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Who learned you how to REW? 🎚🎛🎤

8699 Views 135 Replies 22 Participants Last post by  oabeieo
When I was a youngin, when ever some one said something illiterate we would say "Who learned you how to spoke?". I'm completely REW illiterate 😔 so I want to spark a conversation with some of you fine young/old folks/farts 😃 (jk, dont hang me) about REW. Maybe a why, when, where you decided you needed REW in your life. How you learned, who taught you, how you do it.

I'm sure there's different methods, maybe some one can shoot some of their skills this way. When I got my car back last year from the installer it was a blank slate. I undid the crossovers, re set gains, re-did the input EQ, then I Helix Auto just about Everyting. This was/is new to me. My tune was done in my jobs parking lot before a night shift when I had a lil time. Took a while... half hour here and there for months. Then the finicky UMIK-1 was always cutting out on a constant mid measurement 😡. I'm a busy man with hardly any play time to my self. I got it sounded how I like, but I feel I cheated.

I bought a UMIK-2 a whiles back and a couple weeks ago I started playing with REW. Took a few mesurment just to play with it while I was waiting for my wife to get her nails did 💅. I realized I didn't know WTF I was doing. I brought the Laptop in to the house yesterday to email the pics to my self. I'll post them.

I want to dive in (when time allows) and finish where the Helix Auto tune left off. Hand jerk here n there to see if I can squeeze a lil more out of the tune.

My system consist of rear and front sub. 3 way on my doors, 2 way centre.

I take my measurement in the driver seat waving the magic stick around my face. My TA is also set in between where mine and the wives head reside. So basically a 2 seat tune, kinda. I know there should be an average between both seats but I got to learn to REW first. Plus Fvck her seats response I already compromised my TA.😃

This is a measurement with everything playing. I forgot to turn the sub down when I took this measurement. When I did the auto tune I brought the rear subs down to the front sub level.

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That hump at 1xxhz wast there when I did my tune but since I didn't turn the sub down I get some rear deck rattles. I think that was what it was. I also tuned my sub flat initially but I didn't like it and after some playing. I seemed to like a peek at 40hz

I took this today in the parking lot before my shift started. With the rear sub at like 1/3rd volume.

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NO centre with and withoug the sub up in volume.

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I had read a bunch of REW tutorials but I didn't read them before taking the mesurments and I just kinda shot from the hip. Matter of fact I just barely learned how to make the measurement look squiggly instead of like the stair way to heaven.

These are the settings I have set up. I feel like I'm doing something wrong. 😕

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I just want to learn to REW before I dive in face first into hand jerking a tune.

If you gotta story of how you learned, please share. You got some pointers for me, please share. Any input or criticism is welcomed.

Sorry for the long post I'm at work n bored. It's about to be midnight, and I still got 6 hours to go. I'll end it here so I don't loose my progress.
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I ran I to a similar situation. I tried hooking up 3.5mm to USB into my cars USB input. But the car didn't register it, just said "unrecognizable source" or something along those lines. I don't think I have an 3.5mm input. I'm gonna have to double check. Is there a way I can go USB from my laptop to the USB input of my car? I can't replace my head unit and it's my main source. Going straight into the DSP is not going to work, due to my high level out of the factory head unit needed some de-EQing with the input TRA.

I use a thumb drive with pink noise into the cars USB input. Do I need to use the the tone generator from REW to get it's full benefits? What am I missing by not using it that way? I thought I was good doing it my way. 😒 one of the links I posted shows how to hook up the laptop to your source but it dosnt work for me.

There is so many gaps in the guides, and some of this stuff is outdated to the systems of today. I have many questions and I don't know how to ask them. How do you put multiple measurements into a single graph? Like tweeter/Mid/midbass. When ever I click on one the one that was selected disappears.

I'll figure it out. I still have videos to watch and stuff to read. I'll continue to update here when I learn something new.

Since I decided that the Honda isn't getting any upgrades and I'm keeping it as is. The tunning will be the upgrade.
It looks like you’re viewing your measurements under the SPL & PHASE tab, click the ALL SPL tab to view all your measurements at once.
I’m learning REW partly because I came here in August asking if I should buy new speakers and you said that I should buy a Helix DSP and study the forums, lol. So I bought the Helix and am studying the forums! My UMIK-1 disconnects whenever I bump the cord, too, so I’m just super careful with it while measuring.
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All SPL tab 🤔, got it. Thanx! How's that Helix treating you?

My UMIK-1 would just randomly cut out them come back. I tried different cords and it did the same thing. I got fed up a got the UMIK-2. But I didn't get a chance to use it till recently. The Helix Auto tune does an excellent job, even with a finicky mic.
The Helix is great, for sure. If I knew then what I know now… I’d probably have gotten more channels or a V8, lol


I use the 'Overlays' screen instead of the All SPL. You can pick and choose whichever (or all of em) measurement you want to look at.

Also, in the Overlays screen, you can use the "EQ Filters" tab from the EQ window. This is cool, because you can EQ say your Right Mid-Range to match your Left-Mid-Range.
I’m glad to know and will give this a try next time! The Overlays EQ sounds simpler, but you can also match responses in All SPL by using ‘trace arithmetic’.
Helpful guide for matching responses:
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Thanks!... its kinda fun putting that stuff together. But, was any of that info something you didn't already know?
I knew how to do these things and I’m still going to come back here and follow your walk-through next time, very helpful.
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Set your time alignment to the driver’s seat instead of between, at least for one tune or something. Your passenger seat probably won’t notice a difference, but you should.
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I was planning to on a seperate tune. But I drive with my left and my elbow on the centre console. So my head most of the time is closer to where my time alightment is now vs my head rest when I'm driving. I'll do a seperate tune though.
Okay, it might not matter then, but I at least thought I noticed an improvement when going from center console to driver’s. Because you have the center channels, you can do a ‘true’ 2-seat tune in the future. I have no clue what’s involved in that, lol. Thanks for sharing your REW stuff!
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I don't know what a real true 2 seat tune is ether I'm just shooting from the hip to see what sounds good.
I think the Helix has a center-channel function- I don’t know how it works, but it can be made so that each seat is essentially the ‘driver’ seat? Like, the Helix treats the center channel differently and has it send partial **** sometimes so that each seat is time aligned? I’m way out of my depth, but I think that’s a ‘true’ 2-seat tune.
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Yes I have the centre algorithm. I also used the Helix Auto time alightment and it worked really well. But my time alightment was made to in-between both seats where both our head reside. The centre algorithm removes hard right/left and only leaves common signal.
Okay, I don’t know what I’m talking about anyway, it sounds like you’re doing it right. I’m out of channels on my Helix with my 2-way and a sub, would like to have a center channel someday.
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