Premium sound equalizer settings

Hi everyone,
My new F10 was delivered today...I LOVE this car! Best BMW I have owned. No pulling to the right. I haven't really figured out the settings on the idrive with the sport and sport plus with the 3 choices there but I will. Love the sport mode right out of the gate though. I need help with the premium stereo. I know pretty much nothing about high end sound systems. In fact I really got the stereo for my wife. She loves classical music. Can someone please give me some help for the equalizer settings? I would really appreciate it.

I will post some pics soon. I have to go drive...a little more...Thanks everyone for all the helpful comments on this forum. I found this forum the day after I ordered my car. Wish I would have found it earlier. It is definitely the best.

SRB7787, congratulations on your new F10.

I think giving suggestions on setting the equalizer is a tough thing to do because it is so subjective. Not to mention all the parameters that come into play for a given system and acoustical environment. I am not sure but I think most audio designers of systems try for a basically flat frequency response so that there is a better chance of hearing what the artist and the audio engineer created. The end user gets some controls to tailor the response for their liking and compensate for the environment in the car and not to mention their hearing. I am getting old….rats and so I have a high frequency loss and usually boost the high end of the spectrum. What I did temporarily was boost the low and high frequencies to simulate a loudness control and I am not sure if this system has a variable one built into the volume control. Just for fun I was thinking of frequency sweeping the car and maybe put the results on the forum. Again there are a lot of factors so if I do it, it will be just me in the car and the measurements will be made at my ear level in the driver's seat.

There is one simple gold standard for end users and that is it only has to sound good to them!

Originally Posted by SRB7787

Hi everyone,
My new F10 was delivered today...I LOVE this car! Best BMW I have owned. No pulling to the right. I haven't really figured out the settings on the idrive with the sport and sport plus with the 3 choices there but I will. Love the sport mode right out of the gate though. I need help with the premium stereo. I know pretty much nothing about high end sound systems. In fact I really got the stereo for my wife. She loves classical music. Can someone please give me some help for the equalizer settings? I would really appreciate it.

I will post some pics soon. I have to go drive...a little more...Thanks everyone for all the helpful comments on this forum. I found this forum the day after I ordered my car. Wish I would have found it earlier. It is definitely the best.

I have the old high end system on my 650i. I never touch the equalizer settings. I like things "flat" as well. I just use the surround settings. I either listen to it "off" or on "concert" setting. There is also a "theater" setting, but I don't use it. Try just keeping it simple at first and see what you wife likes best for classical music.

Thanks guys for the quick responses. I think it sounds pretty good on the flat setting as well. Maybe I know more than I think. Still loving it....

I ended up pushing the bass and mid up a little bit, keeping the highs low. I had heard a smiley face (bass+treble up) was considered a "good" setup, but I find that when you crank the volume - they typically use a "loudness" algorithm that over-emphasizes the highs. I noticed that my ears were ringing a bit at high volumes - too much tweeter action, even though it sounded great at low volume. By increasing bass+mids, and lowering the highs, it sounds more natural at high volumes.

But every musical style and preference is different - and your ears get used to whatever you're listening to, even a crappy system will sound pretty good over time as your ears adjust.

Flat equalizer settings does not always equal a flat frequency response. Back when I had my E39 540, one of the members on RoadFly instrumented the car to measure the actual frequency response at the driver's ear level. (My recollection is this was called sound pressure, but it's been a decade or so, so I may have that wrong. It may be what jwrtiger referred to above as "frequency sweeping"). The result was that each of the EQ "pots" had to be tweaked to a different level to achieve a flat response. Not at all a Smiley Face,l looked much more ragged, like the Tetons.

My E60 was much improved in this area, and the M3 sounds really flat, which is a good thing. (May also be due to the fact that my middle-aged ears don't hear as well as they did 15 years ago).

No idea whether the F10 EQ is as flat or not, but here's what I'd recommend. Go to the BimmerFest Bavarian Soundwerks Audio Forum and ask for input on the F10. Many of the replies you get will be garbage - folks who like big thumping bass, hip hop or the like. But you are likely to find one or two real audiophiles who have F10's, and have taken the time to determine the proper EQ settings for flat response. Once you have it nailed, the results are amazing.

I boosted the fader to skightly increase the rear speakers. I listen to Classical Music a lot. The premium audio system is unbelievable with uber awesome audio quality.