Hisound Nova N1 DAP REVIEW - Page 2

Compared to the clip the N1 is like a progressive leap up, yes the sound stage is bigger on the N1 but everything else is better on it also. you have to keep in mind that hisound claim this to be a "hi-fi" player. now this means pretty much nothing to us but to them it means it has a dedicated chip for everything. in the clip they take the power of one chip and use it for everything and it does it very well. in the N1 the ampand dac are seperate and so give it a lot more juice. this leads to a great improvement across board in terms of SQ. the other things as well like UI are better on the N1 and battery too. I find most people by a clip as a good source and add it to a small amp like a ZO. hisound ar trying to make an all in one package which they do very well. the same can be said compared to the 601 on a smaller scale. considering the 601 is $100 and falls short in most criteria i would defineately say N1 over the 601. if i was to rank them i would put it n1>clip>601 because i feel that the 601 is now grossly over priced compared to todays market, and that the clip is not as good as the n1 in terms of SQ.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jaganeee 

thanks big-man.

is there any need for burn-in for Nova 1to get full potentional ?

hi, from what i can hear it seems like the mids and highs are becoming a little more transparent with eachother, they dont seem to have the crossing over issue i mentioned in the review as much. Of course this could be that the sound is growing on me. All i can really say is i like it more and more every day.

Quote:

Originally Posted by purdy44 

Love the review, big-man!

 

Couple of questions

 

Do playlists work ok?

 

Not that it matters, but does the screen display album art?

 

And before I pull the trigger on the N3 before the sale ends, do you think the N3 will support a 64gb microSD card? I'm not entirely familiar with what the differences are internally between the N1 and N3, so I just want to make sure that it will indeed support the larger card as long as it's formatted correctly.

 

Thanks!

The screen does not display album art as far as i can tell. When you say do playlists work what do you mean exactly? there is a favourite playlist that you can build directly on the player, otherwise i dont think so. with drag and drop players like this i always make sure my files have ID3 tags and the sort them into folders according to the playlist i want them in. this way if i want the artist i can select artist and if i want the playlist i just select folder view and play the right folder. if you can elaborate on how you want to build these playlist etc then i can try it and let you know.

i think the internals for the Sd cards should be the same so it should work fine with the 64gb micro sd in the N3, and the N1 goes pretty loud, with my M80s for example i would find anything about a volume setting of 20 too loud, and at home or in the library when it is quite i have it sent to a volume between 1 and 3. that being said i have not owned a zune so i cant compare, assuming it doesnt go too much louder than an ipod video the N1 goes more than loud enough.

Quote:

Originally Posted by purdy44 

Thanks for the timely response! The Zune would be comparable to your standard iPod in terms of volume. I figured that with the Nova's having a dedicated amp, they would be able to produce more power/higher volume.

In terms of playlists, I was thinking a general "Workout" playlist. Also maybe a playlist based on genre or mood. If I felt like listening to electronic music all day, do you think there would be an easy way to organize that with this player?

I do my music in exaclty the same way. The player has a "genre" tab so so long as your music is tagged correctly you can select by genre there. i have my "playlists" sorted in a folders titled workout, work, gaming etc, that way if i have particular feeling for a certain playlist then i can just use the folder view. The problem is that if i want one song in two different playlists i have to have it on the player twice which is a little annoying. Thing for me is i have always had my music organised like this so its no big deal to me but it could annoying for some. Perhaps we should ask to add playlist support? after all they added a micro sd slot after people asking.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Retrias 

Hi, I haven't been able to get the nova 1 music menu working properly , do you know how this work ? does it have to have a a certain folder structure ? does the structure look anything like itunes ?

if all your music is ripped from CDs / downloaded on itunes then it should work fine because of the tags used. can you elaborate more? what does your music menu look like right now?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carlsan 

By the way, what's everyone using for eq settings? I have mine on Hi-Fi and it sounds pretty darn good. 

I have been using a mix. I use hi-fi as standard and i think it is the closest thing to no eq. I also really like the HSA V1.0 one a lot and like i said, always use the wooduo one when i have them paired together. - have you tried out the PAA1pro? what do you think of them?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Retrias 

Sorry for the late reply

I arranged it based on itunes folder arrangement, the files work fine with the tags when played on a media player other than itunes (in its original format FLAC and MP3) but when I tried it on the n1 , it either doesn't show at all and I have to use the browse function, or the tag function goes gaga and I get nothing

have you tried to copy just the music rather than the entire folder structure? in itunes it uses a folder system so it goes artist-album-song. this may not work in the N1. instead go directly to the song and see if the info on it is correct, then try to copy that. i am not sure if i am right about this but its worth a try.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Retrias 

I did try it before, directly copy pasting the files into both micro sd and the internal memory, the one on the internal memory shows upnon the music menu, but without the tags, it is listed as "others" instead of artist name for example, while the ones on the memorycard failed to show up at all on the music menu. I checked the tags both with itunes and mediamonkey, both shown that the tags is in properly

hey everyone, im getting the N3 in the next 2-3 days so will add the comparison soon.

@ Retrias, im sorry but i have no idea whats going wrong with your, i asked jack but they are all away for the spring festival currently so i have not got a reply. i will lt you knowwhen i do