By If there’s one thing everyone’s been missing from Android’s music playback experience, it’s equalizer features. Some people may be just peachy with throwing their MP3s onto their storage provider of choice and playing them back, but audiophiles (like myself) would love to tweak the sound to best match our listening tastes. Mixzing’s helping to fill that gap with the latest version of their media player available now in the Android market.
EQ in their app is nothing unfamiliar: you’re given the standard set of frequencies and bands to play around with, among other things. There are presets, but the selection right now is minimal (with no current option to save your own). There’s also the ability to apply the EQ settings for all of your songs, specifically for an entire album, or just for one song.
The feature only supports MP3 files for now – and the developer urges you to use the feature with caution as Mixzing will tax the CPU more than usual while using it (my HTC EVO 4G struggled to play the songs without intermittent skips with the EQ enabled, particularly when switching between apps and screen orientation) – but they’re hard at work on continuing optimization and adding more features and supported filetypes over time. MixZing can be found in the Android market now in both free (ad-supported) and paid versions.
[Update]: Attempting to return to my homescreen prompted me with a message stating that the EQ feature does not work if MixZing is not the active application. This is an error on Android’s part and MixZing’s urging you to help bring it to Google’s attention. In order to push Google to fix this bug, go ahead and star the issue here.
1st!!!!!!!!!
I have been waiting on this! Yay! Now I can tweek my music for my headphones!
RATS! The EQ only works when the MixZing app is running in the foreground due to an apparent OS bug, on different devices! :(
Thanks for the heads up.
On my Nexus, I don’t detect any skipping, and when letting MixZing be the background app and switching to other apps, I didn’t see any message about the eq not working.
On a semi-related noted, the new version of MixZing does NOT allow moving the app to the SD Card. EQ Settings: increased low level boom and increased high-end, and now a big Boo Hiss for that.
This is nice and all but if a 1ghz processor phone can’t run a song without skipping then something is seriously wrong.
@Quentyn Kennemer Your welcome for the tip.
@jdog my apologies if you sent this in as a tip, but I don’t think I caught it. I use MixZing on a daily basis and wrote this post after being notified that a new version was available.
Thanks, but my poor Droid Eris can barely walk and chew gum at the same time. I’m not about to add an equalizer that slows down an EVO to it’s duties.
On my Moto Droid I experience no hiccups or slowdowns, and no notificaiton of it needing to be the foreground app. I’ve been waiting for an EQ app since the first day with my G1. Having been a MixZing user for quite some time I’m glad to see they made it out first.
Doesn’t download or find album art.
3 Player does, did.
Maybe I doing something wrong?
IMHO gapless playback would be at least as important as EQ support :)
Eq’s are useless. If you need one then either your music is garbage or your headphones are.
This is by far the best music player app I have ever installed! Had 3 other coworkers install it & we’re raving about it. The automatic playlist is great..like your own Pandora off your own music. Can’t get better than that. A must install..you won’t be disappointed! :D
I’ve Been using it since yesterday and haven’t noticed the bug. It’s been flawless so far. I have a droid with froyo.
Psshhhht my rooted G1 has had an EQ app since january. It’s not user friendly and you need a computer but its effects apply globally (calls, music, youtube). You non rooted folks are missing out on a lot
it is not possible to like this enough times… If only it was on a decent player >:(
Yeah any EQ that is causing clipping in my tracks, is not really a better audio experience. :( The reason Android phones haven’t replaced my mp3 player just yet.
I was there was a EQ app that let you apply EQ to all inputs and out puts.
phone sounds tinny — It could fix taht.. other people say you sound tinny, it could fix that.
also I would like a “advanced mode” that has enabled “fully parametic bands”.
you would be able to do what ever you need with 2, MAYBE 3 full parametic bands, then 20 fixed bands.
Uhhhh, Astro Player has had an equalizer for months now, and it still works when you go to the homescreen.
Maybe Mixzing can ask that dev for some tips?
Also sorry for double posting, but there is a feature like that.
It was built into the Motorola Milestone and was ported over to the Droid (but it messed up call volume) and was on the verge of being fixed when the droid forums nuked all of their threads and progress grinded to a halt.
Maybe you can find the old download somewhere if you can put up with being unable to change your call volume during calls?
Hi, I’m a dev for MixZing. Thanks for the review and the comments. I wanted to note a few things:
– You can define one custom preset for all songs, and any number of per-album and per-song custom presets. The latter only show up when you’re playing that song or album.
– The bug that prevents us from enabling the EQ when we’re not in the foreground is only on HTC devices, apparently all the ones that have their 2.x Android release. Which means maybe half the Android users out there. It really kills us for these users not be able to use the EQ to full effect, and we’re still hoping we can find a workaround for it.
– If you’re skipping or it’s lagging your phone too much then just try reducing the number of bands you use (to 3 or 5), and leave sliders on 0 that don’t need to change. Every non-zero slider uses CPU to process it, but you usually don’t need a lot of them to be non-zero to get the desired effect. The easy way to do this is to start from the Flat preset and then only change the ones you need to change.
– If you’re clipping (sliders turning red) then just reduce the overall Gain slider on the far left until it goes away. Or you can reduce the EQ sliders–but again, it’s better to leave as many of them on 0 as possible and use the Gain slider to adjust the level.
If you have any issues please email us at [email protected], we want to know! Thanks.
Regarding Astro Player, they use libmpg, which has a very basic attempt to provide something like EQ. Without going into details it’s nothing like the true 10-octave graphic equalizer that we’ve built from scratch using real digital filters. You can compare the sound quality of both and judge for yourself; if you can’t hear the difference then you can decide on other features.
@Peter Jeffe: VERY true. I got a Samsung Vibrant yesterday and the FIRST thing I looked for was a music player with a TRUE equalizer. Sure my Vibrant has a decent EQ and Astro Player has a ton of bands but they really do not stack up to my equilizers on my Nokia XpressMusic or my computer’s X-Fi soundcard.
MixZing DOES. In fact, many of the bands are the exact same ones I have on my X-Fi card on my computer and I am delighted to say it sounds JUST as impressive when tuned right. I can honestly say that MixZing has THE best audio quality when you enable the Equalizer and tune it.
Yes it taxes CPU (which hopefully can be minizmied in the future) and yes it doesn’t support all music yes (which I hope it being worked on cause its essential) but the premise and sound quality are THERE. It’s a matter of details now.
Oh. Would also be nice if you guys added the option so that MixZing OPENS a folder on a memory card AS a playlist as well as the option to be able to save multiple EQ presets (I have a car and a headphone one that are different).
Great work otherwise
Oh. And if you could introduce a switch song by holding on the volume keys, THAT would make it PERFECT.
Pretty good, works fine on HTC Desire
What audiophone uses a equalizer…… the whole audiophile concept is to listen to the music, exactly as it was recorded?
By manipulating the recording with a equalizer goes completly against this!
When was the last time you saw a equalizer anywhere near top end HiFi……… your a muppet.
I’ve been running MixZing on my Droid X since getting it 3 weeks ago. It is by far the best sounding MP3 player I’ve ever had. I’ve completely stopped using my ipod touch.
First EQ I’ve used that didn’t add hiss. The gain slider and the ability to assign by library, album, or song is the best feature. It has made mp3gain obsolete.
Feature rquest: auto gain setting that reduces the gain when clipping occurs down to a the level to keep clipping from occuring with the current eq settings. And then auto save the gain level for each song. Then the user has to worry about is setting the curve they way want for library(global), album, and song. The gain would be auto tuned for each selection.
Question, is this foreground eq bug only with FroYo 2.2? If so, I will have to decline the 2.2 when it’s available. That would really suck as I want Flash.
Just hands down and utter agreement on what Steve said. If the volume keys could switch track by holding them down that would be just top notch feature.
I tried the ASTRO player which has all these EQ bands which turned out to be a big disappointment. IT was practically useless. On the other hand MixZing features TRUE EQ with outstanding user comfort and customization. Never before have I seen EQ with the option to choose between number of bands and the frequency range. Well the con on the CPU usage is the only issue I would mention, but nevertheless the sound is simply AMAZING given you will adjust it right – it takes some time though. Until now I thought the best sounding mp3 players would be the older iRiver ones, but after this I gotta change my opinion. This product is a BUY with enjoyment to me and recommendation to all Android users out there.
right, i’ve got froyo on my hd2 and while i like the playful apps, no eq can beat srs on windows mobile. this is a joke. fucking eq gets you all excited? fuck me.
“What audiophone uses a equalizer…… the whole audiophile concept is to listen to the music, exactly as it was recorded?
By manipulating the recording with a equalizer goes completly against this!
When was the last time you saw a equalizer anywhere near top end HiFi………”
Love answers like this… If you think you’re getting the same experience in your headphones as in a mastering studio, where the mix is perfected, you are sorely mistaken. Why do you think the Cowon line of media players are so big with audiophiles? It’s because of the tweeking abilities.
I just bought a pair of brand new Monster Hi Performance Turbine speakerphones for my Evo and although the stock sense UI players sounded fine ( loud cuz of Monster), I must say that the low frequencies were a lil flat. Well it was all flat but high freq. were loud and clear. So I stumbled upon this app. Downloaded and saw that the EQ works on only few songs in my library ( dont know why? all mp3 format). Then I tweaked the filters across the board (custom), by just a level and lowered the gain bar with the same level (as the dev said above). Now I feel, my turbines are throwing out more bass albeit loud and crisp highs.
Although, I would still prefer for them to have pre outs like Rock, Pop, R&B, acoustic and stuff like that. I hated Iphones but that was one good thing in them (they had EQ and various settings). Nevertheless, Sense UI needs a better music player to compete with Apple toe to toe, or else this is one area where Apple will keep hammering Android with their eyes closed.
I dont see any lag or delay when switching or browsing and running Zing in background. Just keep tweaking.