[Steve Guppy]

Sony is better among those.

haha feel much better now

Definitely the Sony. Although I'd recommend trying some other music players mentioned if the best sound is your ultimate goal. I do miss Poweramp's customization though...

 

[Grayes]

try to love neutron apps but i can probbly going to try others

 

[Steve Guppy]

try to love neutron apps but i can probbly going to try others

Also try Onkyo HF Player and UAPP.

 

[Romeo Dolorosa]

Htc m10 or maybe axon 7 mini, or lenovo vibe x3 or samsung s3 (wolfson)

Thank you for the recommendations, I think the Sony XZ2 Compact is still my favourite because of its small size. I had the Samsung S3 before it was stolen but I wouldn't want to go back to it because I never liked the ergonomics nor the fact that Samsung stopped supporting older devices quickly (and it lacks LDAC if I am not mistaken), I know you can install LineageOS but having done that on three devices IMO it is not worth the hassle and now I just want a stock Android phone that is up to date.

Does anyone else have recommendations (see quote below)?

TIA!

Hello,

I hope this is the right place to ask, I am in the market for a new/used phone to be able to enjoy wireless audio with a Fiio BTR 5, maybe you guys can help me with this.
I only use my phone as a phone and music player (with the occassional Google Maps usage here and there) so my requirements are rather modest, namely:

• affordable (<250€ new/used)
• small in size (my favourite would be a <5" almost bezelless screen)
• slot for high capacity microSD card (400+GB)
• not too slow (as in five year old CPU)
• decent screen (doesn't have to be great!)
• stock or close to stock Android
• LDAC
• from a company that doesn't stop supporting its phones with updates after a year...
• USB-C would be nice as I hate that micro-USB connector.

Not needed:

• camera quality is irrelevant.
• headphone jack isn't needed because I want to go wireless anyway

Right now my favourite is the Sony Xperia XZ2 Compact (can be had used within my budget) but my dream would be something like the iPhone SE with a much better body to screen ratio (and proper BT audio codecs...) but I didn't even come close to finding such a phone.

Do you guys have any other recommendations?
TIA!

 

[Sonic Defender]

The XM3 is consistently on sale these days, curious why you didn't grab that model as it is widely believed to be better than either of it's predecessors.

 

[Steve Guppy]

Ok, so for no reason other than to help myself decide, I've spent a couple of hours A>B'ing between Neutron and UAPP. I was pleasantly surprised and pleased to discover that UAPP now has a better 10 band PEQ. So i took some tracks that i know intimately, copied my own favourite Neutron EQ preset for my DT 1770's, over to UAPP as accurately as i could, and settled down to listening to them back and forth. I also listened to both with no EQ whatsoever, and both UAPP set to "bit-perfect", and Neutron set to "follow source frequency", and both set to direct usb access, to bypass any possible OS influences.

And from what i could determine, and i don't claim to be any kind of audiophile, just someone who loves music, there was no perceivable difference at all. My brain kept telling me that Neutron had a touch more body to the low frequencies, but that could just be a bias placebo, due to my hours spent setting up Neutron just how i like.

My conclusion is, if you stream music seriously, then UAPP's inclusion of apps like Qobuz and Tidal is a bonus. It's also the best choice if you like a easy interface experience. But if you're a "tweaker", and you do 90% of your music listening from stored music (in my case, Flac files), then you should also consider Neutron.

II'll be sticking with it for the foreseeable, just because i use apps like Spotify and YT music for casual listening (to discover new stuff) and for BT streaming in the car or home. Plus, I've put so much time into Neutron, learning what the different menus do and getting my head round its quirky UI.

What's your favourite default music player and why?

 

[Grayes]

Also try Onkyo HF Player and UAPP.

Yes i just got it UAPP , and try it with my FLAC album and it's sound relative more refined tbh, the mid and noise floor it's not quite sharp as I hear using poweramp, and I tried to tweaks some eq in the lowering mid. because in some high vocal it kinda to sharp for my test. for interface i still kinda love poweramp tbh but with the change of quite a lot of margin in the sound section. i think im going to migrate my library to UAPP. Just a suggestion to you all if you wanna compare it the mechanism of your tweaks find a song that you really familiar with. because you can see the different after you repeat a numerous time. with that being said UAPP FOR THE WIN

 

[Romeo Dolorosa]

The XM3 is consistently on sale these days, curious why you didn't grab that model as it is widely believed to be better than either of it's predecessors.

I assume you are replying to my previous post?
I have a hard time figuring out what "XM3" could be, do you mean the Sony Xperia XZ3? I just had a look at it but it has the same problem as all the other recent phones, it is too large for me.

 

[Sonic Defender]

I assume you are replying to my previous post?
I have a hard time figuring out what "XM3" could be, do you mean the Sony Xperia XZ3? I just had a look at it but it has the same problem as all the other recent phones, it is too large for me.

Sorry for the confusion, but actually I had been replying to @Grayes and I thought it would be clear as I thought my reply would be right underneath a post by the OP, but apparently several posters were submitting post at the same time and theirs bumped mine down a few places. Cheers.

 

[simon740]

Hello,

I sold my Sony wm1a today. Very good DAP. TOP.
But my Samsung galaxy S5 die and I need a good smartphone. And must be good for music.
Im looking LG V40. Will be at least 50% as good as wm1a?

regards,
Simon

 

[Chris Kaoss]

Hello,

I sold my Sony wm1a today. Very good DAP. TOP.
But my Samsung galaxy S5 die and I need a good smartphone. And must be good for music.
Im looking LG V40. Will be at least 50% as good as wm1a?

regards,
Simon

In case of sound quality, no.
Maybe when it comes to amp power.

 

[Gee Simpson]

Is there a Samsung S20 thread around here? Can't find it. So pissed that they removed the 3.5mm headphone jack!

 

[artpiggo]

Hello,

I sold my Sony wm1a today. Very good DAP. TOP.
But my Samsung galaxy S5 die and I need a good smartphone. And must be good for music.
Im looking LG V40. Will be at least 50% as good as wm1a?

regards,
Simon

Lg could be around zx507. So it is about 60% while using with iem that easy to drive.

The thing you really miss is meaty and juicy mid with high impact and good atmosphere from DAP.

 

[simon740]

Lg could be around zx507. So it is about 60% while using with iem that easy to drive.

The thing you really miss is meaty and juicy mid with high impact and good atmosphere from DAP.

So V40 is not good for a little hard to drive HP or IEMs?
I know that I cant expect sound from phone to be like a good DAP.

 

[Chris Kaoss]

So V40 is not good for a little hard to drive HP or IEMs?
I know that I cant expect sound from phone to be like a good DAP.

On moderate volume, while the high impedance mode is enabled, V40 is good to go.
On higher volumes the sound changes to a brighter one bc the amp will running out of juice.
(for harder to drive hp's)

Sound quality is close to higher tier dap's.

In comparison, it's all about the amplification. On this point, dap's are much more qualified.