Audiophile

Hi there!

I'm looking to replace my Edifier R1800BT with some higher end alternative.

What would you recommend?

Thanks!

I use my PC for gaming, streaming, and music production. Currently I just use a Scarlet 2i2 Gen 3 with powered PreSonus Eris E4.5 speakers, which is fine but I have an idealised audio setup I'd like to build which I'm struggling to put together without compromising on some aspect. The audio world is such a rabbit hole of snake-oil and bullshit it is hard to find genuinely good products I can trust to be what they claim, and not just overpriced distractions. I'm no audio expert (which is probably obvious) but I think what I'm trying to achieve is interesting enough to see what people recommend, and help me decide if my goal is unrealistic.

Here are my requirements and what I'm trying to achieve.

1. Volume controlled entirely from Windows. No external volume knobs unless they can be bypassed/overridden in software.

2. Audio Interface for my Mic and guitar.

   So at least 2 XLR inputs and 1 TRS (Combo ports are also fine).

   Include 48v Phantom Power for my Dynamic mics (RØDE PodMic and RØDE M3)

   Might need a pre-amp to boost gain on the Dynamic mic's

3. A Good USB DAC

4. A Good AMP for passive speakers, with a port for my wired headphones.

5. Passive Stereo speakers

6. Sound quality should be natural and true to life as possible. I don't want any silly audio enhancements, like base boosts or clear voice, but a good EQ control would be OK.

7. I'd like separate units for DAC/AMP/Mic Interface but I'd be happy with good combo devices.

Here is a diagram of what I'm hoping for. https://i.imgur.com/shzA8bn.png

I welcome your thoughts and pointers. Thx.

These are my first IEMs! They are very good for the price as I expected from the reviews, but I didn't expect them to sound almost as good as my over-ear headphones. (soundstage aside)

Maybe I'm just imagining this, but I feel like I can hear more small details with these IEMs than my over ear headphones in higher price brackets. (Sennheiser HD-599 and Beyerdynamic MMX-300). In your experience, do IEMs beat the value of over-ear headphones in lower price brackets?

Either way, I'm impressed by this product. If you want to try some IEMs without spending a lot of money, I can definitely say that you should look into these! After owning them for longer, I'll see if my opinion changes.

I would appreciate any help, thanks.

Will this be the end of Qobuz?

Just discovered this app. I love that it allows me to default to LDAC 16/44/quality settings without having to manually fiddle with developer options every time I connect headphones, earbuds, and speakers. I can also toggle between LDAC 16/44/quality and LDAC/16/44/adaptive settings with one click through saved profiles. Paid $4.13 for the premium app. Well worth it for audiophiles who use LDAC.

About a year ago I aquired a pair of these speakers and a diy sub for free. According to a few searches, they are supposed to be paired with a cd receiver. Does the cd receiver matter if I already have a home theater receiver? Are these any good for music and home theater?

I have a hard limit of $100 I can spend on quality headphones. I'm aware it'll never be as good at the wallet killers but surely it'd be better than my Bluetooth earbuds.

TL;DR How can I equalize my car speakers using an equalizer app like ViPER4Android on my phone?

I just equalized my headphones on my phone using ViPER4Android's convolver feature and a headphone-specific .wav file I got from AutoEq, and it sounds great. Unfortunately, AutoEQ only seems to support a limited range of sound devices, which does not include car sound systems.

I'm not an audiophile, but even I can tell that my car's system's frequency response is terrible, specifically in the low end, where there are specific frequencies that resonate through the car (especially noticeable when the bass frequency changes in a song).

As far as I know, AutoEq's files are made by playing something over the speakers, recording it with a high quality microphone and correcting it to match some pre-determined frequency response curve called an equalizer target. I was wondering if there's a way to replicate this process using my phone's microphone (I'm not after near-perfect sound quality here, just something that sounds reasonable), and if that would be the best way of going about this.