Question Where did the Equalizers go?

barcpc

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Mar 23, 2021
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Good Monday to you all,

I remember when I was a kid you had a separate for the Graphic Equalizer and the more knobs it had the "better" we thought it was. Nowadays they have disappeared completely, I don't see them on any separates or AVR, or any modern equipment.

What happened?

Thanks for taking the time to answer,
 
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twinkletoes

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Nov 16, 2021
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Good Monday to you all,

I remember when I was a kid you had a separate for the Graphic Equalizer and the more knobs it had the "better" we thought it was. Nowadays they have disappeared completely, I don't see them on any separates or AVR, or any modern equipment.

What happened?

Thanks for taking the time to answer,

They haven’t disappeared as such but they have evolved into very sophisticated dsp’s that will equalise to individual rooms.

So things/names you might see are Dirac live or in Sonos land i think it’s called True Tone

But yeah the old-school ones were fun but could damage things If not used widely.
 
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treesey

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They are in the software of the AVRs - my Pioneer has a 'page' in the software where you have an equaliser with about 10 slider controls across the frequency range, for EACH speaker.

Also if you listen to digital stored music, sources such as foobar2000 have a virtual equaliser setting, and you can create and save one for each genre of music.
 
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barcpc

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Mar 23, 2021
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They haven’t disappeared as such but they have evolved into very sophisticated dsp’s that will equalise to individual rooms.

So things names you might see are direc live or Sonos land i think it’s called True Tone

But yeah the old school ones where fun but could damage things If not used widely.


Lost me.... can you share a link to a DSP?
 
D

Deleted member 195594

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I'm not sure if you're looking for a product, but Schiit Audio USA do a 3 product line of multi-band tone control units, or EQs.

I had the baby unit (4-band) for a while. Worked really well. The other 2 units have 6 bands, which I believe have balanced input/outputs, and a remote control on the upper model. There are other convenience functions on the top model that may or may not be useful.
 

Symples

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Way back in time (1982 40 years ago) I bought an ADC Sound Shaper 3
I loved it and used it in my recordings. (I was a fiddler in those days)

Nowadays, I do not use tone controls.
Is this an age thing?

ADC_SS3.jpg
 
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Good Monday to you all,

I remember when I was a kid you had a separate for the Graphic Equalizer and the more knobs it had the "better" we thought it was. Nowadays they have disappeared completely, I don't see them on any separates or AVR, or any modern equipment.

What happened?

Thanks for taking the time to answer,
Yes, I always liked the notion of a physical graphic equalizer - boys toys as I've called them.

Many of the manufacturers used to state it interfered with the signal path (less accurate sound), but i wouldn't care that much - more fun.
 
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abacus

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They are used extensively in professional circles; you can find some here https://www.dv247.com/en_GB/GBP/search?SearchTerm=graphic+equalizer or just go to any professional music store (Bricks & Motor or online).
The reason they disappeared from the home market was that nobody knew how to use them, thus in most circumstances they made the sound worse.
If you want to know more just type “How to use an equalizer” into Google or You Tube to get started. (NOTE: They cannot make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear but they are great for removing annoyances)

Bill
 
I’m convinced that any manufacturer to resurrect the graphic equaliser for the domestic market will make a fortune. My opinion is rather than dictating how people should listen to music, let them listen to it how they want to. Imagine buying a TV and being told which specific settings you should use, and that you should pay someone a fortune to come and calibrate it for you before you can use it - you’d switch off (no pun intended). I’m convinced the approach of ‘no tone controls’ forced on the public by the audio industry during the mid/late 80s was one reason why people started losing interest in hi-fi back then. And nowadays, most people don’t like being dictated to.
 
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I’m convinced that any manufacturer to resurrect the graphic equaliser for the domestic market will make a fortune. My opinion is rather than dictating how people should listen to music, let them listen to it how they want to. Imagine buying a TV and being told which specific settings you should use, and that you should pay someone a fortune to come and calibrate it for you before you can use it - you’d switch off (no pun intended). I’m convinced the approach of ‘no tone controls’ forced on the public by the audio industry during the mid/late 80s was one reason why people started losing interest in hi-fi back then. And nowadays, most people don’t like being dictated to.
You could well be right.
My current amplifier has tone controls (that I do not use) but also a Balance control that I do.
Surprised at the number of modern amps that don't have a Balance control.
 
You could well be right.
My current amplifier has tone controls (that I do not use) but also a Balance control that I do.
Surprised at the number of modern amps that don't have a Balance control.
In theory, it shouldn’t be an issue nowadays, as most equipment should be built to such a standard where channel imbalances are a thing of the past, but some people use balance for other purposes, like sitting off centre, or if they have a hearing issue in one ear maybe.
 

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