Quoted from MarkRan:

I'm a first-time PinSound owner and just installed a new PinSound Neo in my Data East Star Wars. It works but the sound is pretty jarring. The high-end is shrill and piercing while the mid-range such as voice callouts is low volume and muddy. The bass out of the cabinet sub is good. I'm using the "SWDE Original Trilogy Ultimate Orchestration" which is highly regarded by users in the DE Star Wars Club. In fact, I bought the PinSound because I've been running this same sound pack on my virtual pincab from a PC through a $20 amp to cheap speakers very similar to those in the Data East cab (4" backbox and a 5" mini sub) and it sounds great (ie full frequency range).
Plugging headphones directly into the Neo also sounds substantially better in terms of the high-end/mid-range imbalance, so I ordered a pair of $70 4" Kicker back box speakers which have gotten good reviews here on Pinside as upgrade speakers to replace the Data East originals. The new speakers have very slightly better overall quality but the same issues with shrill high-end and weak mid-range persist so I suspect it's something to do with the amplifier on the Neo. The audio sounds wrong in a similar way to when a crossover is set at the wrong frequency or something like that. I don't think so many DESW/PinSound owners would be raving about this sound pack if they were hearing what this Neo board is putting out. And most of them have original OEM speakers too.
* Is the crossover something that's under user control?
* I think the sound pack was probably created on an earlier model of PinSound. Do sound packs need to be modified to sound correct through the Neo's amplifier?
* I understand it's possible to edit the sound pack and I assume I could try applying equalization to fix what the amp is doing to the sound but it seems odd I'd need to do this (and perhaps I'd be wasting time correcting the original source files when the issue is really in the configuration or hardware). Is there some easy overall equalization parameter I could adjust in the sound pack as an experiment or is the only way to edit each audio file individually?
We were so excited to get our beloved DESW playing the original John Williams score (like our Vpin cab) in time for hosting league night in a couple weeks, so this has been really disappointing. Any thoughts on how to troubleshoot this would be appreciated.

Quoted from pinballinreno:

Unfortunately the NEO doesnt have the 6 band EQ like the pinsound plus.
So you have ZERO control of the sound.
I think a lot of people have the pinsound plus (myself included), the neo is kinda new and a little bit cheaper, but SADLY no EQ.
You could send it back and trade it for a pinsound plus, or wire in a 7 band EQ:
https://www.amazon.com/EX-Band-Equalizer-Guitar-Pedal/dp/B0876NBHRB

Quoted from MarkRan:

I didn't order the Plus because I didn't have a use for the additional features (headphones etc) and didn't think I'd need the EQ, since I already knew the only sound pack I'd ever use on this machine and it already sounded great on my VPin with no adjustments at all. I assumed the EQ was intended for users planning to switch between different sound packs or perhaps creating their own new packs whereas I'd planned to be a set-it-up-once, never-change-a-thing user of an already known and well-vetted pack.
I certainly never imagined that an authentic $330 PinSound card would sound *far worse* than a generic $20 USB sound card through a $20 2.1 no-name generic amp while playing the exact same file originally authored for a PinSound card.
The idea of adding an EQ downstream might be an easy/quick fix but I'm not clear on how that unit would be wired in between the Neo amp and the back box speakers. Does that EQ accept post-amp, speaker-level outputs or would I need to take the Neo line out to the EQ and then add an additional amplifier downstream of the EQ?

Quoted from MarkRan:

I'm a first-time PinSound owner and just installed a new PinSound Neo in my Data East Star Wars. It works but the sound is pretty jarring. The high-end is shrill and piercing while the mid-range such as voice callouts is low volume and muddy. The bass out of the cabinet sub is good. I'm using the "SWDE Original Trilogy Ultimate Orchestration" which is highly regarded by users in the DE Star Wars Club. In fact, I bought the PinSound because I've been running this same sound pack on my virtual pincab from a PC through a $20 amp to cheap speakers very similar to those in the Data East cab (4" backbox and a 5" mini sub) and it sounds great (ie full frequency range).
Plugging headphones directly into the Neo also sounds substantially better in terms of the high-end/mid-range imbalance, so I ordered a pair of $70 4" Kicker back box speakers which have gotten good reviews here on Pinside as upgrade speakers to replace the Data East originals. The new speakers have very slightly better overall quality but the same issues with shrill high-end and weak mid-range persist so I suspect it's something to do with the amplifier on the Neo. The audio sounds wrong in a similar way to when a crossover is set at the wrong frequency or something like that. I don't think so many DESW/PinSound owners would be raving about this sound pack if they were hearing what this Neo board is putting out. And most of them have original OEM speakers too.
* Is the crossover something that's under user control?
* I think the sound pack was probably created on an earlier model of PinSound. Do sound packs need to be modified to sound correct through the Neo's amplifier?
* I understand it's possible to edit the sound pack and I assume I could try applying equalization to fix what the amp is doing to the sound but it seems odd I'd need to do this (and perhaps I'd be wasting time correcting the original source files when the issue is really in the configuration or hardware). Is there some easy overall equalization parameter I could adjust in the sound pack as an experiment or is the only way to edit each audio file individually?
We were so excited to get our beloved DESW playing the original John Williams score (like our Vpin cab) in time for hosting league night in a couple weeks, so this has been really disappointing. Any thoughts on how to troubleshoot this would be appreciated.

Quoted from MarkRan:

I'm a first-time PinSound owner and just installed a new PinSound Neo in my Data East Star Wars. It works but the sound is pretty jarring. The high-end is shrill and piercing while the mid-range such as voice callouts is low volume and muddy. The bass out of the cabinet sub is good. I'm using the "SWDE Original Trilogy Ultimate Orchestration" which is highly regarded by users in the DE Star Wars Club. In fact, I bought the PinSound because I've been running this same sound pack on my virtual pincab from a PC through a $20 amp to cheap speakers very similar to those in the Data East cab (4" backbox and a 5" mini sub) and it sounds great (ie full frequency range).