Solid Sound

What is Solid Sound and how does it work?

Many people think that the sound quality is primarily related to mastering, compression, bandwidth or analog versus digital formats. However, good sound depends significantly on volume, your headphones and the personal hearing ability.

Solid Sound lets you dramatically improve the sound quality of your headphones. Rediscover your favorite songs – with brilliant highs, luscious bass and details you’ve never heard before.

Developed with famous artists and sound engineers - the people in the know of good sound.

What are the benefits of Solid Sound?

Solid Sound dynamically optimizes the sound based on volume, device and your personal hearing ability to provide for the full richness of sound. The benefits are:

Loud, louder, quite - Full studio sound at all volume levels
Get the best out your headphones
Developed with famous artists and sound engineers
Prevention of ear fatigue
Customized based on your personal hearing ability

What is ear fatigue?

We all know the problem of bad sound as we almost universally consider louder audio to sound better and turn the volume up when listening to music. However, our ears get quickly tired by loud music and we either skip to the next song or turn the volume down.

The widely held assumption that louder sounds better becomes a thing of the past; thanks to Solid Sound’s intelligent technology your headphones reveal their full dynamic range even at low volume. Experience all the thrills your favorite music has to offer while protecting your hearing.

In the long run it may even damage the hearing when listening at too loud volume levels. Solid Sound allows you to enjoy the full studio sound on lower levels, avoiding ear fatigue.

What does 'Tuned by' mean? What are Artist Editions?

Preferences in sound are as individual as personal tastes in music. If you’ve always wanted to know how your favorite artists like to listen to music, here’s your chance to find out. With Solid Sounds’ Artist Editions you can download the unique sound settings of renowned musicians and producers – and hear their tracks as they were originally conceived in the studio.

Does Solid Sound work for all genres?

Whether it’s hip-hop, r’n’b, electro, rock or pop – Solid Sound breathes new life into your favorite tracks. Deep bass and driving beats propel your songs forward. Voices infused with physicality and presence provide real excitement. Even the subtlest of details pop out of the soundstage with perfect spatialization. With Solid Sound you’ll get to know your headphones as you’ve never heard them before.

Do I have to buy an Artist Edition in order to use the App?

You get immediate access to Solid Sound profiles for Apple’s EarBuds and EarPods. The 'Any Other Device' profile is also availble free of charge.

Can I buy multiple Artist Editions?

Yes, you will find all editions you have bought in the selection menu of the Solid Sound App. You can easily switch between the editions and the respective headphone profiles.

What is a headphone profile?

The Solid Sound app is based on the accumulated know-how of acoustics experts and audio engineers. For each and every Solid Sound Profile a corresponding set of original headphones has undergone a thorough technical analysis under laboratory conditions. The results are specially developed algorithms that optimize the sound quality of headphone models whilst taking into account their individual construction principles.

How do I select headphone profiles?

The great thing is that all available Artist Editions include the Apple headphone profiles and the Any Other Device Mode free of charge. Just swipe between the Apple headphones and the Artist Editions to change the set-up. Buying an Artist Edition you get the full list of headphone profiles. Just select the headphones you want to use. They are then included in your personal choice of headphones.

What Headphones does Solid Sound support?

It is our aspiration to provide you the full studio of sound when listening to your music. The best sound quality is achieved when using the specific headphone profiles to off-balance any negative sound characteristics.

We currently provide headphone profiles for:

AKG K450
AKG K518LE
Apple EarBuds
Apple EarPods
Beats Mixr
Beats SoloHD
Beats Studio
Beats urBeats
Bose AE2
Bose OE2
ISY IHP1200
Koss portaPro
Marshall Major FX
Panasonic RP-DJS200
Sennheiser CX 300 II
Sennheiser HD 201
Sennheiser HD 219
Sony MDR V150
Sony MDR ZX100
Sony MDR ZX300
Sony MDR XB500
Urbanears Plattan
Urbanears Bagis
WeSC Oboe Street

You can enjoy Solid Sound even if your headphones are not included. The 'Any Other Device' mode works for every headphone and improves the sound significantly. The main control let's you adjust bass and treble as you want. Of course, this mode provides automatically the full sound dynamics even on lower levels.

More to come - please let us know what headphones you would like to be included in our editions by sending an email to richard.witte@sub-sonic.de.

What if I can't find my headphones?

It is Solid Sound's philosophy to provide profiles for the most popular headphones and especially for those with the most significant sound improvement impact.

Please let us know what headphone you would like to have included by sending an email to richard.witte@sub-sonic.de.

How does the Solid Sound on/off control button work?

After selecting your Solid Sound profile, you can mix in as much Solid Sound as you want via a convenient main control. Just turn the slider to the left (-) or right (+). Make sure to release the finger. The more you mix in, the more Solid Sound will transform the original sound characteristics of your headphones. All your settings remain active until the next time you access them. Solid Sound turns off when switching to the far left.

Of course you can also switch Solid Sound on and off in oder to compare the sound impact of Solid Sound.

How does the sound customization work? How do I adapt Solid Sound to my personal hearing ability?

In case of hearing disability Solid Sound provides a further useful feature: the app’s seven bands of equalization can be used to compensate specific ranges of impairment – separately for each ear. Appropriate settings can be made based on a hearing test audiogram. Generally, you can get your audiogram free of charge from any ear specialist or audiologist. They have the optimal testing facilities for your personal audiogram.

Should your audiogram show a hearing impairment, e.g. at 8kHz at the left ear, just set the sliders in the Solid Sound customization interface at 8kHZ, left ear, according to your audiogram. Solid Sound then automatically adjusts the sound for a better audio experience. Please note, that Solid Sound cannot cure hearing impairments.

Please share your hearing experience with Solid Sound and send us an email to richard.witte@sub-sonic.de.

What Apple devices does Solid Sound support?

The Solid Sound App works for your iPhone 3GS, 4, 4S, 5, iPod Touch 4^th and 5^th Generation.

Can I run Solid Sound on Android and Windows devices?

Not yet. We are working on it.

Does the Solid Sound Audio Player support the Apple Music player functions?

Yes it does. You find your iTunes Playlists, Artists, Tracks, Albums, Genres, Compilations and Composers in the Solid Sound App as well as the standard player functions such as Play, Pause, Skip, Shuffle and Repeat.

Can I listen to my iTunes Songs?

Yes, your iTunes library will automatically be integrated when installing Solid Sound. All changes you make in iTunes, e.g. editing playlists or adding songs will be effective in Solid Sound too.

Can I listen to songs from iTunes Match?

No, unless you download your music to your device.

Can I play DRM songs with Solid Sound?

No, Apple does not allow the processing of DRM files.

You can listen to them, but Solid Sound will be off.

Does Solid Sound support Bluetooth headphones, docks and speakers?

Yes.

Haven't found an answer to your question?

Please send us an email to richard.witte@sub-sonic.de.