Whats this EU volume capping rubbish...???

DrMekon · 21 Dec 2006 at 09:29

Was rather shocked after getting a 4gb Nano, stuck some music on it, wacked it on and listened, turned it up, then a little more, then, oh is that it??? Checked the volume limiter and thought that would sort it, tried again, turned it up, tried some more.. oh..is that it???

After some research I found some rubbish about the EU saying that we are oviously incapable of judging volume levels for ourselves... now ok, the volume level was reasonable, but sometimes you just want a little more, only a touch, but it would have made all the difference!!!

Ok, so the coded volume limiter is a great idea, but then let us judge what limit to set it...

I can think of loads of situations were as adults, we are responsible for our own safety.. now imagine if the EU had more rules, on say.. how sharp knives were, as we can cut ourselves with them! now cars can kill over 30mph, lets fix their speed!!.... fags and booze probably cause more damage than loud music... lets ban all of them too!!!

Luckily though, there are "fixes" to these, but none for the newer models, as of yet, maybe theres a way to flash the US firmware.. and come on, I mean if they are deemed more responsible, then theres little hope for the rest of us!!

But as for now, the player will be going back!!

fini · 21 Dec 2006 at 10:01

The sub-question to this would be 'why do you want to listen to music at such a level that it will damage your hearing?'.

I'm with you that there shouldn't be a limiter, but why do you want to go above it in the first place? Do you not value your hearing?

fini

DrMekon · 21 Dec 2006 at 10:18

So here in the EU, we have different hearing sensitivity than the rest of the world...???

The volume is fine if Im sat in a quiet room.. and lets face it, even up high, its probably less damaging than night club volumes, conerts, gigs.. etc... where you can leave them feeling partially deaf...

Surely everyones hearing is different, and Im sure the levels they set are actually below what would be an average volume.. so even a tad higher would be safe, if like most things, in moderation...

I wasnt asking for a major increase, literally a couple more decibels would be ideal, another 1 or 2 on the volume level would be perfect for times when I need it just that bit higher... it is borderline, bot on the quieter side!!

And anyway, aferall, they are my ears..!!!!

squiffy · 21 Dec 2006 at 10:25

fini said:
The sub-question to this would be 'why do you want to listen to music at such a level that it will damage your hearing?'.

I'm with you that there shouldn't be a limiter, but why do you want to go above it in the first place? Do you not value your hearing?

fini

Not all headphones have the same sensitivity. Using stock inears, but then when you less efficient phones they'll be at different dB levels, for the same setting on the DAP. I had a pair of Beyer DT231 and they needed +15 higher setting for the same volume to my Grados. My iriver EU firmware has the cap, that's soon resolved with flashing it to US firmware, or using rockbox.

One way around the headphone out gain cap is to use a portable headphone amplifier, a good upgrade especially with Ipods poor quality headphone stages.

MetA · 21 Dec 2006 at 10:54

A couple of inputs .....

mp3 players aren't like clubs. You go to a club a couple of nights a week and the ears can recover somewhat. You wear an iPod for many hours each and every day, so the damage inflicted is worse. Hence why they wanted to protect folks.

There ARE speed limiters on vehicles. Trucks, BMWs and Mercs - just a little more than 30

3db increase in "volume" is actually a DOUBLING of the energy in the sound wave. So wanting a "couple more" is increasing the stress on the ears significantly and worthy of alittle protection.

Caged · 21 Dec 2006 at 11:09

If you're having trouble hearing it over the background noise, the way to fix it isn't to make it louder than the background noise, it's to block out the background noise.

fini · 21 Dec 2006 at 16:11

squiffy said:
Using stock inears, but then when you less efficient phones they'll be at different dB levels, for the same setting on the DAP.

Indeed, I quite agree - and would suggest if he really wanted it LOUD try using some IEMs (E4Cs are brilliant) as they're easy to drive and will seem to go really really loud because you can't hear anything else in the background. I do think, however, that we may well be talking about the stock earphones, or at least some very similar - if we were talking about some HF1's or the like then he'd know all about headphone amps and would just get one of those instead.

I'd disagree that the ipod has a bad headphone stage - it USED to, but now its absolutely fine IMHO.

fini

titaniumx3 · 21 Dec 2006 at 18:56

I agree with the OP in that there are plenty of reasons why you'd want higher volumes. For example I frequently use headphones with 60ohm impedance, meaning I need significantly more power output to reach a given volume compared to the majority of earphones. I also frequently listen to older recordings which in general have better mastering and arn't as loud, hence its safe to turn the volume up.

That said, if the volume capping is reversible by some sort of hack or firmware upgrade its not such a bad idea. If the person is stupid enough to listen at such high volumes they're probably too stupid to bypass the volume capping and if they do manage to do so, then they deserve to go deaf.

james.miller · 21 Dec 2006 at 18:58

squiffy said:
Not all headphones have the same sensitivity. Using stock inears, but then when you less efficient phones they'll be at different dB levels, for the same setting on the DAP. I had a pair of Beyer DT231 and they needed +15 higher setting for the same volume to my Grados. My iriver EU firmware has the cap, that's soon resolved with flashing it to US firmware, or using rockbox.

One way around the headphone out gain cap is to use a portable headphone amplifier, a good upgrade especially with Ipods poor quality headphone stages.

^^^ yup. EU volume-limiting is a shambles. its a limit on output power, NOT output volume. power != volume

the cap (15mw isnt it?) is far too low on every player ive listened to. BUt there's more to it than that, poor implementations means it effect more than just the power output. on the iriver h10 for example (and others) it effect the equaliser and its effectiveness. Sound quality is far improved just by removing that limit.

....and remember, its HF that you really need to be careful with, and you dont need a lot of power for high frequencies using earphones anyway, especially IEM's. With the cap removed, bass output is vastly improved in virtually every instance.