[Guppy_]

  i wonder if the new lenovo and moto phones are audiophile phones

Well one of the LeTvs were tested on gsmarena, if performance audio wise is on the same page, it might be decent, however, that enourmous huge nasty bottom bezel!

 

[Steve Wilcox]

  In response to bold... YES! (That, and the V10 is an LG flagship, and the HTC 10 is certainly an industry flagship). Hell, just looking at the hardware, the V10 (and others, but i will speak to what i own and know) has an ESS9018 DAC and 9602 AMP; two parts well respected for their quality and power.  Now, i will happily grant implementation plays a key.. but why is it hard to believe a phone with great hardware somehow still instantly sucks?
 
 
No, its not replacing a studio MIC, but it is not advertised nor built to be doing so either.  However, these new generations of phones are built to provide excellent SQ in a convinient package..
 
 
Ironically, i think people are oddly getting too hung up on the "phone" thing.  Frankly, i am happy to challenge that the only major technical difference between something like the X7 and V10, is the existence of a cellular radio.  Both devices run mobile device hardware (ARM CPUs, RAM, and eMMC storage) and software (specifically built versions of Android). Now, granted, i expect a device like the X7 to have better audio filtering, but in the mobile scope of things, we aren't looking at a drastic quality difference (compared to say a full desktop setup)..

......and I don't think we should under-estimate the economies of scale involved - the top smartphones are produced in quantities hundreds (thousands?) of times bigger than some DAPs - this can potentially bring the price right down compared to a more niche product.  So whilst it should be technically possible to produce a better DAP than audio-player combined with smartphone, the economics mean that for any given price a high selling smartphone could potentially out-perform a standalone DAP.  Economically speaking, it's not a level playing field.

 

[Sound Eq]

  Well one of the LeTvs were tested on gsmarena, if performance audio wise is on the same page, it might be decent, however, that enourmous huge nasty bottom bezel!

i am talking about the phab phones and the brand new moto

 

[Pastapipo]

  i am talking about the phab phones and the brand new moto

 
"Before we get into them, here's what the Moto Z is all about. It's a 5.2mm thin smartphone that's extremely light at 136 grams. The thin profile means there's no 3.5mm headphone jack, though there's an included USB-C adapter to fix this."
 
http://www.gsmarena.com/lenovo_moto_z-review-1450p2.php
 
What's the point of making the phone so thin, you've got to add bulk by adding an adapter? Its like removing the battery so you'll have to carry a powerbank at all times. 'But hey, at least the phone is 5,2mm thin".
And what's up with that 1990s bottom bezel?
I'm going to be a phone designer at Lenovo, seems they're allowed to show up drunk at work.

 

[Gee Simpson]

   
I'm not sure if you guys are talking about Exynos or SD, but the S7(Exynos) was really not that far off if at all in terms of SQ compared to the HTC 10, louder sure... But sounding better? I don't know about that.

 
Is this just your view or are there other people who agree with you?

 

[spongeworthy]

Is this just your view or are there other people who agree with you?

Just my personal experience from my time using both of them.

 

[Gee Simpson]

Just my personal experience from my time using both of them.

What were the differences?

 

[spongeworthy]

 
What were the differences?

 
That's the thing really, they sounded nearly the same with boomsound off and the volumes matched using GPM, apart from the HTC 10 having a slightly boomier bass. Maybe I don't have trained ears or something, but if people claim that the HTC 10 DAC is far superior to the S7, than surely a regular guy like me should hear a difference?
 
Was using ATH-IM50 and Klipsch X10 to test.

 

[Gee Simpson]

I'm currently trying to decide what phone to purchase, the HTC 10 or the S7/Edge. I was going for the HTC 10 because of the audio quality but if there really isn't much difference between it and the Exynos version I might have to rethink that. I know they are pretty evenly matched as smartphones. I'm from the UK so the Samsung would be the Exynos version.

I currently own the Galaxy Note II (International version) which has a Wolfson DAC so I wouldn't want a downgrade. Does the S7 just use the Exynos DAC or is it using a dedicated one like the Note II?

 

[Pastapipo]

I'm currently trying to decide what phone to purchase, the HTC 10 or the S7/Edge. I was going for the HTC 10 because of the audio quality but if there really isn't much difference between it and the Exynos version I might have to rethink that. I know they are pretty evenly matched as smartphones. I'm from the UK so the Samsung would be the Exynos version.

I currently own the Galaxy Note II (International version) which has a Wolfson DAC so I wouldn't want a downgrade. Does the S7 just use the Exynos DAC or is it using a dedicated one like the Note II?

 
Well, if you have the chance, please test it out for us at a Carphone warehouse or some sorts
 
If you disregard the audio part:
The S7 has an Amoled screen and a waterproof design. HTC does offer stellar service and a beautiful design.
Maybe the audio would give one of the two phones the decisive advantage.

 

[tusharthegamer]

   
"Before we get into them, here's what the Moto Z is all about. It's a 5.2mm thin smartphone that's extremely light at 136 grams. The thin profile means there's no 3.5mm headphone jack, though there's an included USB-C adapter to fix this."
 
http://www.gsmarena.com/lenovo_moto_z-review-1450p2.php
 
What's the point of making the phone so thin, you've got to add bulk by adding an adapter? Its like removing the battery so you'll have to carry a powerbank at all times. 'But hey, at least the phone is 5,2mm thin".
And what's up with that 1990s bottom bezel?
I'm going to be a phone designer at Lenovo, seems they're allowed to show up drunk at work.

they are experimenting a lot these days... Moto is making premium phones and lenovo division is making audio oriented phone. Vibe series plus k series both proved they can easily match the quality of any flagship phone.

 

[Duncan]

As the price of the "audiophile" flagship LeTv x800 plummeted to a bargain low 174$ (4GBram/64GBrom model), anybody knows how good is it's sound compared to other popular choices from this thread?

Hmmph - not in the UK it hasn't...

Link

 

[alexandis]

You can read the same info in English on the ZTE USA's launch page for the Axon 7. It just doesn't have the fancy pictures of the Chinese site.

I am interested in the Axon 7, but the reviews in Chinese I've looked at have left me a bit hesitant. The general consensus is the audio is better than your average smartphone. One said the Axon 7 is quite "bottom heavy" and another compared it to the Vivo XPlay 5 and said the latter is definitely superior. Hopefully Soonmal or a similar site will do a review.

Axon 7 seems to use two sound chips (is that right? is that possible?) One of them is AK4961, used in Nubia Z9 classic I own now.
As far as I understand, this is all-in-one chip (DAC + amplifier), no separate amplifier. Am I correct?
 
OK, i might suspect, that conclusion is right. The sound of Nubia Z9 classic might be better, than average smartphone. It's clean, signal/noise ratio is good. But the sound lacks details! It's a little bit synthetic - no specific instruments overtones, if you understand what I mean.
 
Some more, regarding difference between audiosmartphone's sound and plain smartphone's sound. Everything is simple: for those, who hears the difference - it does matter. That's it. For myself, I hear the difference between Samsung S7 and Nubia Z9 or even Meizu MX2. Also I hear the difference between latter ones (that i consider better than S7) and, for instance, VIVO X6 Plus, which I own, too. I also appreciate all-in-one solution to carry, because I use smartphone extensively (video, reading, browsing) and I don't want to carry a separate device for music listening. I realize, that a separate 1000$-costed player provides a better sound and it's easy to reveal. But I'm ready to make concessions here. On other hand, I do not want to listen to lousy sound (for instance, Samsung S7 - despite the fact it's well built, well supported and so on and so on).
 
Sound of VIVO X6 Plus... It seems to be too warm for me. Maybe I'm too quick with conclusions, I now have old bassy earbuds Sennheiser IE80. Soon I will try my smart on new BeoPlay H6 headphones and let's see. 

 

[Gee Simpson]

Well, if you have the chance, please test it out for us at a Carphone warehouse or some sorts

If you disregard the audio part:
The S7 has an Amoled screen and a waterproof design. HTC does offer stellar service and a beautiful design.
Maybe the audio would give one of the two phones the decisive advantage.

S7 also has a slightly better camera, HTC supports adaptive storage and has quick charge 3.0. I'll have to go to carphone warehouse or some other place to have a look, see which one I prefer.

 

[malifact]

I didn't spend a lot of time with the Samsung S7 Edge, but it didn't sound as warm as the HTC 10.