31 Band Native EQ Reminder

[PhaseShifter]

Ditch the 31 band graphic eq and learn to properly use a parametric EQ. You'll be in a much better place.

[soundchicken]

Far be it from me to agree with phaseshifter, but in this case I do.

A parametric EQ is a much more potent tool than a graphic. If you really feel that you need more bands to work with just drop in another instance. It becomes a little cloudy on picking the instance that you want to work with but you can drop in as many as you want. I remember seeing someone (Brett Brandon maybe) that had a multi-EQ skin that could help in this.

[Brent Evans]

I have to +1 here.

The strength of the 31 band graphic EQ in the analog world is its relative ease and precision to other tools out there. The SAC Parametric EQ combined with the frequency analyzer is a far better (and quicker, once you learn it) tool than the standard 1/3 octave EQ for many things, particularly for feedback reduction. You can center a smaller notch in on the feedback frequency, and you can do it for only the mic that is feeding back in the speaker creating the feedback, meaning that feedback notches need not affect overall sound like they do with a 31 band across the output.

[Butch Bos]

+1 for the parametric been using them (digital ones) for 15 years or so.
Hardware 1/3 s can be faster for monitor feedback issues during a gig but any more We don't really have feedback problems with good monitors and proper set up.

Butch

[dbarrow]

Even in the analog world I preferred parametric EQ. I had switched my main EQ to a BSS Varicurve long ago. Bob's native EQ with the Spectrum Analyzer is ideal for me. I also have spectrum analyzer app on my phone, so I can whistle, sing or hum a frequency into that and see exactly what it is (I usually already know more or less). If you use an app like this around in the real world for a while you will find that you become more and more trained to just hear the frequency. It's like being trained to recognize a color and associate it with a name.

[dasbin]

31-Band graphs have their bands placed logarithmically, and with a logarithmic width (Q). Room and speaker summation problems are linear, not logarithmic, so a GEQ is the wrong choice even as a speaker/room EQ. For speaker/room issues you will never, ever hit the right combination of centre frequencies and band widths with a GEQ. Go parametric and try to stop thinking of EQ in terms of octaves - it's not useful. Remember that Q=1 is wider for a 2000Hz filter than for a 1000Hz filter, and compensate when appropriate.

[Brent Evans]

31-Band graphs have their bands placed logarithmically, and with a logarithmic width (Q). Room and speaker summation problems are linear, not logarithmic, so a GEQ is the wrong choice even as a speaker/room EQ. For speaker/room issues you will never, ever hit the right combination of centre frequencies and band widths with a GEQ. Go parametric and try to stop thinking of EQ in terms of octaves - it's not useful. Remember that Q=1 is wider for a 2000Hz filter than for a 1000Hz filter, and compensate when appropriate.

Agreed that 31 band EQs are inefficient for speaker processing, but do you really find it easier to think in Q than octaves? The math is much easier with octaves.. double and half the frequency is one octave. Our brains hear in octaves, our voices sing in octaves and our instruments play in octaves. When adjusting sound, doesn't it make sense to do it in octaves too?

Q factor has never intuitively made sense to me. SAC's EQ uses bandwidth, as do many other mixers, both digital and analog. If you're going to use this product, thinking in bandwidth IS useful, because that's how it works.

[mojogil]

Everyone is at their own skill level. There is a reason why even high end digital consoles include 31 band graphs, its because people like them and use them.

[PhaseShifter]

Everyone is at their own skill level. There is a reason why even high end digital consoles include 31 band graphs, its because people like them and use them.

We used to have an outboard 31 band GEQ hooked up to nothing and allowed people to adjust it to their hearts content. The placebo effect was amazing.

It's never too late to learn a new skill. It keeps your mind sharp and can give you an edge over the competition.

[dasbin]

but do you really find it easier to think in Q than octaves?

My point maybe came across badly. Q and octave-bandwidth are two expressions of the same thing. I don't care about one over the other, really. And both are useful when making artistic EQ adjustments to musical content, because our brains perceive music logarithmically (in octaves).
There's a third option: linear bandwidth measured in cycles (Hertz). "I want this filter to be 400Hz wide." This unit's linear bandwidth is then unaffected by its centre frequency. This is more useful for correcting gear or room issues. Of course, no filter that I know of allows its bandwidth to be set in Hz. It's just that it's more useful to think about the bandwidth you need to achieve in Hz first (for these issues), then calculate the Q or octave-bandwidth you need to achieve that at the target centre frequency.

One example of why this is useful: Speaker phase interactions are linearly related in their physical size to their cycle bandwidth. A summation problem that is 500Hz wide in bandwidth will affect twice as much physical space in the room as one that is 250Hz wide in bandwidth.

When most people apply channel EQ on systems that aren't very well tuned or aligned, they're usually just primarily fighting these system issues. So you might try to dismiss all this in importance because most of the work you'd do as an operator seems to be of the "artistic musical EQ" rather than "systems EQ". But that's not necessarily the case - find yourself eqing many of the same bands on different channels? You're probably just fighting a misaligned system, and a linear approach to speaker EQ would serve you better. Usually when the system is really well-designed and aligned and tuned, very minimal EQ is needed on anything except for truly artistic choices.