan these files with a Replay Gain which should make the perception volume of these files pretty equal, I guess this step may be omitted if I used pink noise instead. Then I play these individual band limited files of noise and compare them in terms of loudness to each other and change the level of each frequency band respectively, the result is often pretty good, though it is not as accurate as using appropriate measuring techniques and using a parametric or a graphic 127 band EQ. (I prefer the AutoEQ to this technique if the phones are in the database.) I also use it sometimes to the addition of the AutoEQ if I replace my original earpads which also changes the sound signature, they sometimes provide more EQ profiles for some headphones with different earpads.

There's one BIG thing that might explain the audiophile's proclivity against EQ: Phase effects. Dan Worrall has a great set of videos about different types of EQ and what they do to the phase/temporal information. The gist is that you have to trade off between maintaining the accurate timing of audio events and maintaining the phase of co-incident events. This occurs for every single individual filter type, which means every individual pole in an EQ. What does this mean for people tuning their own IEMs? It means that you MIGHT get the tuning you want, and it might be a perfect target curve of your liking, but you might very well DESTROY the soundstage in the process. Phase-dependent information includes things like imaging and timing. I might get my breakbeats to sound more treble-forward, but I might turn those fast snare attacks distant and washy in the process.

If you’re on iPhone and want Parametric EQ, the Qudelix 5k is a good middleground, albeit not free. I wish there was a build of Poweramp for iOS.

I was very wary about using eq at first but now its the most fun thing in this hobby since getting new headphones. you can have just bass and nothing else or just highs and nothing else, this shit was hilarious even if your not going to use it practically. even said that I do use it practically but on;y when actually listening to songs. its a bit of a hassle to open every time for gaming or just watching videos

Oh man I love eq peace gui apo all day long I love it to death complete game changer for all my media consumption needs with my Ifi zen stack and lcd2 and cascades love it love it love it

Ok wow, thank you for this. On my Logitech G Pro X it made it too quiet after auto EQ, which I figured was the pre-amp being at -6.8. I put that to 0 and activated Peace's automatic anti-peaking option instead, which I hope does the job. It's way too quiet otherwise. But oh god it sounds so much better now, it feels like the audio equivalent of putting on glasses.

I have a set of the akg n400s and use EQ because I like a little more bass than they come with. I've always been a fan of EQ make bad head phones decent, decent headphones good, and good headphones great.

Almost at 100k again, it really is meant to be

i really liked this tutorial, the jokes were much softer :) thanks!

I didn't know much about EQing, then got into it first when custom tuning a set of earbuds using a free app. The earbuds were unlocked (i.e. EarFunFree Pro 2) and able to be tuned with my Android phone (Samsung GS10+) using an app called "AirReps15 6x" to establish a persistent 10-band default tuning. Before doing this, I first found a Pink Noise site and used my headphones to identify my personal resonant ear canal frequency (i.e. 6000Hz...I am over 50...so the frequency is on the low side, I suppose). Once I had my resonant frequency as reference, I used third party presets from another RU-vidr (Oluv's Gadgets). In any event, the earbuds went from sounding like crap to sounding terrific. This set me on a path to discover how I could do this using my PC as the music source and also able to deliver lossless quality. As I use a Windows 10 Pro PC, I needed a proper solution and chose the FiiO BTA30Pro, which has TX, RX, and DAC modes...so I can use it wireless OR wired. When wired, I choose DAC mode to feed an AMP (Yamaha CR-420 receiver or Nakamichi SR-2E receiver). When Wireless, I set the BTA30Pro in TX mode and settle for AptX Adaptive (codec) using my IEM BT5.2 earhooks (KZ AZ09 Pro's). The earhooks I marry to a variety to IEM's (e.g. S12, T3+, Oilna, HeartMirror, etc.). However, here I need to leverage EqualizerAPO with Peace (a user friendly GUI), both are free EQing software. I have taken presets from GITHUB's AutoEQ for most of my IEM's plus my planar headphones (HE400se, when cabled to my receiver) and it works like a charm. The instructions are simple for a non-programmer and the setup was pretty fast.

DT770 user here - throwing the IR file for it into APO did all I'd have wanted it to do: Shovel away at Mt Beyer and fix the low end. Just dope.

proooooo thank you sooo much ❤❤❤ i have a kz x hbb pr2 iem now its much better 😁 thanks from all of my heart 💗

Holy shit, you made my Jabra 75t's sound awesome using wavelet.

Thank you daddy crin, this was very helpful

good points you made but I still find EQing or using Auto EQ profiles kind of a hassle. When I change my headphones I have to change my profile too and I usually forget that. Also reliability of measurements or unit variance is a thing. Not every 8k peak is a 'peak' for example. In this sense Resolve's video touched these topics better. In the end I think you find a headphone you mostly like and try to change the little things you don't like with eq. Trying x band eq to see what each frequency does to your particular headphone is a good idea and a big step to EQing by ear.

Man, you're awesome!

i gotta sub you keep saving me money

That's awesome. A profile for the AKG k361 would be great. Peace has one, but I don't get to see that awesome graph.

Do you have the raw data from your measurements somewhere? Do you also measure at different volumes? I'd like to code something on top of this to help even further with eq using electrical engineering and signal processing algorithms

Thanks, my HD6xx now feel...the same, but a small bit more clearer? Neat.

If ur on apple get the music player app hs player, it’s basically built for audiophiles, it has a 10 band eq and preamp control, it’s amazing, it made my kz’s last longer before I upgraded and realized they were average

I am looking forward for your test of the Shure Aonic Free. I get dizzy with ANC so have been waiting for TWS earpghones with T100 nozzle like my trusty Etymotics. All the best!

I really get everything you said❤❤

Some people won't use this program on principle? They have no idea what they are missing. I used autoeq on an old pair of Tozo T6's and now they actually sound good. My Lypertek Tevi 2 sounded great with no eq, I used autoeq and all I can say is WOW.

i use a frankenstein- wall of sound audio system. all loudspeakers have volume control, so i can set the tweeters, mids, sub, transient favoring and steady tone favouring speakers independantly and adjust their positioning independantly.

I always have a inner conflict with myself when crinacle uploads I want to listen to music but I want to watch his video hmmmm the winner today is crinacle

Let's say I have a device like a dap - would I just try to enter in the band adjustments as closely as I can there? Is there any way to read the output of the IEMs to see where I am at as coming from the device? New to this trying to learn still.

damn I just appreciated my DT990 more. thank you so much!

it's insane there are still no other reviewers that expand on eq'ing like this. like i wanna know more like which iems can be improved or which are best for eq'ing. maybe some low rank iems become top tier with a good eq, stuff like that and not just product reviews.

It baffles me how so many vinyl enthusiasts have never heard of the RIAA EQ curve. Vinyl is literally a compressed audio standard, yet many enthusiasts are in denial about that.

Great. Gonna try to patch some reference curves in Sonarworks.

Thank you for the insight

AutoEQ has a audibility test built in. How do you tune to your hearing if you use the audibility test data? :) Thanks. I added harmann curve to my old mdr 7506 and it was quite a nice improvement. Will play with it a little over the next couple of weeks. I'm trying to get my headphones basically flat and eq my source instead (working on making the mic sound better live).

This video is a god sent

This channel is a boon man. Cheers.

As a music producer, its often recommended to use sonarworks to allow for any headphones to be given a flat response. What are your thoughts on this software?

Hi, Great content 🙂 👍

i tried 2 IEMs based on your recommendation, and i cannot hear the difference from my Samsung ear buds pro. I think the buds pro are even better and more convenient. I was and been always pissed that all the cell phones (majority) dont have the headphone jack, but now that i have used it again with a dongle and cables, i see how much a pain in the ass is to use it and get tangled. At this point, the only reason to use heaphones with cable, is only if you are stationary. Just my 2 cents. Thx for your hard work and recommendations.

3:29 Rohsa is cultured.

are we going to get an in-depth guide on how to use graphic and parametric eq anytime soon?