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I believe I've found a serious fault with the previous version Sony's. At volume levels between 21-30, the Clear Bass creates a volume inconsistency....BADLY. It's as if the song is going up and down in volume....like turning your amplifier knob up and down rapidly every second to create a loud,soft, loud, soft effect. The higher the Clear Bass, the worse the effect. Turning off the Clear Bass fixes the problem and restores loudness to a level volume. In fact, the entire equalizer has issues. With it off, the volume is at it's appropriate loudness. Going to a custom eq setting without making any adjustments..the sound level drops a few decibels. Strangely enough, I find some songs to be worse than others. Green Day-Boulevard of Broken dreams is terrible, as is Nickleback-Someday. And no it is isn't the tracks, it is apparent on the demo ones as well. Listening to the player through the docking cable with headphones plugged into the computer eliminates the problem entirely, even if I have the Clear Bass on +3. I assume this is because it's bypassing the EQ.
I discovered this only after getting some Altec IM716's..the higher impedance made it necessary for me turn up the volume past levels I would normally listen at. It's pretty much driving me crazy now..I even went to a Sonystyle outlet and confirmed the problem on one of their store demos..
So hopefully others can try this. Use high impedance phones, crank the volume up as close to 30 as you can stand, turn up the Clear Bass, and listen.
An alternative is to plug into computer speakers or the comp itself, max the volume on the player, and you'll hear it at moderate listening levels. Try switching between EQ presets to hear the loudness difference as well. Presets with higher Clear Bass are the worst.
BINGO! I thought I was nuts. I attached the 716s, turned on the A816, and the volume was going up and down (with clear bass turned to +2 and the volume in the range you specified). To check it, I hooked up the SA6s, and no such problem. What are we going to do about it. It's clear that there is some strange interaction with the 716s and the Axxx line, I just thought it as me. Now, I know better. Anyone else who has both pieces of gear needs to try it out. The 716s are unmodded. I noticed it with my last pair as well. I am going to try it with the 616s and see if it happens too. No doubt has something to do with the attenuator pod.
Haven't noticed anything like that with my Denon AH-C551s plugged into my A818. I usually keep the EQ completely flat though, since the phones sound so great on their own, but I have played around with the EQ settings and Clear Bass of course - especially with the included MDR-EX082s, which really need a bass boost.
But then again maybe I shouldn't if only happens with your 716s. Why would it only happen with certain phones, though? Is it just because of their higher impedance, or...?
I have owned two A818s, and I think I notice a difference between the two A818s that I owned. Headphones used is the Denon C700.
My first A818, which I sold to a member here on Head-fi, bought from Amazon during Christmas, has a not completely flat screen. It has a flat curve about 1mm in length on the side, so a screen protector will not fill up the sides completely. When I tested this A818 with a song from the Ultrasone test CD (track 14), the striking of the chimes has a powerful attack. You can hear the *thud* and the *ding*. It sounded so cool! I have not heard this effect with my laptop or my other MP3 players, where I just hear the *ding*.
My second A818, bought from BHPhotoVideo, seems to have a completely flat screen. I can't find any dips on the edge on the screen. This A818, when testing with the same file, does not have the powerful attack that I was expecting. It was a simple *ding* without the *thud*. It sounds the same with my laptop + DAC, and my Meizu SL.
I did not amp my first A818, but when I amped my second A818, I can hear the volume discrepancy when I put Clear Bass at +1, volume max. It occurs at max volume, but does not seem to occur when the volume is around 18. When I hear a bass boom, the volume "lowers" and then normalizes back up. Dynamic normalizer is off. The same happens when I use the SHure volume attenuator.
I don't know if the same thing happens with the first A818, since I never put the volume that high.
Last edited by ShinyFalcon; 03-31-2008 at 06:41 PM.
Haven't noticed anything like that with my Denon AH-C551s plugged into my A818. I usually keep the EQ completely flat though, since the phones sound so great on their own, but I have played around with the EQ settings and Clear Bass of course - especially with the included MDR-EX082s, which really need a bass boost.
But then again maybe I shouldn't if only happens with your 716s. Why would it only happen with certain phones, though? Is it just because of their higher impedance, or...?
tstarn it's not the phones. I tried them with some full size Sony cans(high impedence and same thing...also hook the headphone out to a laptop or directly to computer speakers with volume maxed on the player and you'll hear it. It happens with the stock phones as well...it's just that we probably aren't using them above 21 vol....I just cranked them to 30(ouch on the ears) with Clear Bass and it's just as bad.
For the record, I have a flat screen a818..well seems flat to me anyway. ShinyFlacon could you elaborate on the different screen a little..Do you mean the screen wasn't a perfect rectangle, or not perfectly flat? If you look at the bottom pic(not my player), it looks like the screen bevels towards the edge...like that?
Left screen is the first A818 I owned, and the right screen is the one I have now, the flat screen.
This is from memory, and I am certain that the two screens are different. The note you see is where the "Now Playing" info you see, and is raised compared to the adjacent smaller rectangles.
Last edited by ShinyFalcon; 03-31-2008 at 07:43 PM.
"Let's just say that at first I was a little freaked out. I had it on the user EQ setting with the "CLEAN BASS" setting at "MAX" with the volume turned all the way up. All at once the volume started to "breathe". The "CLEAN BASS" feature seems to not only boost the bass but to cut the interfering frequencies around it to allow the bass frequencies to cut through cleanly. When the setting is too high, and the volume is at max, the volume of the surrounding music goes up and down to the beat of the kick drum (or synth, bass guitar, whatever). I can't believe none of the reviews I read mentioned this!"
I went back listened again and yeah looks like Clear Bass is doing exactly this....suppressing the higher and mid frequency volume to allow the very low frequencies to be more apparent. Music gets loud on the off-beat, and low on the bass heavy on beat. The heavier the bass hits, the more the mid/high gets suppressed. A cheap trick IMO
On the 818 I do get the problems mentioned by the OP which I dont get on my 805. I found the problem... dissable Dynamic normalliser on the 818 - everything sound fine now. BTW Dynamic normaliser works on the 805 so its a bug in the 818's firmware.
I must agree that the 805 sounds better than my 818. The 805 has a punchier sound with bit more "fizz" in the sound. Saying that I use my 818 all the time now and its still a fantasic sounding player - selling my 805.
On the 818 I do get the problems mentioned by the OP which I dont get on my 805. I found the problem... dissable Dynamic normalliser on the 818 - everything sound fine now. BTW Dynamic normaliser works on the 805 so its a bug in the 818's firmware.
I must agree that the 805 sounds better than my 818. The 805 has a punchier sound with bit more "fizz" in the sound. Saying that I use my 818 all the time now and its still a fantasic sounding player - selling my 805.
Are you sure? Makes no difference to me. Also Shiny Falson stated above he has the problem wiith dynamic normalizer off.
Sony a81x s61x...Faulty?
Linear Mode
