Dirac has more sane pricing for stereo option

[wgscott]

Relatively speaking ...

 

[Miska]

Honestly, I would say it had sane pricing already. Most of the audiophile software is insanely cheap... Especially if you compare to hardware price tags.

[wgscott]

It costs five tweeters.

[Miska]

It costs five tweeters.

 

I noticed that on the other thread. Danger becomes always when some frequencies are boosted, it creates danger for clipping and can also drastically increase power used to reproduce the boosted frequencies...

[wgscott]

Yeah, I wonder if it might be saver just to equalize up to the point of midrange/tweeter crossover? (I know there are arguments for only doing this to about 200Hz, but I think Dirac handles the higher frequencies better than most).

[Miska]

Yeah, I wonder if it might be saver just to equalize up to the point of midrange/tweeter crossover? (I know there are arguments for only doing this to about 200Hz, but I think Dirac handles the higher frequencies better than most).

 

Up to 250 or max 1000 Hz is usually good. There are no room-related correctable errors anymore above that and it becomes just loudspeaker correction that should be measured near-field for correct results. The Harman's algorithms in my amp measure >1 kHz near field, 60 cm distance on tweeter axis.

 

Did you have calibration file for the measurement mic? If uncalibrated mic begins to roll-off at HF, then the generated correction would overdo HF...

 

Clipping shouldn't become issue if Dirac correctly calculates max gain and lowers overall gain accordingly. Since that leads to reduced subjective volume and then you end up turning the volume higher to compensate...

[VandyMan]

Honestly, I would say it had sane pricing already. Most of the audiophile software is insanely cheap... Especially if you compare to hardware price tags.

 

I kind of doubt that anyone who does not have an audio software business is going to agree with you. Software is far cheaper to package and distribute than hardware and has a near zero BOM cost, of course. So, even as a software developer, I expect software to cost a lot less. I paid over 2K for my TACT. I'd never pay anywhere near that for an equivalent software package.

[Miska]

I kind of doubt that anyone who does not have an audio software business is going to agree with you. Software is far cheaper to package and distribute than hardware and has a near zero BOM cost, of course. So, even as a software developer, I expect software to cost a lot less. I paid over 2K for my TACT. I'd never pay anywhere near that for an equivalent software package.

 

Compare the R&D effort divided by number of units sold. BOM for hardware is usually around 10 - 15% of the retail price. How many man years were spent developing the unit you have? How many free (feature) upgrades you've got for the price you paid for the hardware?

 

Let's say you have average small software company of 10 persons. Now calculate a software license price that could keep that company employed for the sales volumes you estimate there would be for an audiophile software package.

 

Here cost of employing a person is roughly 2x the monthly salary of the person.

 

So let's say hypothetical 100k€/MY price, so for a 10 person company that would 1M€/year. So the company would need to sell 10000 of 100€ licenses per year just to pay salaries. Zero profit, assuming running the company would be otherwise completely free (no cost for web hosting, electricity, work space, connectivity, coffee, etc...)

 

I seriously doubt the Dirac software package sells even 1000 licenses per year.

 

Of course, once you have first product out, you should somehow catch up with the past R&D effort costs while sustaining also the current ongoing R&D in order to at some point reach profitability.

[Jud]

Here cost of employing a person is roughly 2x the monthly salary of the person.

 

 

In the USA also. Less goes to taxes in the USA but more goes to various benefits (retirement plan, health insurance, etc.) that are traditionally paid by the employer rather than by the government.

[wgscott]

It is quite expensive for software, but cheaper than any decent analogue graphic equalizer you are likely to purchase.

[VandyMan]

Well, for an apple to apples compassion vs Dirac, my Tact required significantly more software development then Dirac. After all, it required one or more hardware engineers, software engineers who specialize in embedded systems for the firmware, Windows software engineers for the accompanying software, someone to design the face plate and physical UI, and engineers in the factory. Add in the cost of prototypes, tooling, shipping hardware from the factory , inventory costs, spare parts, and more. The Tact would also likely have much higher support costs since bug fixes could require changes to multiple sub-systems that have different engineers and faulty parts require hardware replacements. Lastly, most hardware is still sold thru dealers who take a significant cut of the profits. I have no idea how many licenses Dirac may sell, but I would think that since Tact and Dirac compete for the same market share and Dirac costs a lot less, it is possible they will out sell Tact and other hardware-based competitors. Generally speaking, it is hard for me to see how a software program should be priced anywhere close to the Tact's price. However, the Dirac is less than half the price and does come with the XTZ Pro II measurement kit which is excellent (I own it) and may well justify the total price in this case.

 

I think you should charge whatever the market will pay. I don't begrudge your profits at all. I have developed very specialized software that sells for 150K, so I get it.

[Esprit]

It is quite expensive for software, but cheaper than any decent analogue graphic equalizer you are likely to purchase.

Right. You can find for free DRC but it is much more complex and there is no Apple version.

[Miska]

Well, for an apple to apples compassion vs Dirac, my Tact required significantly more software development then Dirac.

 

I cannot compare the two, because I don't have any experience on Tact and not much on Dirac either. I don't know how much of their things were in-house and how much was licensed from outside.

 

I think you should charge whatever the market will pay. I don't begrudge your profits at all. I have developed very specialized software that sells for 150K, so I get it.

 

Specialized software are not the one that make big profits. If I spend one year developing a custom software solution for one single licensee, 150K is not a strange price tag at all. And there's lot of expensive generic purpose software too, like Autodesk Product Design Suite that costs 10+k and will probably sell much higher volumes than Dirac or Tact.

 

Synopsys/Cadence/Mentor EDA suites are not cheap either, and also sell in high volumes compared to audiophile market products.

 

I can find many audiophile amps in price category from 10k to 100k where schematic is pretty simple analog amplifier and BOM is probably way under 1k... I wouldn't pay 10k for an amp I can build myself for less than tenth of the price.

 

Or if I look for example at MuFi V-Link192, set of cheap electronics components and small piece of firmware and driver licensed from outside. Sells for 350€.

[wgscott]

Right. You can find for free DRC but it is much more complex and there is no Apple version.

 

I just compiled it on OS X without issue. It is GPL and I can upload the binary for 10.8.X if you want it.

[Miska]

I just compiled it on OS X without issue. It is GPL and I can upload the binary for 10.8.X if you want it.

 

With DRC there's not so much to compile (glsweep and something else). It mostly depends on Octave (and gnuplot) which should be also fairly easy to compile for OS X... Although I don't know if gnuplot supports display output to anything other than X11 which is of course available for OS X, but not anymore bundled with the OS itself...

[wgscott]

There is a native interface, but if you need X11 you get a prompt for the download. It works rather seamlessly.

[Esprit]

I just compiled it on OS X without issue. It is GPL and I can upload the binary for 10.8.X if you want it.

Thank you very much.

P.S. DRC remains complex, I have to measure using REW which is free but does not work with firewire cards.

[wgscott]

Thank you very much.

P.S. DRC remains complex, I have to measure using REW which is free but does not work with firewire cards.

 

REW frightened me off as too complex. Just reading the documentation makes me think I would need to have a Ph.D. in some field related to Fourier theory just to make heads or tails of it. Actually, I do, but I still find it too complex.

[VandyMan]

However, the Dirac is less than half the price and does come with the XTZ Pro II measurement kit which is excellent (I own it) and may well justify the total price in this case.

 

I am wrong about this. XTZ is sold separately. So it is 400 euro just for the software. I had tried the trial of the original version last year and they were kind enough to send me a 20% off coupon for the new stereo version. I think I will demo it and decide if it is worth the price to me.

[wgscott]

I got the 20% off coupon too. But the thing that keeps me from buying it is the inability to export the result to an AU plugin I could use with Audirvana Plus. Audirvana run in iTunes integration mode does not appear to be compatible, and (no surprise) direct mode isn't either. The difference that Dirac makes is something I can reproduce manually to a reasonable approximation with just a graphic equalizer AU plugin. My guess is the timing correction, at least in my room, is less of an issue.

[Esprit]

REW frightened me off as too complex.

Dirac measures, calculates, creates and applies the filter. All in one.

It's sw independent. It's a "virtual" audio card.

You cannot obtain the same result with an EQ :

Technical description | Dirac Research

[REShaman]

For those who already own Amarra Symphony or may purchase Symphony, Sonic Studio is offering for sale as an add-on their version of the Dirac stereo program which they've named iRC (impulse response correction). I do not believe they have advertised the price for iRC bit it is very soon-to-become available, as in days. I realize the price for Amarra Symphony may be dear, but that is a different issue. Just making this offer known to those not yet informed.

 

Best,

Richard

[ckpiv]

Richard,

 

Pricing for standalone and upgrades are showing on the Sonic Studio's online store.

 

Amarra Symphony with iRC $789.00

 

Amarra Upgrade to Amarra Symphony with IRC $560..00

 

Amarra Hifi Upgrade to Amarra Symphony with IRC $749.00

 

Did not List Amarra Symphony to Amarra Symphony with IRC ??????

[VandyMan]

wgscott - I see you are trying DRC on the Mac. Is there an AU plugin you are doing the final correction with?

[wgscott]

Dirac measures, calculates, creates and applies the filter. All in one.

It's sw independent. It's a "virtual" audio card.

You cannot obtain the same result with an EQ :

Technical description | Dirac Research

 

I do understand that. The question is how audible is the phase/timing correction? In other words, is brain-dead equalization good enough?