EQ in a nutshell: a volume knob for grown-ups
EQ stands for "equalizer" – a frequency adjuster. In practice, it means you get to decide what your music sounds like. Want more bass? Boost the low frequencies. Vocals getting lost in the mix? Bring up the mids. Hi-hats and cymbals sound dull? Crank up the treble.
EQ is a bit like seasoning food. The chef (in this case Jasse, whose ears are insured) has already tuned the headphones to a solid base sound. But you know best whether you like your food spicy or mild.
Frequencies – what actually are they?
Sound is made up of frequencies. Low frequencies (20–250 Hz) are bass: the thump of drums, the rumble of a bass guitar, your neighbour's subwoofer bleeding through the wall on a Saturday night. Mid frequencies (250 Hz – 4 kHz) are where the human voice, guitars, and most of the music lives. High frequencies (4–20 kHz) are treble: cymbals, sibilant s-sounds, birdsong.
In an EQ, these are split into sliders or curves. Push a slider up, that frequency gets louder. Pull it down, it gets quieter. That's it.
How do you adjust EQ on Valco headphones?
On Valco headphones (VMK25.2, VMK25, VMK20, NL25 and others) you adjust EQ using the Valco app. The app has ready-made profiles for different situations, and you can also tweak things manually.
A few rules of thumb to get you started:
- Bass feels weak? Boost the 60–120 Hz range gently. Don't slam everything to max – you'll end up with a muddy mess.
- Vocals getting lost? Bump the 1–3 kHz range up a bit. That's where the human voice lives.
- Sound feels stuffy? Give the 8–12 kHz range a gentle lift. You'll get some airiness.
- Sound is sibilant or fatiguing? Drop the 5–8 kHz range just a touch.
The most important thing is to experiment. There's no right answer, because everyone's ears and taste are different. Some people like bass so heavy their teeth rattle, others want to hear every individual guitar string. Both are correct.
Most common mistakes
The most common blunder is boosting everything. If you raise every frequency, you're not actually changing anything – you're just adding overall volume and getting distortion as a bonus. EQ is about the relationship between frequencies. Often you'll get a better result by cutting a bothersome frequency than by boosting a missing one.
Another classic is copying someone else's EQ settings from the internet. Those were made for different headphones, different ears, and different music taste. They're fine as a starting point, but do the fine-tuning yourself.
What if I can't be bothered to adjust anything?
That's totally fine. Jasse has tuned Valco headphones so they sound great straight out of the box. The default setting is intentionally balanced – not some "bass to the face" type deal – because a good foundation works for all music. EQ exists for those who want to tinker.
And if you get completely lost in the settings, there's always a reset button in the app that restores factory defaults. You can't break anything. Except maybe your music taste, but that's not our responsibility.
