Loudness on or off?

[Harleywood]

Me personally run my preamp with it off. I prefer to add low end using my eq and adjust the mids and highs to balance it out. I also think it sounds terrible and puts an unnecessary load on your amp. Am I crazy? 

[JerolW]

On during low volumes.

 

jerol

[Chris A]

Loudness contours really need two controls: one for "on" and "off", and another for adjustment of the degree of boost vs. frequency to adjust for the differences in the sensitivities of your loudspeakers and your room size/listening distance.  That's what is missing from most two-channel receivers and older preamps with a fixed loudness button. 

 

In the 1980s, the Bose corporation provided that second control in auto radio systems in select GM cars with the option for Bose loudspeakers and radios.  Note that Audyssey's "dynamic EQ" is a loudness contour that is calibrated to your loudspeaker's sensitivity, so it is doing a calibration of the degree of EQ vs. frequency for you after you run the in-room calibration sequence at or around your listening positions.

 

Because Klipsch loudspeakers have much higher sensitivities than other loudspeaker brands, those older fixed loudness contours on older receivers/preamps are too much correction to match the loudness contours of human hearing.  Notice the changes in human perceived loudness at low frequencies--which are sensitive to the absolute loudness level at the human ear canal:

 

 

Chris

[Woofers and Tweeters]

5 hours ago, JerolW said:

On during low volumes.

+1

[JJkizak]

The Denon X4000 has a thing called "Restore" in the menu I believe that acts as a loudness control which I use in "low" around 80 to 85 db SPL.  It "Pops" the bass pretty good in my horridly acoustic living room.

JJK

[jjptkd]

I use to use it during low volumes but not since I've added my second subwoofer.

[tom b. 57]

7 hours ago, Harleywood said:

Me personally run my preamp with it off. I prefer to add low end using my eq and adjust the mids and highs to balance it out. I also think it sounds terrible and puts an unnecessary load on your amp. Am I crazy? 

I agree. I too would much rather adjust with tone controls or EQ.

 

Tom

[Dkfan9]

2 hours ago, JJkizak said:

The Denon X4000 has a thing called "Restore" in the menu I believe that acts as a loudness control which I use in "low" around 80 to 85 db SPL.  It "Pops" the bass pretty good in my horridly acoustic living room.

JJK

The Restore function is technically meant for low quality to medium quality steamed or compressed music (eg mp3). Low boosts the bass only I think, medium boosts more and also provides treble boost, and high boosts the highs more and possibly the bass more too. It can act essentially as a loudness control with a little more gradation than old school one button loudness controls.

[Tarheel]

The loudness switch duplicates the Fletcher-Munson curve one of the equal loudness curve sets for the human ear.  These two gents developed this curve as their proper way to listen to music while doing research at Bell Labs.  Its use does seem to add a bit of "richness" to the sound.  I usually run everything flat and most preamps no longer offer tone controls anyway.

[derrickdj1]

With my SC 99, it automatically regulates the loudness depending on the volume.  No need to fool around with it.  Only you can decide on if you like the feature in your system.  It has a purpose.

[jjptkd]

I had an EQ in my car audio days, thought of it as necessary at the time. The thing is almost every song, CD, whatever seemed to need minor "tweaks" to sound its best, which was better than flat in the car environment. I got very familiar with the controls and with the EQ within arms reach it was easy to make quick adjustments at the beginning of a song. At home though I just could not imagine getting up off my arse and "tweaking" the EQ every time a new song came on, that would get old really fast.

 

What I have done is through numerous trial and error in equipment and speaker swaps found a certain "synergy" that sounds good in my space with most sources without the need to "tweak" the sound in any way. With this method some source material just doesn't sound the best and I just live with it. Luckily there is plenty of good, well recorded music in my library that sounds fantastic so its really a non-issue.

 

 

 

 

[ssh]

Off and flat on the crossover on the Scott 299A...always.

SSH

[Fish]

I have not had a radio with loudness button for some decades but.......I liked em if done kinda right. Dolby Volume has a setting (1) on most implementatios for this purpose and works really good. As mentioned Audyssey Dynamic EQ also does pretty good. With most Klipsch you need all the help you can get with bass/low freq......at lower volumes....

 

[Ski Bum]

Audyssey DynamicEQ and Yamaha's old school variable loudness controls, both used judiciously, actually work, for the very reason's Chris mentioned.  I think Yamaha calls their loudness compensation on their AVRs 'YPAO Volume' and it's much the same as Audyssey's approach.  

 

It's easily over done, particularly when high sensitivity speakers that feature reflex loading are involved, and many of the fixed loudness controls of yore were goosed excessively to help sales, not because it was such a good implementation.    

 

I recall PWK strongly discouraging the use of fixed loudness controls in Dope From Hope articles.

[dtel]

13 hours ago, Harleywood said:

Am I crazy?

Crazy, it's hard to tell, give us some time and we might have an opinion, but also consider the source. 

 

3 hours ago, Fish said:

I have not had a radio with loudness button for some decades

Same here, but when I did it was only used at low volumes.

[chriswhotakesphotos]

My preamp has a loudness contour (only affects bass), but I've never found it necessary. I used it when I wanted to speed up the break-in of my KG 5.2s (they were unused when I got them) but I think it was designed with less sensitive speakers in mind, since the effect was still somewhat strong into higher volume levels. It works well for running Heresies without a sub, but I run mine with a sub so it's not needed there either

[garyrc]

14 hours ago, Chris A said:

Loudness contours really need two controls: one for "on" and "off", and another for adjustment of the degree of boost vs. frequency to adjust for the differences in the sensitivities of your loudspeakers and your room size/listening distance.  That's what is missing from most two-channel receivers and older preamps with a fixed loudness button. 

 

In the 1980s, the Bose corporation provided that second control in auto radio systems in select GM cars with the option for Bose loudspeakers and radios.  Note that Audyssey's "dynamic EQ" is a loudness contour that is calibrated to your loudspeaker's sensitivity, so it is doing a calibration of the degree of EQ vs. frequency for you after you run the in-room calibration sequence at or around your listening positions.

 

Because Klipsch loudspeakers have much higher sensitivities than other loudspeaker brands, those older fixed loudness contours on older receivers/preamps are too much correction to match the loudness contours of human hearing.  Notice the changes in human perceived loudness at low frequencies--which are sensitive to the absolute loudness level at the human ear canal:

 

 

Chris

Starting in the early '60s, Centralab provided a concentrically double control.   You had to replace the Volume control in your preamp with it.  One knob was "Volume" and one "Loudness."   IIRC, you were instructed to turn the "Volume" control to as loud as you would ever want the sound, using a typical record, then turn the "Loudness" control down to the SPL you wanted.   As you turned the "Loudness" control down, the bass and treble were turned up.  It also had switches to select whether you wanted the maximum treble boost to be 8 dB or 12 dB.  

[JohnA]

On 12/23/2016 at 1:45 AM, Harleywood said:

Me personally run my preamp with it off. I prefer to add low end using my eq and adjust the mids and highs to balance it out. I also think it sounds terrible and puts an unnecessary load on your amp. Am I crazy? 

 

Partly.  No Loudness system I've ever seen would put a load on an amp.  Typically, the preamp attenuates its effect as volume knob is raised. 

 

I don't have a loudness "button" and so don't use use it.  But the best loudness system is on old Yamahas.  Set the main volume and reduce the volume to your desired level with the "Loudness" knob.  Speaker efficiency is thus accommodated. 

 

 

[pauln]

The F-M curve is descriptive, not prescriptive. It is a measurement of what is happening, not a suggestion of how one should adjust playback frequency response.

People are free to do and enjoy how they please; but don't fool yourself thinking that using loudness compensation is approaching the correct musical picture. Extra boom and twinkle is a marketing feature, not a musical feature.

Music at a distance or at a low level is not heard to have as much bass and treble... that is exactly how it is supposed to sound. There is no such natural sound as loud full spectrum frequency soft sound. There is no such natural sound as loud sounding soft sound. Adjusting to make it otherwise is not natural, does not sound natural, and is not a better representation of the music because that sound does not exist except by artificial sounding boost.

[Fish]

Actually analysis of music listening gear and methods and all that goes along is what had ruined it for me. Listening to the music and enjoying that has made my listening much more enjoyable in the past few years.