[kiteki]

Yeh...... one of the highest fidelty recordings I have is a Nirvana album in 24/96.
 
and with the new generation of audiophiles that mostly listen to J-POP, expect a lot of high quality recordings coming from that department soon, including videogame music and stuff.

 

[Bojamijams]

Most pop music used electric guitars I thought? Not to mention electric drums/drum machines.

 

[DaveBSC]

Quote:

So what type of music do hi-fi people listen to???
 
I also listen to classic music occasionally. But I find my Naxos CDs has only one third the bit rate of my pop CDs when I was ripping flacs from them. I also feel that my Naxos CDs are nowhere as detailed as my pop CDs when I was listening to them.
 

When I really want to appreciate what my Stax rig or even the 801 can do, I reach for my classic Jazz discs. Coltrane and the Red Garland Trio on DCC Gold, Coltrane's Ballads on MFSL Gold, Oscar Peterson on SHM-CD, etc. The 801 can still provide a noticeable upgrade with my more average sounding rock and metal albums, but the better recording you use, the more you realize just how limited those mass market DAPs are. I don't even bother with Jazz on my Cowon.

 

[kiteki]

 
Quote:

Most pop music used electric guitars I thought? Not to mention electric drums/drum machines.

Acoustic pop, but yes, electric guitars are usually involved, not so much electric drums/sequencers in east-asian pop music though.
 
The nirvana album is unplugged.
 
With that said, there are high-end headphones that will shine with synthetic and electronic sounds, so the audiophilia is justified in that sense, imho.
 
 
 
 

 

[DaveBSC]

Quote:

icic. I am thinking about hooking it up with a PS3 also. Can I buy an optical to coaxia adapter to make it work???
 

Headroom makes a nice portable amp with both optical and coaxial digital inputs, though you would lose the DAP capability there. An interesting portable rig would be the QLS QA350 V2 > Headroom Portable desktop at home, and via its own amp while on the go.

 

[kiteki]

DaveBSC
 
1. Does the QLS QA350, compared to the Teclast T51, sound more like the HO, or the LO?
 
2. Does the normal version surpass the volume levels of the T51?
 
Thanks =)

 

[DaveBSC]

Quote:

DaveBSC
 
1. Does the QLS QA350, compared to the Teclast T51, sound more like the HO, or the LO?
 
2. Does the normal version surpass the volume levels of the T51?
 
Thanks =)

 
You can read how the original QLS QA350 compares to the Hifiman players and some other portable products at Headfonia. The V2 version has some significant upgrades and of course is way more powerful. I'm not sure that anyone has done a comparison of the original vs. the T51/S:flo, and I don't think there has been a review of the 350 V2 anywhere.. or at least not in English.
 
http://www.headfonia.com/hifi-dap-comparison-hm-801-hm-602-qa350-boomslang/
 
 

 

[kiteki]

Thanks yeah I saw the headfonia review already, but I have a really picky headphone right now and I want something that has the sound of the Teclast T51 HO with perhaps 20% more power, not 200% more that's just overkill.
 
Anaxilus compared the original QLS and the Teclast T51 and said the QLS sounds cleaner and better, but I don't know if he was talking about the HO or the LO, and he probably can't comment now since that was a while ago.
 
Oh well, for $200 odd bucks, it does seem like a beast.

 

[DaveBSC]

Quote:

Thanks yeah I saw the headfonia review already, but I have a really picky headphone right now and I want something that has the sound of the Teclast T51 HO with perhaps 20% more power, not 200% more that's just overkill.
 
Anaxilus compared the original QLS and the Teclast T51 and said the QLS sounds cleaner and better, but I don't know if he was talking about the HO or the LO, and he probably can't comment now since that was a while ago.
 
Oh well, for $200 odd bucks, it does seem like a beast.

Too much power is always better than not enough. If you do want to stay with the T51 and just make it louder, any portable amp fed by the LO will work just fine. The QA350 V2 uses the AD8397 for its headphone output, the same as the $300 Headstage Arrow portable amp. It's a serious piece of kit, and seems like a pretty incredible value for its price.
 

 

[kiteki]

Yah....... but my headphones don't like the LO on the T51 so if I used a portable amp I'd have to use the HO to the portable amp, and I don't have good experiences with ANY portable amps yet, looking for a desktop solution that sounds like the T51 HO, just louder/better.
 
The QLS... I don't need it, I just like powerful stuff made out of metal.

 

[DaveBSC]

Quote:

How exactly are you using the Cowon? Do you use BBE at all? Even comparing my Anedio against the Cowon, which involve obvious audible improvements, I can not make a statement like that.
 

It's been awhile since I've done any A/B tests, so I just spent about ten minutes going back and forth between the Cowon and the 801 with the track "Coast" from Devin Townsend's album Ki. I used my Denon NC-800 headphones. I had the Cowon set to my preferred settings for the NC-800 which is a slight bump in the bass and lower mid to fill in the bottom a bit, and the "stereo enhance" at level 1 for a bit of extra width to the soundstage, which the NC800 can use. I tried the BBE enhancement off and on at several levels, and found that overall the sound was worse with it turned on. It completely eliminated any depth and most of the width of the stage, and made the mids sound muffled. The highs were perhaps a bit more present, but in no way more clear or detailed. I suspect I simply heard more of the highs because the mids had been cut. Ultimately I left the BBE off for my test. The NC-800 is a well balanced and pleasant sounding phone, and the sound out of the S9 was perfectly acceptable and enjoyable. It was not the trainwreck of the DT880-32 by any stretch.
 
Then I switched to the 801, and was surprised at how much better the NC-800 sounded. I remembered some differences, but not this much. The NC-800 is by no means king of anything, its performance is better than the ES10 which is a bass monster and not much else, but the DT1350 is definitely better than the NC800. Out of the 801, there was more width and depth to the soundstage, bass was more present and considerably better defined (and this is with EQ boost on the Cowon, and the 801 flat), the mids gained warmth and detail, and the separation of instruments was WAY better, with each clearly defined rather than simply a blur from the Cowon. The highs I actually thought had the smallest improvement. The NC800 to my ears is a bit rolled off in the highs, not dark like the ES10, but a bit sweet. It's high frequency resolution isn't exactly world class, and I suspect that the NC800 is the limitation there, not the 801. Still, the highs were a bit more present compared to the Cowon, and slightly clearer and better defined.
 
I want to make it clear that in no way does the 801 sound like it is down 2 or 3dB at 11-13kHz compared to the Cowon. That may be what RMAA says, but I'm not hearing it.

 

[wind016]

Quote:

It's been awhile since I've done any A/B tests, so I just spent about ten minutes going back and forth between the Cowon and the 801 with the track "Coast" from Devin Townsend's album Ki. I used my Denon NC-800 headphones. I had the Cowon set to my preferred settings for the NC-800 which is a slight bump in the bass and lower mid to fill in the bottom a bit, and the "stereo enhance" at level 1 for a bit of extra width to the soundstage, which the NC800 can use. I tried the BBE enhancement off and on at several levels, and found that overall the sound was worse with it turned on. It completely eliminated any depth and most of the width of the stage, and made the mids sound muffled. The highs were perhaps a bit more present, but in no way more clear or detailed. I suspect I simply heard more of the highs because the mids had been cut. Ultimately I left the BBE off for my test. The NC-800 is a well balanced and pleasant sounding phone, and the sound out of the S9 was perfectly acceptable and enjoyable. It was not the trainwreck of the DT880-32 by any stretch.
 
Then I switched to the 801, and was surprised at how much better the NC-800 sounded. I remembered some differences, but not this much. The NC-800 is by no means king of anything, its performance is better than the ES10 which is a bass monster and not much else, but the DT1350 is definitely better than the NC800. Out of the 801, there was more width and depth to the soundstage, bass was more present and considerably better defined (and this is with EQ boost on the Cowon, and the 801 flat), the mids gained warmth and detail, and the separation of instruments was WAY better, with each clearly defined rather than simply a blur from the Cowon. The highs I actually thought had the smallest improvement. The NC800 to my ears is a bit rolled off in the highs, not dark like the ES10, but a bit sweet. It's high frequency resolution isn't exactly world class, and I suspect that the NC800 is the limitation there, not the 801. Still, the highs were a bit more present compared to the Cowon, and slightly clearer and better defined.
 
I want to make it clear that in no way does the 801 sound like it is down 2 or 3dB at 11-13kHz compared to the Cowon. That may be what RMAA says, but I'm not hearing it.

I believe using BBE actually sounds more detailed but it changes the FR and recessed the midrange. I usually boost the midrange above the other frequencies with the EQ when in high levels, such as level 10 BBE. I do notice that BBE doesn't sound good on certain headphones with this kind of setup, but they tended to be IEMs. I've been using the Cowon players for 3 years, but it took about a year to figure out BBE. I thought BBE sounded terrible for a year.

 

[Poimandres]

Clean flat signal?  Then why are you promoting players that are not flat and steering others away from players that are much flatter?  The clip+ is flat and so is the cowon when using phone of 50 ohms or higher as noted by dfkt.  Even using lower impedance phones the s9 only has a slight bass roll off.  It would be better to have your facts straight.
 
Quote:

 

I didn't experiment much with BBE, It's a matter of taste, I'm usually more of a clean flat signal No eq type listener, I love eq'ing sometimes but in the end I prefer gear which sounds best on flat, the S9 is not this and there's data (on paper) that shows it.