Best DAP's for Ampless Use?

[Ernie Mccracken]

I had my impressions done last week and am now waiting on my livewires to show. I will be purchasing a DAP in the meantime. The primary use will be for frequent business travel. As such, I already haul a ton of crap through the airport with my laptop, 2 phones, adapters aplenty, and other gear. There's just no way I have room for an amped setup. From perusing this forum, it seems I am alone in this dilemma.

That being said, what are some good DAP's that allow for decent SQ out of the stock headphone jack? According to some members here, ipods are not the best. I have not decided if I want to go flash or HDD based yet. I may do both.

 

[rockin_amigo14]

how much music do you have? how much are you willing to spend?

if you don't mind spending a bit, the Kenwood HD30GB9 has the best headphone out sound available.

 

[oalex]

Quote:

Originally Posted by rockin_amigo14 /img/forum/go_quote.gif if you don't mind spending a bit, the Kenwood HD30GB9 has the best headphone out sound available.

pity about the lack of ogg

 

[richierich]

The Zune has great sound straight from the headphone jack.

 

[Ernie Mccracken]

Quote:

Originally Posted by rockin_amigo14 /img/forum/go_quote.gif how much music do you have? how much are you willing to spend? if you don't mind spending a bit, the Kenwood HD30GB9 has the best headphone out sound available.

I have about 150gb of MP3's and always growing.

I don't mind spending a bit, but a 2 year old player that costs almost 50% more, has less than half the storage, and is noticably larger than an 80gb ipod? Is the SQ that much better? Do you know if the hard drive can be upgraded?

 

[oalex]

If you look at forums and reviews all over the web, the one that stands out unquestionably asper SQ (and sound power) is the Cowon Iaudio. If you listen to them both you will not even consider the Zune.

"The Zune’s sound quality is good and will suffice for the majority of users, but if sound quality is a very important feature, you may want to look elsewhere. The very high end and the very low end are somewhat blurry, but something you can only tell with a really nice set of headphones and some critical listening. Sound quality is average at moderate listening levels, but tends to fall flat and louder volumes.

The lack of great sound quality can be blamed on the ODM manufacturer of the Zune, Toshiba. The sound quality of the Gigabeat S was poor and since the Zune is just a modified version of the Gigabeat, this is where the sound quality issue stems from. I’m hoping that Microsoft will ODM the next generation Zune to a different manufacturer (cough . . . cough . . . Cowon) or do it themselves in house. " http://www.anythingbutipod.com/archi...eview.php#more


you might wnat to look at the new iaudio 7 8GB or U3 4GB or D2 8+8GB (all priced reasonably) or if you are looking for hard-drive then you could get a X5 LP 60GB still without compromising SQ.


For a rather unbiased review of most recent mainstream DAP-s look here: http://www.anythingbutipod.com/archives/reviews/

You could look anywhere else, just dont look at cnet, they have to most biased review.

I personaly belive that iaudio are the only mainstream DAP that can do any reasonble job of driving a highend covering headphones, without portable amp.

I am sure the Kenwood HD30GB9 are great, but they are a mist, hard to get and way over priced. People always talk about it as my friend's friend said he meet someone that said he heard someone say he has listened to it and was blow away. Just do a search for any first hand review on that DAP, you'll see what i mean.

 

[Ernie Mccracken]

Interesting. Where does Creative fall in the comparison?

 

[faichiu]

iaudio 7 should be good for you.

 

[oalex]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ernie Mccracken /img/forum/go_quote.gif Interesting. Where does Creative fall in the comparison?

This might answer your question: You will not meet anyone that sold an iaudio to get a creative (due to need for better SQ), but you will find people that had creative and sold it for an iaudio for that reason.

But what the hell, do some research of your own. No big deal, just a lot of reading. I can promise you you will not find any other DAP (main stream) mentioned as being a better SQ that iaudio. People recommending others are mostly people that haven't had/tried it. You might see people critisiz the fonts/menu/support/etc but never the sound (and in my oponion that is the single most importan aspect in a dap). And no i dont work for them

If what you realy need is what you mentioned in OP, something to drive high end phones, then you realy haven't got much choice.

What you have to decide is flash or HDD, aka 7/U3 or X5. Period.

even the over biased cnet had to give it up this time, what faichiu also suggested. read http://reviews.cnet.com/mp3-players/...&tag=pdtl-list(look at the score, and these guys are ipod freaks)

Also read: http://gadgetaholic.com/content/view/143 (he confeses in the review that he is an ipod fan boy yet...)

and there are tons more reviews.... your move

 

[wgr73]

I prefer the zune for ampless use.

 

[El Duderino]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ernie Mccracken /img/forum/go_quote.gif I have about 150gb of MP3's and always growing. I don't mind spending a bit, but a 2 year old player that costs almost 50% more, has less than half the storage, and is noticably larger than an 80gb ipod? Is the SQ that much better? Do you know if the hard drive can be upgraded?

In answer to your questions: Yes, the Kenwood HD30GB9 is expensive, has limited storage (30 GB) relative to the IPod and is noticeably larger (although just about the right size to slip into a pocket without issue). And, yes, the sound quality is that much better than the IPod. In actuality, it blows the IPod away, no contest. The Iaudio/IRiver players are slightly closer in terms of sound quality, unamp'd but are still in a completely different (and inferior) league to the Kenwood.

There are a few reviews on Kenwood players here on head-fi. You can do a search for my review of the HD30GB9 or Antonyfirst's reviews of the slightly older HD10GB7 or even the first-gen Kenwood HD20GA7.

If you have the disposable income, you will not be unhappy with this purchase. They can be relatively easily purchased from pricejapan.com or bluetin. I got mine from Pricejapan and had it delivered door-to-door from Japan to Philly in less than 48 hours via DHL. Total price was $420 including DHL delivery.

El Duderino

 

[Shizelbs]

Quote:

Originally Posted by richierich /img/forum/go_quote.gif The Zune has great sound straight from the headphone jack.

+1. I am very happy with my Zune. I am getting so tight qualty bass through my Shures right now straight out the Zune. Such a nice suprise.

 

[Assorted]

Okay I just came back from a little appointment with the Zune...

Honestly the only headphone outputs that can play ball with my HD30GB9 is the Denon DCP-150 and probably other obscure discmen. Just make sure your headphones/IEMs have a high enough impedance, white noise output is very high with low impedance headphones, and especially with higher-end IEMs like the Shure E500/Triple.fi and other 30 ohm IEMs. They however are not known to hiss with Grado's, Atrio M5s, Shure E4c's and its league.

The best way to avoid it is to use an impedance adaptor.

 

[antonyfirst]

The JVC XA-HD500 beat both my Kenwood in details and vocals, and sounds as good as them in everithing else. It's limited to 6gb, though. If you don't need a lot of HD space, I strongly recommend it.

More info on all these players, here: http://www.head-fi.org/forums/showth...08%3Cbr%20/%3E

 

[FenderP]

I disagree. I owned the XA-HD500 and was underwhelmed.