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Is there a way to tweak the sound settings such as treble and bass with Vista, or any third party plugins/drivers that will add that feature.

I know some programs have their own built-in graphic equalizers, but I'd like to find an OS wide solution since not all sound/music related programs offer that.

Update I do have Vista 64 with the latest Realtek drivers, which by the looks of it don't support an equalizer with their drivers any more.

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3 Answers

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I have been looking for something like this myself, the closest thing I found is SRS Audio Sandbox. It installs as a virtual audio device and modifies the sound output of every program. Unfortunately it is not a graphic equalizer but an "audio enhancer" that can be adjusted by parameters like "space level" "center level" etc, but maybe it can help you.

Edit: Have a look at VSTHost, and how you can use the virtual audio cable to route audio output through it as described here. I will definitely try it.

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The virtual audio cable solution looks interesting. Searching on that I found a similar question answers.google.com/answers/threadview/id/279494.html but it sounds like quite a hassle to get that to work. I've installed the SRS audio sandbox trial - it seems to do most of what I want - it has the TrueBass setting which is all I am after. For me it is worth the $25. Unless I find anything better I'll mark this as the answer before the end of the bounty. – Vdex Aug 5 '09 at 13:18
Thanks for the tip. SRS audio sandbox is actually working out very well for me! – Vdex Aug 6 '09 at 17:54
up vote 1 down vote

Usually it's implemented by your sound card vendor through their own driver.

For Creative cards:

Start -> Run -> mmsys.cpl -> Click Speakers -> Properties -> Tone tab

On my Realtek they don't let you actually use an equalizer; you're stuck with a dropdown of presets (Jazz, Classical, Rock, etc.). On my SoundMax there's nothing at all.

I was looking for this a while back also and the only thing I found was Power Mixer, which didn't display tone controls for me despite the author's claim. Dunno, maybe I just didn't find it.

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I think you're right about it being a vendor specific thing. I assume there must be a technical limitation stopping a generic third party tool from intercepting the sound and modifying it. And I just tried power mixer. Same result here - no tone controls. – Vdex Aug 3 '09 at 8:33
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Simple Way :-

  1. Open Windows Media Player 11.
  2. Point at the Now Playing tab and click the down arrow that appears under it.
  3. Point at Enhancements and then select Graphic Equalizer.
  4. The graphic equalizer will show up at the bottom of the Now Playing section of Windows Media Player 11.

  5. Click Turn on located near the top left of the equalizer to enable it.

    alt text

(source: http://maximumpcguides.com/windows-vista/enable-and-adjust-windows-media-player-11-graphic-equalizer/)

You can use Tools

Graphic Equalizer Studio 2.5

Voxengo Overtone GEQ

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I tried the Media player now playing equalizer, but it does not seem to change the sound for other running programs. Voxengo Overtone download is a DLL only, and the description says it is a plugin for any "VST or AudioUnit" application, not sure what that is. And finally "Graphic Equalizer Studio", seems to be an app to change the levels of mp3 and wav files? Or at least I couldn't get the demo to change my real-time sound settings. – Vdex Jul 29 '09 at 18:58

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