[BrianD19]

Yeah, Windows can be a pain for USB DAC. I also use a Mac and can't think of a time I've had issues using a DAP as a USB DAC.

Glad others are confirming not only N3's gapless ability but also how finicky gapless can be. Perhaps I've got the magic touch when ripping my gapless albums because I very rarely run into issues. I use XLD on my MacBook Pro.

After a couple of hours with it yesterday evening, while impressed with it out of the box confirming gapless playback, OTG and BT seem fine, I have to say I'm not so impressed with the sound quality. It sounds grainy to me and the performance as a USB DAC is no good at all.

All my albums have been ripped using EAC and I'm sure are fine given other devices used as players.

 

[nmatheis]

After a couple of hours with it yesterday evening, while impressed with it out of the box confirming gapless playback, OTG and BT seem fine, I have to say I'm not so impressed with the sound quality. It sounds grainy to me and the performance as a USB DAC is no good at all.

All my albums have been ripped using EAC and I'm sure are fine given other devices used as players.

What was your previous source?

 

[nplateau]

Do you still notice the pitch change with the Ice Cube track using Sharp?

Pitch shift seems to be gone with the sharp filter.

 

[gLer]

After a couple of hours with it yesterday evening, while impressed with it out of the box confirming gapless playback, OTG and BT seem fine, I have to say I'm not so impressed with the sound quality. It sounds grainy to me and the performance as a USB DAC is no good at all.

All my albums have been ripped using EAC and I'm sure are fine given other devices used as players.

Would appreciate more details here: other sources, headphones used, A/B comparison. How is the USB DAC not good - what's the source, and what else are you using as a USB DAC to compare? Can you describe the differences (other than 'grainy')?

I demoed a DSD128 SACD rip of Chesky Records' Amber Rubarth's "Session from the 17th Ward" yesterday and it was mind-bogglingly clear, precise, with a soundstage that made me feel like I was sitting in a large room with the singer and the band. The source files make a massive difference to SQ in my opinion - the N3 will be unforgiving if you feed it poor quality files (and I'm not saying that you are!).

 

[docholliday]

Pitch shift seems to be gone with the sharp filter.

Good to hear. I figured that from your description, it was more of a filter issue as I haven't had any "shifted" tracks. Sharp (and Short Delay Sharp) is what I switch to when I'm running electronic instruments (or tracks I've recorded that are mostly keyboard/synth/theramin). Otherwise, I stay at Short Delay Slow for most. On pure acoustic recordings, I'll switch to Super Slow.

Now if there was an option to auto switch the filter based on the Genre of the track, that would be sweet!

 

[docholliday]

After a couple of hours with it yesterday evening, while impressed with it out of the box confirming gapless playback, OTG and BT seem fine, I have to say I'm not so impressed with the sound quality. It sounds grainy to me and the performance as a USB DAC is no good at all.

All my albums have been ripped using EAC and I'm sure are fine given other devices used as players.

I too, would like to hear what you are comparing it to. I listen to tracks daily that I've recorded in studio and compared them what I heard directly on the board as well as the other side of the glass. I've had no "grainy" tracks, nor have I had an experience where the N3's playback was significantly and noticably different that the real source.

I have had issues where cymbals sound way off because the digital filter was set to Sharp or Short Delay Sharp and resulted in a very flat response. However, on these tracks, running the "Short Delay Slow" or "Super Slow" filter resolved the issue.

 

[gLer]

Hey guys - busy testing the N3 throughout this week and next. Just hit a roadblock: how do I get lyrics to show up during playback? Currently only using flac files, and used Meta to input the lyrics into a few tracks, but they don't show up on the N3 despite setting the Lyric switch to 'ON' on Music Settings. Any ideas how this feature is supposed to work (and which file formats it supports)? Thx.

 

[BartSimpson1976]

probably lyrics only work via .lrc-files which is ridiculous. Totally agree that lyrics suppoort should be via tags.

 

[gLer]

probably lyrics only work via .lrc-files which is ridiculous. Totally agree that lyrics suppoort should be via tags.

Hmm, never used lrc files in my life. Would be cool if the N3 manual gave us a hint on how the Lyric function is supposed to work. Anyone else tried this with any success? (PS. already figured out that adding a cover.jpg or folder.jpg image to a music folder works for cover art, as well as embedded cover art in the file tag. Not sure why lyrics should be any different).

 

[BartSimpson1976]

Same on the i5 for artwork. Lyrics there must be .lrc-files to work properly. So I assume it is same for N3. I created them for two songs then I gave up. Plain ridiculous.

 

[gLer]

Same on the i5 for artwork. Lyrics there must be .lrc-files to work properly. So I assume it is same for N3. I created them for two songs then I gave up. Plain ridiculous.

Yep, tried it using lrcgenerator.com and it works. But damn - you literally need to play through the song line by line, time the lyrics, then generate a file. If I had to do that for each of my songs we'll be onto the Cayin N29 by the time I'm done! Surely there must be a way to just read them off the tags like cover art, even if it means not having timed lyrics (and being able to scroll through the lyrics with one of the buttons if need be). Anyway, not a biggie, I'm into listening to music not reading it, so if a feature is going to be a PITA, I'll just skip it.

 

[BrianD19]

To clarify my earlier comment. Grainy may not be a good description, I'm not sure what is. I find I don't want to turn it up, it kind of grates on me a bit. Hard to describe to the point of being worthless, it's subjective. Maybe what I mean is it not a smooth, clean kind of sound. A bit harsh sounding. Makes me want to turn it down.

My main source is music from external storage to a RPi running minidlna to a Naim Unitiqute (upnp). As far as DAPs go I've owned the ibasso DX80 and AK Jnr. I've recently heard the Sony NW-A35 and the 15A, Pioneer xdp-300r, Ak70, Opus #1 and Cayin i5. The only DAP from that bunch that sounds bad to me is the Sony NW-35.

 

[gLer]

To clarify my earlier comment. Grainy may not be a good description, I'm not sure what is. I find I don't want to turn it up, it kind of grates on me a bit. Hard to describe to the point of being worthless, it's subjective. Maybe what I mean is it not a smooth, clean kind of sound. A bit harsh sounding. Makes me want to turn it down.

The N3 is definitely exposing more details in my files than I've heard before through either of my Creative Labs DAC/AMPs (using the same headphones and source files). The E5 is not quite at Oppo, Chord or Schitt level (from what I've read - haven't heard any of these DACs in person), but it's no slouch and costs more than the N3, and from my limited testing so far the sound signature from the N3 is both smoother and more detailed (which is why your description is a bit confusing).

I've read that different DAPs pair differently with different headphones, so maybe it's a case of your headphones not being an ideal match for the N3's sound signature? In my case the N3 has taken both my B&W headphones up a notch, which makes them even more enjoyable.

Like everything subjective YMMV.

PS. Have you had a play with the different filters, gain settings and possibly some EQ to see if you can better match the sound you're after?

 

[gLer]

Glad others are confirming not only N3's gapless ability but also how finicky gapless can be. Perhaps I've got the magic touch when ripping my gapless albums because I very rarely run into issues. I use XLD on my MacBook Pro.

Finicky indeed - just loaded a newly-minted SACD ISO of Dark Side of the Moon and despite gapless being 'on' the tracks play with a slight pause between them. If you've ever heard DSOTM you know it can't have any gaps, so this version is basically useless on the N3. Haven't tried it on my Mac yet to see if Audirvana plays it gapless, but if so it suggests the N3's implementation may not be perfect after all. Bottom line - it all depends. So many links in the chain and each of them has an effect.

EDIT: just tested on my Mac - gapless. Issues.

EDIT 2: just tested another version on the N3 - same SACD only this time ripped to separate DFF files. Perfect, gapless. Source matters.

 

[jamweiser]