I recently installed the FXsound application to improve the sound on my PC. The following problem has arisen: I can’t understand whether I should now enable the built-in sound enhancement effects in Windows or is it better to turn it off? After all, in essence, the application is an improvement in sound, I tried to understand by ear which is better, the difference is audible, but I can’t understand which is better.
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Hi,
Disabling all Enhancements is part of my standard troubleshooting list bannered at the top of the forum; when people are experiencing problems, disabling Enhancements is one of the first things recommended.
It is also worth checking from the get-go if your machine has an inbuilt audio console by a specific brand (e.g. Beats, Dolby, Waves MaxxAudio, Lenovo, HP, Bang&Olufsen, Realtek, or other).
On Windows 11, these are the most common Enhancements found:
- Bass Boost
Bass Boost evidently lets you choose the bass frequency you wish to boost as well as the intensity with which it is boosted.
- Virtual Surround
Virtual Surround creates a wider, more spacious soundstage, similar to FxSound’s Surround Sound slider, or options offered by Dolby.
- Room Correction
This is for speakers only, to correct the influence of your room on your audio output. I honestly wouldn’t recommend activating Room Correction unless you can use a near-professional-grade microphone; otherwise, the results of calibration will most likely be disappointing.
- Loudness Equalization
The Loudness Equalizer keeps sound output from all applications on your computer within a consistent volume range. Long takes a longer time to level the output, and balances out the sound quality, while Short does it faster. You’ll probably need to test this for yourself to determine which setting you find the most satisfying.
- Low Frequency Protection
This eliminates frequencies below a certain threshold.
You can find all the info pages on all the Windows Enhancements here:
As you noted yourself, FxSound is able to replicate and/or replace some of the Enhancements offered by Windows.
It’s also worth noting that most “audiophiliac” websites are of the opinion that enabling Windows’ own Enhancements is harmful to audio quality; take, for example, this paragraph, quoted from a speaker setup guide by AudioHolics:
Make sure extraneous sound processing is deactivated in Windows
Most desktop Windows operating systems have some optional sound processing features that globally alter the sound output. This audio processing is rarely an improvement when the PC is connected to a good sound system (Mac users need not worry; I haven’t seen anything like these features in Apple computers unless installed by a third-party). In a normal Windows install process, the default status of these features is off. However, I have seen instances where these features were active when it would not have been expected. In a sound system where the speakers aren’t terrible, these sound processing features should absolutely be turned off. They can only degrade the sound in a good loudspeaker. For those who are setting up a sound system around a Windows PC, it’s worth taking a moment to make sure these processing features are not engaged.
All that being said, I would argue that audio quality is highly subjective, and that it is, of course, your machine; so if FxSound runs smoothly with some Enhancements enabled and it sounds pleasing to you, then nobody is holding you back from setting your sound up any way you want.