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Reverse-engineering my speakers' API to get reasonable volume control

(jamesbvaughan.com)
287 points jamesbvaughan | 1 comments | 25 Jul 24 15:11 UTC | HN request time: 0.659s | source
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rectang ◴[27 Jul 24 01:24 UTC] No.41083828[source]▶
> Those methods either give me a tiny slider that I can only use 10% of or about 15 steps where the jump from step 3 to step 4 takes the speakers from “a bit too quiet” to “definitely bothering the neighbors” levels.

Volume controls need to be logarithmic, not linear.

To a first degree approximation, everybody gets this wrong.

replies(4): >>41083930 #>>41084547 #>>41084715 #>>41085319 #
1. ruuda ◴[27 Jul 24 05:59 UTC] No.41084715[source]▶
Yep. I was always using only the low end of the volume slider and having the same problem as OP that the steps were too coarse. So for Musium, I added a logarithmic volume control with a step size of 1 dB. That difference is on the border of being perceivable in the range I usually listen at, which is fine enough in practice.

https://docs.ruuda.nl/musium/loudness/