so ive been running SSB for about two years now mostly on 40m and 20m and i keep getting reports that my audio is either too bassy or sounds like im talking through a tin can. running an IC-7300 which i know has decent DSP built in so i dont think its the radio itself. mic is the stock hm-219 that came with it.

ive messed with the bass and treble settings in the menu and got it a little better but still not great. someone on a net last week told me to try running it in a more scooped midrange kind of setup but honestly i dont fully understand what that means for SSB versus like FM where i know you want it punchy. and my ALC is always riding pretty high, like bouncing up into the red a bit which i suspect is part of the problem but im not sure. compression on or off? ive heard both ways.

anyone have a rough starting point for the 7300 specifically or just general SSB audio tips? im not trying to sound like a broadcast station just intelligible and not annoying to listen to

the ALC thing is almost definitely your main issue. on SSB you really want that meter barely moving, maybe kissing the first couple segments on voice peaks but not slamming. what happens when it rides high is the radio starts compressing in a bad way and you get that distorted crunchy sound. back off the mic gain first before touching anything else. like way more than you think you need to.

for the 7300 specifically i run mic gain around 30-35 and the TX bandwidth set to something like 100-2900 hz. that cuts the really low rumble and also trims some of the high end hiss. the stock mic does pick up a lot of handling noise and breath so if you can get it off to the side a bit instead of talking directly into it that helps a ton. compression i leave off personally, some guys swear by a little bit but if your levels arent right to begin with compression just makes it worse and louder wrong.

yeah what he said about ALC is right, same thing happened to me when i first got my 7600. took me forever to figure out why i sounded bad and it was just mic gain cranked too high the whole time lol. also worth asking someone you trust to give you an honest audio report, not just a 59 on a net because those are basically meaningless for audio quality. find someone patient who will actually describe what they hear