Wish Headphone Volume Safety Feature

A

AtomicBlaze

Inspired
I accidentally typed in the wrong level value, forgot to put the negative and I was surprised how much output went to the headphones, I can't think of any good reason to allow those volume levels to a headphone out. I would like a safety feature option to prevent accidentally blowing out my eardrums.
 
With the Axe-Fx II, some complained that it puts out to little level to drive high-impedance headphones.... ;-)
 
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Then you had your volume levels on your headphones too loud. People complain about ear monitors blowing their ears out... turn down the volume, your max volume should be the most you can take, never above, so transients dont kill you.
 
Output is going to depend on a number of variables so what could be effectively limited for your headphones might have someone else not getting an acceptable level.

Rule of thumb is turn things up as loud as you think you’d want then put headphones on. Don’t wear them and make adjustments because you don’t know how hot of channel your going to monitor.
 
I am honestly concerned that Fractal could be sued if someone goes deaf with the headphones. I do think there should at least be a safety option.
 
dpeterson said:
Then you had your volume levels on your headphones too loud. People complain about ear monitors blowing their ears out... turn down the volume, your max volume should be the most you can take, never above, so transients dont kill you.
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My headphone output was set pretty low, I always set it low when tweaking levels it was still one of the loudest things I ever heard.
 
AtomicBlaze said:
I am honestly concerned that Fractal could be sued if someone goes deaf with the headphones. I do think there should at least be a safety option.
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Then there should be a safety option on anything that “can” produce a loud sound including amps, car stereos, iPods, etc. I’ve blasted myself with the most simple amp/speaker devices. It all boils down to user error. There’s just no way to have a device determine if you mean to turn up or not.
 
While I don't personally want this wish, I understand it.

Saying "well then your headphones were turned up to loud" isn't fair.

Some presets are very loud. The range of quietest to loudest sound produced by the Axe Fx III is very large.

I've had the same experience with FRFR cabs. I now turn down my guitar volume when scrolling to unfamiliar presets...
 
Same can be said for any amplification system. Turn the wrong knob, not realize the settings when he take the amp out of standby, plugging a cable in or out of a powered main... All can get harmfully loud

My CLR's are sitting here as I'm typing, levels pretty high. If I plug my III into USB, and which is then connected to the CLR's I could get a windows system sound at 120 dB through the monitors based upon the Axe III volume settings. Solution is to be aware and be in control, just as its always been working with studio gear, and just like working with power tools, firearms etc.

There is no way an output limiter is able to know how loud the output of a given pair of headphones actually is, too many variables.

Simply don't input high values, just like you don't want to plug an instrument cable into the speaker output jack on an amp, etc etc. You can only make things so "safe"
 
there was another similar request before that was a bit simpler:

for Output Level parameters, have Axe-Edit default to negative values if you type in a number. since most levels are going to be negative, we always have to put the - sign before typing the number. if it could do that by default and instead require the + sign to put a positive value, we could avoid 20 db jumps.

of course, you could just drag the dial as well, but for typing, this was a great suggestion. i don't know how plausible it is to implement, but i like it.
 
chris said:
for Output Level parameters, have Axe-Edit default to negative values if you type in a number. since most levels are going to be negative, we always have to put the - sign before typing the number. if it could do that by default and instead require the + sign to put a positive value, we could avoid 20 db jumps.
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that IS a great idea… +1 all day on this.
 
h.c.e. said:
that IS a great idea… +1 all day on this.
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I use the fm3 for some online jamming so i get some sounds back by usb to my headphones. One of my partners in crime plays harp and is poor at controlling his volume. It is beyond my control. I think a limiter would help me for this scenario.
 
Would love this. It’s a failsafe that defaults to off. Ideally I could say, “give me at most 95dB through the headphone out” and if something exceeds that we get a GUI alert (like input clip?) that it’s happening.

I think about this anytime a beta comes out after the FM3 beta firmware that had a runaway volume spike. It was a beta, yes, but it’s a wholly different situation versus turning the knobs up too high. The limiter handles both of these cases.

Think about this way: hearing lets us enjoy our AxeFX units, and ensures we want to buy the next one. :)
 
It's always possible to wear our headphones around our neck when we're editing, then when we're auditioning the sound put them on "for reals". That way IF we fat-finger some parameter it's not being sent directly into our head.
 
mattgreenrocks said:
Would love this. It’s a failsafe that defaults to off. Ideally I could say, “give me at most 95dB through the headphone out” and if something exceeds that we get a GUI alert (like input clip?) that it’s happening.

I think about this anytime a beta comes out after the FM3 beta firmware that had a runaway volume spike. It was a beta, yes, but it’s a wholly different situation versus turning the knobs up too high. The limiter handles both of these cases.

Think about this way: hearing lets us enjoy our AxeFX units, and ensures we want to buy the next one. :)
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Not realistically possible. The actual SPL output is dependent on the headphones you are using, their impedance and efficiency. The output range can vary considerably across the hundreds if not thousands of different headphones on the market.
 
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Seem like a configurable Output block brick wall limiter would be easy in principle just as a safety. Of course for OUT1 it would apply to all output1 signals including phones.
 
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