Looking for per-channel mixer/EQ software??

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venm11

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Hi. I've got some audio projects and I'd like to be able to have better control as to what's coming out of each channel. Essentially I'm looking for professional-grade EQ/Mixer capabilities per-channel.

It seems like sound card driver software may have one EQ for the whole range, and then let you pick different preset speaker configurations (stereo, headphone, 4.1, 5.1, 7.1) and maybe some left/right and front/rear balance. Ultimately, that's kind of limited.

I have my own unique speaker configuration and want to build a customized and tuned surround configuration that will work for all sound coming out of the PC. Winamp plugins can handle the music, but then there's games and movies.

I read about a linux tool which let you specify formulas to define how the channels are processed and mixed together. So, you could EQ a channel, apply filters (high/low pass), adjust the timing and phase, mix channels together, etc.

If it involves getting a new soundcard, I'd consider it.
 
For that, you want to get dedicated EQ hardware. There's no real good way to do it in software. Even if you have something that can technically do it, the load is going to be immense and not something you want to mess with.

Depending on what you want I'd go one of two ways:

--If you are just looking for something that will balance your sound, like EQ out speaker differences, set levels correctly, do delays, etc get a good receiver. The Yamaha HTR-5860 will do a nice job of that and should set you back only $300-400. You just set up it's little calibration mic and tell it to do it's thing. It'll handle the rest.

--If you want to do your own fine tuning, well then you need to get some dedicated EQs and I'm sorry to say but it's going to be expensive if you want it done right. Behringer makes some cheapish ($250) ones but you may want something better. They are stereo so you need 2 for a 4 channel, 3 for 5.1.
 
Look into the KX drivers they could easily do what you want in software. They are designed for musicians and people doing home recording. They kill EAX in games though and you must be using a creative labs cards to use them. They have a DSP page that is simply awsome for this sort of thing. You could load a 5 band parametric EQ for your fronts a 10 band graphic for your rearr and a 2 band parametric for your sub channel. -this is just a for instance. Your configs are only limited by your imagination and the power of the DSP on the card. Basically you can have any filter config you can think of and write your own effects if there is something you need. You can also route seperate audio to different sources. Winamp can play out your fronts a movie out of the rears etc..etc. It doesn't see it as a 5.1 setup it see is as a recording card with 3 stero pairs. You can do surround mode also.
 
I'm not too big on buying more hardware, mainly because of space, power and general concerns of high-overheadedness and lack of flexibility and multipurposeness. Etc. :)

Anwida's eq is interesting. I downloaded it and will try it out tonight. Thanks for the tip, X.

On the subject of plugins (which Anwida has).... do any of the major sound card manufacturers have plugin capability, where I might find one that does the trick? That would be pretty ideal.
 
I figured you may have a Creative card if you do you can download these drivers for Free. IF you have a SB Live, Audigy 1 or 2 or 4
 
I could be mistaken... the only card I have ever remember seeing that allowed plug-ins was the Audiotrack Prodigy, in fact they used to have a whole bunch of these plugins for that card on their ftp server but I cannot get into tht site ATM to confirm this so....
 
I am not sure if your talking ot me or not but Creative labs cards with the KX driver installed uses plugins within it;s DSP you can load and unload them on the fly and connect them with virtual cables. It is perfect for doing things such as this.
 
Audioguy said:
I am not sure if your talking ot me or not but Creative labs cards with the KX driver installed uses plugins within it;s DSP you can load and unload them on the fly and connect them with virtual cables. It is perfect for doing things such as this.
Click to expand...

Really.... can you mix channels like that? I'm envisioning a sort of daisy-chaining of configurable filters.... but can you do it per input channel, going straight through to mixed output channels?
 
Yes, you have inputs and you have outputs you can do whatever you want in between. So you can load a filter such as a EQ and put it on whatever channel you want. There is about 146 different plugins. The only thing you limited by is your imagination and your DSP power. so if you have a SB live you may be ablt to load two Graphics EQ's But a Audigy 2 for example has twice the power so you could load a parametric EQ on the fronts which could be your winamp outputs. you could put a graphic and reverb on your rears which you may have set as a movie output. The DSP is where all the power is in the KX drivers. YOU load effects which show up as rectangles with inputs and ouputs then you connect the I/O with virtual wires. You can riught click on the modules to set parameters..tweak the plugin. Does this make sense? if your into making these "different' audio setup there is nothing better then KX. They take a while to learn becasue they are very powerful.
 
It sounds nearly perfect. I'm not sure what the different cards actually offer... like, benefits of audigy 2 vs 4. Does X-fi support this (not sure if its worth considering).

But it sounds, from what you're saying, that all the DSP stuff happens on the board's processor. It doesn't do any of this stuff via the CPU? (i think i have a core free :) ) How do you figure out how much juice you need for the card?
 
I think you misunderstand what I am saying about DSP power. SB Lives use the 10K1 DSP processors and the Audigy 2 & 4's contain the 10K2 DSP. These chips have a certain amount of registers and other things inherent to progammable DSP chips. The best way to go is the Audigy 2 or 4 becasue the 10K2 has alot of power for effects so more DSP modules can be loaded at once. think of effects as blocks and you can wire up these blocks anyway you want. That translates to the internal wiring of the DSP chip and the input and output. The sky is really the limit when using these driver for custom DSP work. I remember guys using them for designing speakers etc. I have used Seperate parametric EQs for my front channels and rears and center and sub. You have all basic effects like reverb and delay etc. then other guys have written effects for certain tasks. Like time delaying speakers to set up a room correctly for surround sound. You can pick up a audigy 2 for next to nothing and the amoutn of DSP power you get out of it is amazing if your using it in this manner. You will be astounded. You want to produce a custom setup this the easiest and cheapest way to do it as I can see. They have a forum over there aswell. I wish all audio drivers had this level of customization. If your into audio on a PC you should learn about these.
 
Audioguy said:
I remember guys using them for designing speakers etc.
Click to expand...

That's exactly what I want to do-- create a crossover network with adjustments for eq, phase and timing, and do the surround stuff. Except in my case, I'm not building, I'm trying to fill the midbass holes in my AE Aego satellite systems and turn the 2.1s into 6.3... Or actually, 6.2.3 (6 sats, 2 adhoc midranges, 3 subs). But anyway....

I understand what you are saying about the DSP programmability. That's just where it's handled. For example, winamp plugin sound processors are handled by the CPU, which would be fine too (for my purposes). If the audigy does it, and does it completely transparently to what game/app is shooting sound at it, that's perfect.

What do you recommend, the Audigy 2 or 4? I'm seeing the Audigy 2 USB version which I could also use in my laptop(s), but the Audigy 4 is better (creative is a little shy on the specs)? Plus newegg has the 4 for like $40.

And thank you, Audioguy, this is very helpful!
 
They will work perfect for what your trying to do. The Audigy 4's are so similar to the Audigy 2's they are basically the exact same card. I would go to the KX forum and do some reading. When I used the KX drivers I used a SB Live! the SB102 and I used the Audigy 2 Value SB400. It may take a little while to catch on to the way signal flow but after while it;s second nature and very easy to figure out. I would go and read some docs about the driver and see what you think. The base skin on the driver is very flowery but there is other skins for the main mixer, Remember that ALL the power in the KX driver are in the DSP page.
Glad I could help. Go check out the forum and ask some questions and see if they are what your looking for. I htink they are 100% perfect for what you need/want to do.
BTW, if a filter doesn;t exist for what you want to do you can write one or get somebody else to.
 
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