How Long is it?

[kozikowski]

With regard to the bottom-right of the 1.3 equalizer tool, I'm equalizing my voice. How long should my filter be and why?

Koz

[steve]

The "longer" the setting the more precisely the filter will match the curve that you draw.
Low settings can be useful for making a smooth curve filter with few control points (the actual filter curve is shown in green).
High settings are useful if you need rapid changes in the filter curve, for example for notch filtering.
Low settings run faster than high settings, which may be significant on album length files.

For general use, a setting of 3000 to 4000 works pretty well, but for sharp bends in the Eq curve you may need to go higher - particularly for improved curve definition at low frequencies. On my machine a setting of 8000 will take approximately 25% longer to process than 4000.

Not certain about the mechanics of "why", but I think it's to do with the FFT size (longer filter = more frequency bands = tighter curve definition).