Roon Rock, the parametric EQ, DSP and musical enjoyment. .....

[joeinid]

I have to say that I’m not a huge fan of tone controls in practice. I believe they can be beneficial, even necessary at times for enhanced enjoyment. Maybe I’m not a strict purist, but it’s the final product I look forward to enjoying.

I still think about a preamp with tone controls as long as the implementation is well done. This is sometimes rare these days.

I am sure my hearing is not the best (and maybe a little afraid to find out) but I know what I like and can not stand systems with excessive treble or high end. I don’t want or like a system that sounds like a blanket is over the speakers either. As the saying goes “I can’t handle the truth”. The speakers that I have now, to me, sound superb.

I enjoy all kinds of music and some probably not recorded so well. Since setting up my Roon Rock server, I started playing with the built in parametric EQ. Wow!

True audiophiles please look away now but I’m loving this simple tweak. I’m sure some will think that maybe there’s something wrong in your (my) system to need any tone control at all and if everything was balanced properly, it would be perfect. Well just a little finger point to move the treble down one notch makes some of my collection sooooo much more enjoyable long term, I’m ecstatic. No hazy or foggy tone control in the signal path. Just a tiny tweak in the digital domain with a little processing and everything aligns for a more enjoyable listening session.

Thank you Roon Labs for the simplicity and the power to tweak. Having a little more fun and enjoyment is what it’s all about.

I kinda wish I had this with my TAD CR-1s, things might be different now

I’ve only scratched the surface with what Roon has to offer. It’s not for everything, just the music that normally sounds a little hot to my ears.

I think they have DSP settings for you headphone guys too and other room correction curves. This is getting fun again!

 

[Dr Tone]

True audiophiles please look away now but I’m loving this simple tweak. I’m sure some will think that maybe there’s something wrong in your (my) system to need any tone control at all and if everything was balanced properly, it would be perfect. Well just a little finger point to move the treble down one notch makes some of my collection sooooo much more enjoyable long term, I’m ecstatic. No hazy or foggy tone control in the signal path. Just a tiny tweak in the digital domain with a little processing and everything aligns for a more enjoyable listening session.

I used to do the same thing with my Devialet. The move to the McIntosh pre and amps removed the need.

I'm quite certain the C1100 would do the same for you. :exciting:

Hardware aside it would be nice if Roon had a quick way to toggle DSPing on and off for those albums that need help.

 

[joeinid]

Yes, I was thinking the same. Sometimes too much control can be overwhelming.

 

[Elberoth]

I've been playing with the Roon DSP lately (I have the mic and convolution filter set created in REW). I'm not sure it is fully transparent. In any case, I prefere EQ limited to bass only (20-150Hz) vs full range (20-20kHz).

 

[still-one]

Joe
Thanks for starting this thread the other day. Like you my tone controls were almost never used on my Momentum Pre. I had no plans to try out the equalizer built into Roon until I saw your post and had some time yesterday afternoon to play with it. To start with I know the limitations of my room and there is a delicate balance in turning up the volume a bit to get my X2's to provide the bass I am looking for without overloading the room. I bumped up the bass a bit using Roon's Parametric Equalizer and now I seem to get a bit of additional bass without having to up the volume. I only wish there was a toggle on the main screen to turn this on and off since MQA will not play with DSP enabled. I have to drill down about six clicks to perform the task.

I may get tired of it quick but it sounds pretty good for the time being.

Thanks Joe!!

 

[joeinid]

Awesome Jim. I’m glad I could spark a little exploration of the inner controls of Roon. Yes, you are right, there could be a little quicker access to some of those functions but I suspect with increasing popularity, that may change. I’m very judicious with how much correction or tweaking I do, but it’s nice to know it’s there.

I’d like to experiment with room correction like Adam does but I’m probably a little lazier than most when it comes to things like that.

Having Roon as my front end player is fun and powerful. It makes me want to play and interact with my music. I’m ecstatic. I’m also happy that you are getting better sound because of it.