Qudelix for macOS 1.1.0
Two new features, and one fix that matters if you are on 1.0.1.
Bluetooth
The app now controls the 5K over Bluetooth as well as USB. Plug in and it uses
USB; unplug and it carries on over Bluetooth, and the header shows which link is
carrying the connection. Everything works the same either way — status, volume,
EQ, presets, import.
The first Bluetooth device it connects to is remembered, and nothing else is
adopted afterwards. If you need to point it at a different 5K there is a button in
the footer to forget the remembered one.
Tune — find your EQ by ear
A new tab with two ways to settle EQ by listening rather than by reading a graph.
Compare is a blind A/B. Play music you know, and it offers two settings; pick
whichever sounds better. It narrows down over about twenty comparisons and ends
with a curve you can keep or save to a preset. Both options are always matched for
loudness and never labelled, so you cannot simply prefer the louder one — which is
what usually goes wrong with casual A/B tests. "They sound the same" is a real
answer and is used rather than discarded.
Tones plays faint tones at ten frequencies, finds the quietest level you can
hear at each, and compares that against typical hearing. Some presentations are
silent on purpose, and it tells you if you responded to too many of them. Tones
stay quiet throughout, and the EQ is switched off while measuring.
Be clear on what Tones is not: without laboratory calibration it measures your
ears and your headphones together, so the result is specific to that pairing, and
it is not a hearing test in any medical sense. If you are concerned about your
hearing, see an audiologist. For most people with ordinary hearing the honest
answer is that there is nothing to correct, and the app says so plainly instead of
inventing a curve.
Your existing EQ is restored if you stop or discard either session.
Fixed: wrong EQ mode on connect
The handshake reply was parsed in a way that could select the 20-band EQ group on
a device in 10-band mode. The wrong number of bands was shown, and the wrong group
was used for writes, until the device next reported its configuration a few
seconds later. This affects 1.0.1 over USB, so it is worth updating even if you
never use Bluetooth.
Also
Preset names and the device name are sanitised before display, so an odd name
cannot distort the window. Bluetooth scanning never records the names of other
devices nearby — only a count of how many were ignored. The log now notes that it
contains your 5K's Bluetooth address and any preset names, since you are asked to
attach it to bug reports.
SHA-256 Qudelix-1.1.0.dmg
b2e60328404e8827a7f66a80160cdb4ce5086fcb430aee380ddd6fe286f19ff0
The app is signed ad-hoc, not with an Apple Developer ID, so macOS cannot tell you
who built it. Verify your download before opening it:
shasum -a 256 ~/Downloads/Qudelix-1.1.0.dmg
Or, with the .sha256 file downloaded alongside it:
cd ~/Downloads && shasum -a 256 -c Qudelix-1.1.0.dmg.sha256
That should print OK. If it does not, do not open the file.
Requires macOS 14 or later. Universal binary, Apple Silicon and Intel.