[promerc]

 

What MP3 players offer the best sound quality for a cheap price. I'm thinking around 32gb... Can I potentially buy a sandisk clip+ and replace the micro sd card with a 32gber? I heard the sound quality of these are pretty good for the price, but the highest they come in is 8gb I think.  Sandisk also offers a 32gb called View. Would this have the same sound quality as the clip+? or do they use different sound cards, etc.   priced $200 or under... also I own an 8gb Itouch and am happy with all of those features. Just need something to carry around the bulk of my music, so no features needed really.    I'm looking to purchase a pair of DBA-02's when I can find them. So that is what I'll be using the mp3 player with.   Edit: I use a mac too!!!   Thanks

 

[mootookang]

Cowon s9, or rockboxed clip/clip+

 

[AndyT87]

"Can I potentially buy a sandisk clip+ and replace the micro sd card with a 32gber? I heard the sound quality of these are pretty good for the price, but the highest they come in is 8gb I think. "
 
that was my plan too but have been kind of dissapointed with the clip+.
 
for me, the sony x series completely trounces the clip+ for sq. even my ipod classic sounds better than the sansa to my ears..

maybe my ears are broken lol, but the sansa sounds way too warm and bassy and lacks detail/sparkle with my ie8's (flat eq on rockbox) and I never had that problem with the ipod or sony; weird because I heard the sansa had a neutral soundsig; like I said maybe my ears are broken....
 
still awaiting a 32/64 gb sony a series europe/us release.....

 

[Achmedisdead]

 
Quote:

"Can I potentially buy a sandisk clip+ and replace the micro sd card with a 32gber? I heard the sound quality of these are pretty good for the price, but the highest they come in is 8gb I think. "
 
that was my plan too but have been kind of dissapointed with the clip+.
 
for me, the sony x series completely trounces the clip+ for sq. even my ipod classic sounds better than the sansa to my ears..

maybe my ears are broken lol, but the sansa sounds way too warm and bassy and lacks detail/sparkle with my ie8's (flat eq on rockbox) and I never had that problem with the ipod or sony; weird because I heard the sansa had a neutral soundsig; like I said maybe my ears are broken....
 
still awaiting a 32/64 gb sony a series europe/us release.....

What is the point of using rockbox if you are not using the world-class parametric EQ? You can make the Clip+ adapt to your earphone and hearing, to get the sound you desire. I can get my preferred sound both with Grado SR60i's and Sennheiser PX100's, and they have kind of opposite sound signatures. Definitely more tweaking required with the PX100, for my ears.
 
The Sony players, at last the lower end models that I've heard, sound very good to me, but I would not call them neutral.

 

[AndyT87]

so i was just playing around with the eq, turned the bass way down (into the minus infact) and upped the treble a tad (I had played around with eq, but only the presets) and it seems to be much more to my liking, so perhaps you are right and I was being hasty (just got rb today, clip a few days back)

" class="bbcode_smiley" height="" src="http://files.head-fi.org/images/smilies//smily_headphones1.gif" title="

" width="" /> still need to play around with it abit more methinks.
 
op disregard my hasty judgements.

 

[Achmedisdead]

Quote:

so i was just playing around with the eq, turned the bass way down (into the minus infact) and upped the treble a tad (I had played around with eq, but only the presets) and it seems to be much more to my liking, so perhaps you are right and I was being hasty (just got rb today, clip a few days back)

" width="" />" class="bbcode_smiley" height="" src="http://files.head-fi.org/images/smilies//smily_headphones1.gif" title="

" class="bbcode_smiley" height="" src="http://files.head-fi.org/images/smilies//smily_headphones1.gif" title="

" width="" />" width="" /> still need to play around with it abit more methinks.
 
op disregard my hasty judgements.

There's definitely a learning curve with the EQ, but if the bass and treble settings don't work well enough for you, read up in the manual on how the whole EQ works, and do some experimenting....it'll be time well spent.

 

[Dreamnine]

With Rockbox on the Clip+ you can pretty much get the sound you want, then save the setting.
 
Mine sounds as good as the X - and it didn't cost £200 plus.

 

[AndyT87]

ok thanks for the advice

" class="bbcode_smiley" height="" src="http://files.head-fi.org/images/smilies//smily_headphones1.gif" title="

" width="" /> i didn't really want to play around with some of the other eq settings too much before I knew what they did, so i shall have to get reading!
 
@achmedisdead

 

[Achmedisdead]

 
Quote:

With Rockbox on the Clip+ you can pretty much get the sound you want, then save the setting.
 
Mine sounds as good as the X - and it didn't cost £200 plus.

Exactly right....I have three settings saved on each of my rockboxed players, for my different headphones.

 
Quote:

ok thanks for the advice

" width="" />" class="bbcode_smiley" height="" src="http://files.head-fi.org/images/smilies//smily_headphones1.gif" title="

" class="bbcode_smiley" height="" src="http://files.head-fi.org/images/smilies//smily_headphones1.gif" title="

" width="" />" width="" /> i didn't really want to play around with some of the other eq settings too much before I knew what they did, so i shall have to get reading!
 
@achmedisdead

Enjoy it AndyT87!
My approach is to take a few of the albums that I know the best, and listen to them when I am figuring out my EQ settings....once I get the setting right for one set of headphones, I save that setting. It took me a few evenings to get everything just right, but in the end it was well worth it.

 

[promerc]

What is the X?
 
Also, I really know nothing about EQ and all of that stuff as for how I would set it and stuff. Would it just be easier to get the X? or the cowon s9 as someone suggested to save the headache. (price isn't too big of an issue)
 
 
Edit: Also I just found a late 2009 model for an Ipod classic 160gb for $300 on newegg. I'm really leaning towards this now as I could just put a ton of discographies on it without having to worry about space.... For an obv noob like me, is the sound quality that much worse than some of these other players you guys are into. Sorry for sounding like an idiot, kinda surprised I haven't been flamed yet

I have def heard of people bashing the sound quality of Ipods traditionally, why is this? 
 
Last thing, If i decide to get that Ipod.. Is it even worth getting a pair of headphones such as the DBA-02s? Or am i better off getting a decent pair of klipsch image s4s for under half the price of DBA-02s. Not sure it matters but I listen to music ranging from rap (jay z,kid cudi,biggie, 2pac,eminem) to indie rock like band of horses, the shins, the national!! and deathcab.. some electric some like daft punk etc etc blah blah... Thanks guys!!! 

 

[LFF]

The strength of the Clip+ with rockbox is that it can sound anyway you want for a lot less money! With enough EQ, it can sound like a HiFiman.

With a little EQ it can sound like the X. You can completely tailor the sound to your liking and not have any residual artifacts you get with cheap EQ's.
 
Straight out of the box with rockbox and flat EQ it sounds phenomenal IMHO. Add in the DBA-02 and well mastered FLAC files and you have a winning ultra-portable system.
 
Just my 2 cents but what do I know.

 

[DJGeorgeT]

Umm, highly doubtful. Maybe you can match the sound signature, but not the other qualities. There is so much RB hype on this board that it is getting out of hand.
 
Quote:

The strength of the Clip+ with rockbox is that it can sound anyway you want for a lot less money! With enough EQ, it can sound like a HiFiman.

 

 

[MarkTwain]

Clip+ can sound like Hifiman HM-801?

NO WAY AT ALL!

My clip+ is really cheap and has very clean sound, but nowhere near to my Hifiman HM-801 in terms of smoothness of sound!

Using my clip+ mainly for jogging. For the rest of the time, my 801 will be the only DAP used.

Weird when someone compare Clip with Hifiman, when the sound is so different. Will be keeping my clip for it's purpose of being light, but really nothing to match against Hifiman.

You can test both my Hifiman and Clip+ and easy to tell the difference.

 

[stevenswall]

Rockbox has the best EQ of any other portable device I know of, but the S9 goes a little further with the BBE+ DSP effects, which can give you a larger soundstage, reverb, upsampling, ect. I have used numerous DAPs, including a Rockbox iPod 5.5g, and my current Cowon S9, and I would pick my S9 over a Rockbox because of the custom flash interfaces that go beyond icons and fonts ect, and superior screen, and well integrated buttons.

 

[promerc]

for someone who doesn't know much about computers or tech stuff.. Is rockbox hard to enable and use? Sounds like I could "rockbox" that 160gb Ipod? would that improve the sound quality?