Room Mode + Speaker Anechoic Measurement Correction

[lempogi]

That is very reasonable, IMO! And my opinion is that you probably won't be missing too much in the way of sound quality either way, TBH.
But that doesn't mean it isn't fun to learn and experiment with other approaches!

Just be aware that the quality of RoomFit correction is still at least somewhat dependent on the phone you use - a) the phone built-in mics are in general not very reliable (they are not individually calibrated), and b) some phones seem to misrepresent the bass even when using individually calibrated external microphones (see this example).

But many phones work well enough so you may not run into these issues at all.

BTW, do you already own a measurement mic that you could use?

My hope is that in the future WiiM will find some way to make RoomFit less sensitive to this kind of phone-specific issues. One idea tossed around the forum was to use the WiiM Voice Remote microphone in RoomFit, if possible. Presumably this could be pre-calibrated at the factory, it would avoid relying on the phone, and already comes bundled with many devices. But I guess no one knows if WiiM is actually considering ever implementing this or not.

I bought a UMIK-1 mic, secretly. But I'll do the correction maybe tonight or tomorrow night if time permits. I have an old Google Pixel 6. Is that phone ok to use? My wife has a Pixel 9 just in case my phone will not be fit to use.

 

[dominikz]

Thanks so much for reply and advice. Frankly speaking I was thinking to do as you suggested when found these data at spinorama site but my RoomFit at the moment is done according to BK curve and this settings seems to be for Harman (it is described at spinorama site as “These EQ optimise the Harman score and is a good start for far field listening like in your living room”). So can I use this settings along with BK RoomFit 20-400 hz correction ?

The EQ settings from spinorama.org are unrelated to the target curve you use in RoomFit, so it is absolutely fine to use them if you use B&K curve in RoomFit.

To give a bit of background - the "Harman score" is actually something quite different to the "Harman target" or "Harman curve" - though I see how the naming is misleading.

"Harman score" is a preference score used to grade the tonality of loudspeakers based on their full anechoic (spinorama) response.
"Harman curve" or "Harman target" is a curve following the in-room steady state responses of well-measuring, front-firing loudspeakers.
This is not to be confused with the headphone "Harman targets" (which exist as well)!

Note that the "Harman curve" was actually never intended to be a 'target' for EQ; it was found to be a natural result of well-measuring loudspeakers. These days many people use it as a target, however - and regardless of loudspeaker type - which doesn't necessarily guarantee good results.

All of this came from years of research done at Harman (and NRC before it), which explains the confusing and not very imaginative naming

 

[lempogi]

Thanks so much for reply and advice. Frankly speaking I was thinking to do as you suggested when found these data at spinorama site but my RoomFit at the moment is done according to BK curve and this settings seems to be for Harman (it is described at spinorama site as “These EQ optimise the Harman score and is a good start for far field listening like in your living room”). So can I use this settings along with BK RoomFit 20-400 hz correction ?

Good question bro. Good thing you asked also here as I missed that part that you asked.

 

[cristoo]

The EQ settings from spinorama.org are unrelated to the target curve you use in RoomFit, so you can use them without fear with your settings.

To give a bit of background - the "Harman score" is actually something quite different to the "Harman target" or "Harman curve" - though I see how the naming is misleading.

"Harman score" is a preference score used to grade the tonality of loudspeakers based on their full anechoic (spinorama) response.
"Harman curve" or "Harman target" is a curve following the in-room steady state responses of well-measuring, front-firing loudspeakers.
This is not to be confused with the headphone "Harman targets" (which exist as well)!

Note that the "Harman curve" was actually never intended to be a 'target' for EQ; it was found to be a natural result of well-measuring loudspeakers. These days many people use it as a target, however - and regardless of loudspeaker type - which doesn't necessarily guarantee good results.

All of this came from years of research done at Harman (and NRC before it), which explains the confusing and not very imaginative naming

Thanks a lot for clarification. I will then give a try with these eq seetings. Pretty exited about results. I am absolutely delighted of the insights and help I can get from this forum. Great community.

 

[cristoo]

Good question bro. Good thing you asked also here as I missed that part that you asked.

Glad i can contribute my 5 cents. I guess we follow similar path and mindset. Cheers.

 

[dominikz]

I bought a UMIK-1 mic, secretly. But I'll do the correction maybe tonight or tomorrow night if time permits. I have an old Google Pixel 6. Is that phone ok to use? My wife has a Pixel 9 just in case my phone will not be fit to use.

Don't know about these phones, unfortunately. You can perhaps try searching for experiences of other members in the forum.

But IMO it should be quite apparent from the RoomFit graphs if you have the issue or not, especially since you have a good sub and UMIK.
From what I've seen the bass cut in problematic phones is pretty severe (see this post by @Wiimer for some examples of "good" and "bad" responses).

 

[slartibartfast]

I bought a UMIK-1 mic, secretly. But I'll do the correction maybe tonight or tomorrow night if time permits. I have an old Google Pixel 6. Is that phone ok to use? My wife has a Pixel 9 just in case my phone will not be fit to use.

If my Pixel 3a works your 6 and 9 should be fine.

 

[cristoo]

I bought a UMIK-1 mic, secretly. But I'll do the correction maybe tonight or tomorrow night if time permits. I have an old Google Pixel 6. Is that phone ok to use? My wife has a Pixel 9 just in case my phone will not be fit to use.

I bought Dayton mic and used with my iPhone with calibration file. I decided to Dayton because of costs and fast delivery. When my wife asked my what exactly I bought and when she heard it is calibrated measurement mic. She looked at me like at crazy madman audio freak and I realised I should have bought is secretly, lol.

 

[slartibartfast]

I bought Dayton mic and used with my iPhone with calibration file. I decided to Dayton because of costs and fast delivery. When my wife asked my what exactly I bought and when she heard it is calibrated measurement mic. She looked at me like at crazy madman audio freak and I realised I should have bought is secretly, lol.

Whenever my better half walks in while I'm doing room correction measurements she always asks what the strange noise is.

 

[lempogi]

If my Pixel 3a works your 6 and 9 should be fine.

Wow, do you still use that phone? I thought my phone is already old, but I still use it and ok for me.

 

[cristoo]

Whenever my better half walks in while I'm doing room correction measurements she always asks what the strange noise is.

In my case she stopped asking what the hell I am doing while performing room measurements. I guess I am complete weirdo for her with this audio stuff. Curious about kids, lol.

 

[dominikz]

I bought Dayton mic and used with my iPhone with calibration file. I decided to Dayton because of costs and fast delivery. When my wife asked my what exactly I bought and when she heard it is calibrated measurement mic. She looked at me like at crazy madman audio freak and I realised I should have bought is secretly, lol.

If one tiny measurement mic is pushing boundaries of sanity, I better not list the audio measurement gear I collected over the years...

 

[Kidprofessor]

I agree with so many of the points you raise - especially about the need to link both room and loudspeaker correction to outputs, and to have a much more simple tone control available. This is something I also brought up several times - including very recently in this post.

Yes please! Great post. If they could even have the bass and treble on the remote so I don't have to look at my phone, much the better.

A small tip regarding how to approach blind listening when comparing different EQ strategies - there is actually a relatively simple but very effective way to do it, in case you're interested.

In rough terms the process is:

1. Calculate EQ filters which you want to compare (e.g. with REW and with RoomFit)
2. Select audio files you want to use for your comparison
3. Use audio processing software (e.g. something like Audacity, or foobar2000 with a PEQ plugin, but many others work as well) to process the source audio file with the EQs and create two new files:
   • A) original file processed only with RoomFit-calculated EQ correction,
   • B) original file processed only with REW-calculated EQ correction
4. Disable EQ in your playback chain completely
5. Use foobar2000 ABX comparator plugin to compare the two new files.

By comparing these two files with "embedded" EQ corrections in a system with EQ disabled you are basically comparing the EQ corrections themselves.

I've used this approach in the past to compare results with various room correction tools (e.g. see this example).

Excellent! I should have thought of it this way, putting the eq in the file is indistinguishable from eq in the system.

Note that if "individual channel" RoomFit is used, you get +3dB in the bass when playing both channels (which is a natural consequence of coherent vs incoherent sound source summation, not something specific to WiiM - a bit more about it here, here and here).

So IMHO B&K is a pretty balanced target when using "individual channel" correction, but it is bass deficient if using "stereo" correction - though this will to some extent of course also depend on loudspeaker directivity, and how "live" the listening room is.

When "stereo" correction is used I find that a curve with a more aggressive downward slope is indeed needed compared to "individual channel" correction, so I understand why you'd prefer the "trained listener" curve when using the "stereo" correction.

More great points! I think my problem with individual channel correction may be different than summing the bass. There seems to be a wide null when I do it this way, measuring in stereo after individual channel correction, which may be related to something I'm missing. Maybe I'll try a different curve for separate channel and check the results. Maybe after Wiim has an import function for REW filters though.

Yes, the trained listener slope is steeper than other curves, so that sounds like a good explanation!

 

[dominikz]

If they could even have the bass and treble on the remote so I don't have to look at my phone, much the better.

If you're willing to sacrifice a few smart preset blocks there's one practical workaround for this already. Have a look at this post.

There seems to be a wide null when I do it this way, measuring in stereo after individual channel correction, which may be related to something I'm missing. Maybe I'll try a different curve for separate channel and check the results.

Perhaps you will find this post and the subsequent test results interesting. It is not the same case (since you don't apply boosts), but should be relevant.