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interesting. trying it now, dont really care for the interface but it does sound somewhat different to my ears. for one thing, it (obviously) doesnt work with foobar's replaygain, so I will have to listen for a while to figure out if the change is for better or worse. so far i like it with my speakers, havnt had a chance to use it with my headphones yet. the program crashes with mpc files tho, maybe it doesnt support them?
does it come with some predefined eq settings by any chance? sounds quite
different really.
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I've used/compared these players only using headphones (soundcard --> headphones). There are not many supported formats (MP3, WAV, AIFF, Audio-CD, FLAC, Ogg Vorbis, non-DRM WMA and AAC ) on BeatPort or DJ Studio.
Shortly 'bout NI,
[size=xx-small]"NATIVE INSTRUMENTS is the pioneer and technological market leader in the field of software synthesis, and one of the key players in the booming market for music and audio software. The company’s mission is to develop outstanding tools for musicians, producers, sound designers and DJs. The resulting products regularly push technological boundaries and open up new creative horizons for professionals and amateurs alike."
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I've been using their software synths and been demoing their products during years (incl. DJ Studio). Some times ago, I noticed they've developed BeatPort and just checked it out ... All their products excluding that free 'Traktor DJ Player' are ASIO compatible products.
I found NI's mostly better on bass (clear and really deep if needed) and it's overal rich sound. I've been comparing these players with some jazz pieces, where bass parts was played using contrabass --> big differences to me. Got same type results with old recordings from bands like Pink Floyd, ELO, Rainbow, etc. Foobar2k and Winamp (with ASIO or KS) just sounds too bright to my ears (like midrange and above it are somewhat emphasized). I even tried resampling on Foobar2k but it sounded like treble boosting mainly.
Of course, all these differences I can tell can be caused by my setup(s), my age (~50, younger ones have just 'better' and more sensitive hearing than older ones) and my hearing (been playing (el)guitar quite a long time).
All music I have, are been ripped to 16/44.1 wave files --> converted to 192kpbs mp3. I also made now some comparison with plain wave files (16/44.1) ripped from original CDs.
jiitee |
I am still baffled about this, and trying to compare the two players with same tracks. IMO I am sorta sensitive to changes in sound, but not very articulate in verbal sense, so its hard to describe what I hear
For one thing, I will agree the NI player sounds smoother, more organic perhaps. Foobar sounds harsher and more dynamic in comparison. Also, Foobar is somewhat grainier and has more impactful but muddier bass. I am under impression there is more treble information resolved with foobar, but NI sounds strangely detailed, feels like certain details are "emphasized"... dunno, gotta keep experimenting more I guess
This is with foobar @ 44.1kHz, 24bit padded to 32bit and no RG.
some other things I have noticed about the NI player
1)sometimes it takes unusually long to load files. My files are located on my primary rig, so I play them over the network. Foobar doesnt seem to suffer from the same delay.
2)Does not support unicode, so half of my songs have either question marks all over them or do not have any description at all. At worst case, it simply refuses to load a song or displays it in read (unplayable)
3)Kinda related to topic 1), whenever I play my files over the network, close the player and then reopen, the previously played files are rendered unplayble. All I have to do is add to the playlist again, but kinda tedious.
4)crashes upon loading some tracks.. kinda random, but happens on same set of files
When it comes ot the interface, foobar wins hands down - IMO at least. but like I said earlier, the thing sounds very liquidy smooth and gets rid of some harshness present with foobar. I just hope I am not getting fooled by some undocumented EQ or DFX-like postprocessing
