Popular CDs with this problem are becoming increasingly prevalent, coexisting with discs that have beautiful dynamic range and impact, but whose loudness and distortion level is far lower.
There are many technical, sociological and economic reasons for this chaos. The height of the red bar reflects perceived loudness and potential loss of quality and clarity. Thus, applying Crystalizer to modern maximized records will lead to manifold growth of distortions, resulting in cracks and pollution of the recording with spurious harmonics.
We shall change sine amplitudes and look at the results. Maximum loud RMS signal level is IMD varied from 0. Before applying Crystalizer, it would have been reasonable to convert the signal into floating point format and reduce the amplitude in digital form, in order to avoid overflow.
But in this case the recording will not sound subjectively louder, which will weaken Crystalizer's positions, when compared directly to the original recording with the same volume level. Considering the above said, that is being aware of the nasty Crystalizer's feature to increase the general volume level in digital form, I compared Crystalizer records with the original, amplified by 3 dB to equalize the levels.
The comparison was based on two typical recordings: an old analog recording with a great dynamic range reserve and a modern recording with maximized levels. We used an X-Fi Elite Pro sound card and active studio monitors.
The original recording sounded much better to me in both cases. Crystalizer heavily equalized the recording, causing an evident trough in medium frequencies. All sharp noises such as percussions, guitar strings, saxophone's edge of attack were stressed, often occulting the rest of the recording automatics failed to detect that singing was more important than the cymbals part in this recording.
Perhaps, such audio processing will do good only if you listen to some recordings on small computer speakers, which add their own distortions.
Through these distortions you will make out the equalization and a sharper attack of percussions. Turning down Crystalizer produces a positive effect: it results in the reduction of equalization and general volume level, and in higher resistance to overload.
At last we've learnt enough about the bit Crystalizer technology. It's quite a complex combination of static and dynamic signal processing, which cannot be defined in a single term.
That's why Creative patented Crystalizer as an independent creation. However, no matter what Crystalizer is from inside, we are more interested in its effects and applications. We have seen no miracle, the X-Fi sound card in cooperation with Crystalizer failed to wonderfully remaster a recording, thoroughly created by experts in a mastering studio. Nevertheless, we should admit that the hardware betterizer Crystalizer is a plus for common users, as well as an equalizer or tone controls.
Using these tools they may try to make up for shortcomings of their speakers or headphones. Whether this technology is justified is up to you to decide, taking into account how it makes your recordings sound. I doubt that modern popular recordings need additional violation of their dynamic range. Probably you'd better carefully choose the Crystalizer effect until you hear the signs of overload.
You must also take into account that Crystalizer increases the volume level by dB in digital form. So perhaps all you need is to increase the volume by the same value and avoid distortions in the tonal balance and other problems.
Write a comment below. No registration needed! Article navigation:. Sandy Bridge. All rights reserved. The highs and lows in particular seem much more detailed and I have tried switching between the regular 3.
In consideration of all cases, I do feel it adds a nice kick that I can't seem to get on an equalizer.
This is also true when I play it on my logitech z, z-3 and xs all which are not great by any means, but the crystallizer feature is a noticeable difference on all of them. I have found this whether I am running high bit rate MP3s kps , lossless files or straight from the CDs themselves. They were very minute and hardly discernible details like a cymbal ringing, but the crystallizer certainly brought it out.
I have also tried running a line out directly through CD to the Xmod and found that it kicked up the fun, but I wasn't absolutely blown away compared to when I was streaming the MP3s. Just wanted to put in my two cents. SirMaster 2[H]4U. Joined Nov 8, Messages 2, Anything that alters the sound from it's original source to me is a bad thing so I vote to not use it. At least for headphones. For a home theater then EQ is necessary for room correction. Joined Jul 17, Messages It's decent for adding some excitement to the sound if you don't have a good amplifier with good speakers in your setup.
Alternatively play around with an equalizer instead there's one in foobar to learn which frequencies does what to your sound. Jellyfishpudding Limp Gawd. Joined Oct 12, Messages It comes with the same software you'd use with an add-on X-Fi card. The sound is decent, but you still can't apply the EQ and crystalizer to the line-in, which sucks.
The Xonar does this, allowing the audio from my consoles to benefit from my sound settings, but the codec the Xbox uses causes some popping noises. PS3 sounds clear though. The onboard X-Fi as well as the X-Fi sound cards simply allow for audio pass-through with line-in audio. Anyway, that's getting off the subject.
Joined Mar 30, Messages The crystalizer is nothing but a fancy software version of the old graphical equalizer. All it does is molest the musical signal and creates the "illusion" of better sound. At the expense of the truth of the original music. In short another marketing gimmick.
It definitely is a marketing gimmick, but if the end user is happy with the sound, is it a problem? I guess the idea is yes, it doesn't sound like the original source, but if the end user enjoys a more colored sound I don't see it as a problem. Joined Sep 10, Messages 8, If you find yourself multi-tasking across different apps and web-based platforms, SB Smart Volume is your go-to.
Without sudden spikes in volume change, SB Smart Volume is capable of delivering a consistent listening experience across the board. What SB Smart Volume does is that it automatically and continuously measures volume across and within different programs, and intelligently applies gain and attenuation to compensate for those sudden changes.
To dive deeper, Smart Volume utilizes a series of processing modules to analyze audio content up to 7. It also uses an algorithm to control the attack and release of the overall volume of the content with a smart ramping process. In multi-channel content, the center and low-frequency effects channels are also factored in as these channels contain a significant amount of the loudness in a typical game.
In addition, the Loud mode is designed to boost overall signal levels to allow maximum volume without clipping the overall frequency response, while the Night mode adds a gentle equalized curve to compensate typical human hearing at low volumes.
SB Smart Volume is also great at controlling the dynamic range of audio. As a result of this, listening fatigue is reduced, allowing you to keep gaming comfortably even over long sessions. Music and movie files are often compressed to maintain a smaller installation footprint — sacrificing audio fidelity and details in your content that we're intended to be heard by those creating the content.
SB Crystalizer enhances the dynamic range of compressed audio, effectively restoring those lost details to deliver the realistic and impactful audio experience the content creators intended. To rectify this, SB Crystalizer effectively restores the highs and lows that are often lost during the compression process by enhancing the dynamic range of the compressed audio.
In real-time, the Crystalizer constantly monitors the current audio stream and rapid amplitude changes. A dynamic equalizer then applies the audio boost an audible effect to the lower, transient, and higher frequency regions on demand, and releases the boost when the audio stream normalizes. This real-time capturing and releasing of audio boost improve the dynamic range of audio to deliver a more realistic and impactful audio experience.
Accept All. Precise and Accurate Positioning Scout Mode Not able to detect your enemy's location from a single shot or footstep? Sorry, your browser doesn't support embedded videos.
Without Scout Mode. Immersive Surround Sound Surround Virtualization — Sound Blaster Acoustic Engine Looking to recreate the massive movie theater audio experience at home on your headphones or desktop speakers? With SB Surround, you're transported out of the living room and into the movie theater.
Creative's bit Crystalizer converts an incoming audio signal to bit resolution with X-Fi features, the likes of CMSS 3D and the Crystalizer each have their own switches and are tweakable where at the core of all this technology are algorithms that converts the music from bit to bit surround audio.
United States. Bureau of the Census, Using the X-Fi audio technology's " Crystalizer " mode, the restored music in your PMP plays more highs and lows in tracks with heavy use of cymbals, shakers and bass instruments. Moreover, the X-Fi's "Expand" mode allows moving the sound As for those controls, they let you activate two features that set the Aurvana apart from other noise-canceling headphones.
The first is the X-Fi Crystalizer , which is supposed to fill in the gaps created in music that uses lossy compression, such Dennis R.
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