To Equalize or Not to Equalize

When I first got into this hobby back in the mid 1970's graphic equalizers were very popular. By the early 1980's as audio boutique stores selling astrobuck audio gear began to emerge, using a graphic equalizer became frowned upon; so much so that IME they were no longer offered in most audio companies' product lineups. 

It seems that over the past decade as the headphone hobby began to expand and more quality  audio gear was offered  to the headfi enthusiast, that the graphic equalizer began to experience a Renaissance. 

I think that Schiit Audio has had a lot to do with this Renaissance, given the company's first offering, the Loki Mini, followed by the Lokius and Loki Max. 

I use a Loki Mini in my headfi system and a Lokius in my two channel system, and find them to be very beneficial in tailoring the sound to my personal taste. 

I truly cannot envision any audio system that I use, not having a graphic equalizer.

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I try not to introduce any eq but in a couple of cases it’s worth it.

I just use the Roon eq.

Roon has suggested eq for every headphone and I find it worth it. I travel with earphones and headphones for my daily music fix.

I have some open baffle speakers (2nd system) without subs so I boost the low end some with good results. With a sub that would probably go away.

I have a lot of room treatment in my listening roon so it sound good without EQ.

Hope that helps.

There's an interesting thing I see happen with most people when using an EQ. They create, visually, a Fletcher-Munson curve. Whether they need it or not. Boost both ends. It just looks good. Clueless to the added distortion by boosting. (they could put in the curve by cutting instead of boosting but they don't) The smoother the curve the better. 

My son works at an Audi dealership. Almost every car that comes in for service has this curve boost put in the EQ. Almost every system is way overly bright and bass boosted. NOT good sounding at all. This is what they do with an EQ.

I’m a Loki fan and have a couple of those (headphone rig, TV) and was an early adopter of the Loki Max. Having used various pro EQs it was interesting how Schiit designed the Max (and all the rest of the Lokis). It does not behave like a pro EQ which to people who can’t grasp that fact makes it seem somehow less effective than the pro stuff. It was never supposed to act like a standard pro EQ. The remote is a great feature (I use Chicken Head knobs so I can easily see where everything is) and I rarely need the Max anyway, but when I do, it’s perfect and utterly transparent.  Wilson took the name Loki for their sub and I still think that's kinda lame.

If you are open to getting a used EQ I can recommend a DBX 10/20 Equalizer. It is a 10 band EQ with memory settings so you can save and recall several different profiles. The unit also has a real time analyzer but you would need to find one where the owner has the original microphone. I have two of these, a 14/20 for my main system and a 10/20 for my desktop system. There are usually a few of them for sale on eBay selling for $400 to $800 depending on condition.