D7 Sidewinder....Initial impressions - Page 36

Wanted to note, Sennheiser OMX-980's with my D7/P4 stack is producing a sweet, sweet sound.  Definitely the Sennheiser "house" sound in a smaller package.  Bass Rolloff at about 45hz but good to 35hz.  Coherent imaging and soundstage.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TiEx 

I am 99.99999% sure that in a blind test you wouldn't have any chances to distinguish a difference between 176 and 88 even on a very good gear! There are some articles who state that 96 is plenty good enough and 192 can be even worse sometimes if implementation is not on a good level. No offence man, lets keep it cool. I just want to say that D7 is a bang for buck and lack of 176 support is a very minor issue (if it is an issue at all). 176 is a rare format to start with. 

 

And about conversion. Where did find that recommendation only for PMP use? First time hear such a thing. On the contrary resampling "on the fly" with software may give a bad result. Lack of 176 is not a deal breaker for me. I am still considering D7 in future.

 

Cheers.

You have your ears and I have mine, so don't make assumptions on what others can or cannot hear.

The ideal sampling rate is well below 96KHz, a matter discussed by several knowledgeable audio engineers.

Conversion is a bad idea unless the destination format is meant to be used on (low-fi) portable gear, so I'm talking about usage scenarios, being a common sense recommendation, not a rule written in stone. For everything else, the original format should be maintained, that according to purists' philosophy. And a quality resampler doesn't do half as much damage as an irreversible conversion does.

I would caution anyone looking to purchase that the D7 is a tad drier than what I've experienced from Ibasso, sometimes harsh.  Should pair with a warm amp and softer treble to save your hearing if you are sensitive and even then, darker headphones.

Hey, just a heads up, guys... Grace Designs has a Thesycon V1.26 driver for their m903 available for download on their product page; the version on iBasso's website is 1.22, IIRC... I'll try it out to see if it works...

EDIT: Hmm, the installer seems to be product-specific for the m903; but all the files are there, so I wonder if there's a workaround...

I just uploaded modified 1.26 drivers for everybody. Who like to try are very welcome to do that.

It's here: http://www.box.com/s/6d72763fca8c23f42ec1

EDIT: No, there is more then this have to be done. It's installing no problem but something wrong with timing on playback...

May be it's just me. Please report.

EDIT: Yes it's just me :) Reinstalled works perfectly.

Just got mine by the way. First impression is very positive, I'm gonna wait till 300 hours of burn in at list before say anything.

Quote:

Originally Posted by shrisha 

Just got mine by the way. First impression is very positive, I'm gonna wait till 300 hours of burn in at list before say anything.

300 hours may not be too out of the question too--I had well over 100 (maybe close to 200) when I still felt it sounded a touch too warm when using my DT880's.  But now it doesn't feel too warm with them anymore.  I don't think it was my ears changing, since as a baseline, I frequently A/B-tested it against my Fiio E10, and it always sounded the same level of warmth as the E10 (to my slight disappointment) but now sounds a bit less warm than the E10.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Uchiya 

I would caution anyone looking to purchase that the D7 is a tad drier than what I've experienced from Ibasso, sometimes harsh.  Should pair with a warm amp and softer treble to save your hearing if you are sensitive and even then, darker headphones.

That's the opposite of what I've experienced, although I don't use IEMs (not sure what type of phones you're using) so I can only speak for larger phones--maybe it does have harsher highs with more sensitive IEMs?  For me with larger phones like the DT880's, the D7 amp was actually a bit warm for my liking, although as I previously posted, some of the warmth seemed to dissipate somewhat after 200-300 hours of use.  I've always had hyper-sensitive hearing (and had a hearing check-up about a year ago still confirming it) so I generally notice harsher highs immediately--it's one of the reasons why I couldn't use my DT990's for some albums regardless of amp used, which is notorious for occasional harsh highs/treble screeches (although that dissipated a bit too after many, many hours of use--probably over a year).

EDIT:  Although now that I remember it, I will say that I remember its sounding a bit harsh out of the box--the first 20 hours or so sounded both a bit muddled and harsh, but that mostly went away after an initial burn-in.  The initial harshness went away very quickly after initial use, and the muddled aspect quickly settled into a slight warmth that persisted until a couple hundred hours later.

Beauty

From my experience with the D6 and D10 the D7 is by far the warmest sounding iBasso device I've heard.  No need for a HiFlight mod and it sounds terrific right out of the box.  YMMV.

Quote:

Originally Posted by shrisha 

I just uploaded modified 1.26 drivers for everybody. Who like to try are very welcome to do that.

It's here: http://www.box.com/s/6d72763fca8c23f42ec1

 

EDIT: No, there is more then this have to be done. It's installing no problem but something wrong with timing on playback...

May be it's just me. Please report.

EDIT: Yes it's just me :) Reinstalled works perfectly.

Confirmed. Working excellently on mine as well! Thanks!

For those wondering -- 176 kHz still doesn't work with updated drivers. It has to be a firmware issue, and we can't deal with that on our own.

Does anyone know what is different with the updated drivers?  Any improvements or fixes?

I was hoping the updated driver would work with Windows 8.  After some troubleshooting it appears the driver is the culprit for my issues.  Hindsight tells me I should have checked before installing Windows 8 but I thought that everything that worked with Window 7 was supposed to work with Windows 8.  Now I have a powered USB hub that I don't need and a D7 that I can't use.  Anybody wanna buy a D7 with about 50 hours of use on it?

Quote:

Originally Posted by shrisha 

 

Beauty

Damn, another audio gear with I-Shall-Blind-Thee-Onto-Submission LEDs. Don't they get fatiguing on the eyes after a while?

I bet these LEDs are the reason why Windows and OSX whine about the unit pulling too much current! 

Quote:

Originally Posted by KimLaroux 

Damn, another audio gear with I-Shall-Blind-Thee-Onto-Submission LEDs. Don't they get fatiguing on the eyes after a while?

I bet these LEDs are the reason why Windows and OSX whine about the unit pulling too much current! 

That's just camera tricks. It's not actually as bright as what it looks like in the picture. Also, I don't believe LED brightness depends on current draw.