High cut on cabinet vs hi love cut

[Lazzinazz]

Hey everyone!

First week after buying a Helix and man do I just smile from playing with this thjng. One issue I've found is that  I recently decided to experiment and I threw on a high and low cut.(I have never used the high and low cut or the cab high cuts before this point) When I change the high cut from off to 20kHz I hear a drastic difference in the upper transients of my patch. If I set both of my cabs' high cuts to 20k, I don't have this drastic difference. Are the cab high cuts not true high cuts? Is there an issue with the low and high cut and it is not actually cutting at 20kHz? Im super confused haha

[cruisinon2]

11 hours ago, Lazzinazz said:

Hey everyone!

First week after buying a Helix and man do I just smile from playing with this thjng. One issue I've found is that  I recently decided to experiment and I threw on a high and low cut.(I have never used the high and low cut or the cab high cuts before this point) When I change the high cut from off to 20kHz I hear a drastic difference in the upper transients of my patch. If I set both of my cabs' high cuts to 20k, I don't have this drastic difference. Are the cab high cuts not true high cuts? Is there an issue with the low and high cut and it is not actually cutting at 20kHz? Im super confused haha

 

The perceived wisdom is that the dedicated hi/low cuts, or those in the parametric EQ are much steeper curves than the ones in the cab blocks, so that may explain the difference. 

 

Setting any of them at 20kHz though, really isn't trimming much... it's at the upper limit of what we're able to hear anyway, so I'm surprised that you notice much of a difference no matter which one you use. It depends largely on your choice of cab and mic models of course, but many of us end up needing much more savage high cuts than that to get rid of ice-pick fizz. Dragging it down around 5 or 6kHz is not at all unusual.

 

Or it just means that you're 20 years younger than me, and I can't hear anything above 12kHz anymore...;)

[Lazzinazz]

Wow I was tired when I wrote this!

Anyway, I'm only 24 and I've always thought I've had very acute hearing, however, I can't imagine there is a very large amount of harmonic content being processed post 20kHz. It almost sounds like the helix may have issues (Not as in a bug, more as in a general digital signal processing problem) recreating these extremely high transients due to the nature of processing higher frequencies and the DSP power required. I'm curious as to what exactly I am hearing. To my ears, I enjoy hearing it with the 20khz cut more than without but it almost sounds like a slightly higher limit would satisfy my ears. There's just too big of a difference between off and 20kHz for me not to wonder about a higher cut range. I just can't imagine me hearing being that good though.

[cruisinon2]

32 minutes ago, Lazzinazz said:

Wow I was tired when I wrote this!

Anyway, I'm only 24 and I've always thought I've had very acute hearing, however, I can't imagine there is a very large amount of harmonic content being processed post 20kHz. It almost sounds like the helix may have issues (Not as in a bug, more as in a general digital signal processing problem) recreating these extremely high transients due to the nature of processing higher frequencies and the DSP power required. I'm curious as to what exactly I am hearing. To my ears, I enjoy hearing it with the 20khz cut more than without but it almost sounds like a slightly higher limit would satisfy my ears. There's just too big of a difference between off and 20kHz for me not to wonder about a higher cut range. I just can't imagine me hearing being that good though.

 

Lol... well I was kidding, but you are 20+ years younger than me, so it's a virtual certainty that I've lost more high frequencies than you have at this point. We all lose them to a greater or lesser extent, the older we get. A word to the wise if you play at gig volumes: EARPLUGS. Every time. And not the $hitty foam ones from the drug store, unless you want to try and play all night hearing nothing but the bass player and the kick drum. Get a good fitted pair from an audiologist, with flat response filters so you can still hear everything, but at a tolerable volume... they'll cost you a couple hundred bucks,  but it beats going deaf. You'll thank me later, but I digress. 

 

Bottom line is it's all of this stuff is entirely subjective... set the cuts wherever they sound best to you, and don't worry too much about individual numbers. 

[gunpointmetal]

Just set the high and low pass where it sounds good. There's almost nothing of use in a guitar signal over 8-9kHz and you've gotta be able to hear dog whistles to notice a difference with it set to 20kHz. For recording it's not unusual to cut the guitar off at 6-10kHz because pretty much everything above there is "air" and noise and is going to be eaten up in the air by cymbals. 

[Lazzinazz]

I guess my point is that it sounds like either I am hearing above 20khz, and I can hear a difference between cutting above 20kHz and not (which just seems really unlikely from a human ear physics point of view) or there's something more that is happening other than simply cutting above 20kHz . I am more curious if anyone else has noticed this and has more insight into what I'm actually hearing happen. Never in my life have I ever made a tone in the last 10 years based off of anyone else's ears or even attempted to emulate anyone else's tone. My point is that my initial reaction was "Ok, the difference between off and 20kHz cut is pretty drastic to me, the only way I can see getting a compromise between the high cut off and set to 20kHz would logically be a higher high cut." However, based on how I understand the physics of human ears, it just seems really unlikely that I should be able to tell.

 

 

[codamedia]

A 20K cut does not mean everything above 20K is removed and every below it remains... There are a number of ways cuts are implemented... the most common is a slope. Without knowing the details of the cut (or putting it on an analyzer) one can only guess. (two different EQ's can have two completely different slopes)

 

Let's assume a 12db cut at 20K for these examples.

1. If the cut begins at 2/3's of an octave, the slope will begin around 12K until it reaches the full 12db cut at 20K  (2/3 octave slope is very common)
2. It the cut begins at 1 octave, the slope will begin around 10K
3. If the cut begins at 2 octaves, the slope will begin around 5k

At 20 years old you are not likely to hear a full 20K... 16k is more realistic. BUT... if you understand how the slope works, you will definitely hear the high end beginning to roll off because it's likely starting at 12K. If it's a 2 octave slope, even the oldest and most tired ears will notice the roll off beginning at 5K.

 

Summary: You need to know 3 numbers to know what is happening with a filter. 1: The frequency 2: The amount of cut 3: The slope ratio.

When you don't know one or more of these numbers it really does become a matter of "twist the knobs until it sound good" :) There is nothing wrong with that, you don't need to know what spices were used for something to taste good :) 

 

[Lachdanan0121]

2 hours ago, codamedia said:

A 20K cut does not mean everything above 20K is removed and every below it remains... There are a number of ways cuts are implemented... the most common is a slope. Without knowing the details of the cut (or putting it on an analyzer) one can only guess. (two different EQ's can have two completely different slopes)

 

Let's assume a 12db cut at 20K for these examples.

1. If the cut begins at 2/3's of an octave, the slope will begin around 12K until it reaches the full 12db cut at 20K  (2/3 octave slope is very common)
2. It the cut begins at 1 octave, the slope will begin around 10K
3. If the cut begins at 2 octaves, the slope will begin around 5k

At 20 years old you are not likely to hear a full 20K... 16k is more realistic. BUT... if you understand how the slope works, you will definitely hear the high end beginning to roll off because it's likely starting at 12K. If it's a 2 octave slope, even the oldest and most tired ears will notice the roll off beginning at 5K.

 

Summary: You need to know 3 numbers to know what is happening with a filter. 1: The frequency 2: The amount of cut 3: The slope ratio.

When you don't know one or more of these numbers it really does become a matter of "twist the knobs until it sound good" :) There is nothing wrong with that, you don't need to know what spices were used for something to taste good :) 

 

This is exactly what I was thinking as well. In Fabfilter Pro Q2 when I high cut at 16khz, the slope will start at lower frequency. That depends on the steepness of the cut, and even on steep ones this still occurs.

 

At 20 years it is highly unlikely you can hear 19khz much less 20khz. Most children can barely hear anywhere near 20khz.

 

I am 33, I tested myself, and had a hearing test done at 31. I can hear just above 18khz, but I start to top out long before I reach 19khz. However, the hearing test did state that my hearing was well above average for my age. Especially for a guitarist, and extra especially since I do Metal as well. Most people top out at 17khz before they turn 30 years old.

 

But I do take care of my ears. I have become quite vigilant about it since I became an adult. I am not a touring musician, so I think that has a lot to do with not losing as much being a musician. I am also pretty particular who I go see live, cause I am not a people person, and don't care for large crowds, or long drives. (good shows rarely come to NW Louisiana)

 

[Lazzinazz]

Thank you! That explains what I'm hearing. Through frequency generators I have found that I can hear above 20kHz. The theoretical upper range of my 30 dollar earbuds is 24kHz. However, I'm not sure what the response is like because I don't have any other speaker setup to compare it to. Now if only I could a adjust the target frequency, db cut and ratio to my liking...

[jws1982]

I believe the high-cut filter on the high / low cut block is actually turned off when set to 20khz.  When you change it, I believe that’s when it turns on, and that’s why there’s a noticeable difference in sound. 

[Lazzinazz]

4 minutes ago, jws1982 said:

I believe the high-cut filter on the high / low cut block is actually turned off when set to 20khz.  When you change it, I believe that’s when it turns on, and that’s why there’s a noticeable difference in sound. 

It turns out I had a fundamental misunderstanding of how a hi cut works causing a disconnect between what I was hearing and what I thought I should have been hearing.