[cordova]

I saw the reduced price, and thought it best to jump on it, in case it was an introductory price (Amazon tend to do that occasionally) - decent headphones for less, kind of thing. Like you say, it's not too bad now...

The screen's probably a lot tougher than I imagine it to be. I just remember the Apple iPod Nano(?) debacle, and am paranoid about it...

 

[DunninLA]

My Sony S639 arrived yesterday, and I took the 2 hours to sync to 12G of cds (about 135) in Windows Media Player. Like the poster above, all my music is EAC + FLAC ripped into FLAC, then immediately duplicated with Foobar2000 using LAME at V0 at about 256 vbr.

My basis of comparison for portable music is a "warm" solid state system comprised of an FT audio passive preamp with impedence matching, a Marsh A100 amp, copper cabling by Luminous Audio, Ensemble Megaflux speaker cables into Sonus Faber Signum monitors with REL Strata II sub. (about $9,000 retail). The cd player is a Heart modded Magnavox cd 6000 into which I rolled some NOS Amperex Bugle Boy tubes (Hewlett Packard badging).

All listening last night directly out of the Sony S639 and the Sansa Clip 4g into Sennheiser HD 580 with usual mods and V2 cable. I cannot notice any difference in sound quality between the S639 and the Clip. Here and there a certain piece of a song will stand in the foreground a little more with the Sony... I'd like to say at about 2k, but I need to listen more to be sure. The volume of the Clip at 95% (one click from 100%) is about the same as the Sony at 100% (30 on Sony's volume meter). The results were consistent when listening with Sennheiser PX 100 earlier in the evening.

I really appreciate the 16G capacity on the Sony. In the future I'll buy another Sony, or the Sansa Fuze 8G, to accomodate all my music on 2 daps. I'll use the Clips for subsets of the music due to its lightness and clip-ability for running, gym, beach, etc.

My experience last night reaffirms the high sound quality of both of these DAPS in comparison to the ipod Touch 1st Gen, and Nano 2nd Gen, my only other points of comparison. With the Touch, I have to boost the Bass one or two ticks to make the sound more balanced.

I do find the Sony "Jazz" EQ (+ 1 click at Bass, -1 click at 2.5k, +1 click at 16k) preset to be just right for all those 1980's cds that were mixed way too hot in the 2k-4k frequency band. With the Clip, the EQ is much less effective.

I don't use in-ear headphones much, but those that came with the Sony were not bad at all. A little muddy in the midbass, slightly rolled off in the higher highs, but nice IEMs for free. I would easily pay $30 - $40 for them for the few occassions I need more sound isolation. Much better IMO than the Senn CX300 and a little better than the "giant killer" $20 SoundMagic PL-30 I bought for curiosity (but they don't fit my ear.-- too large .. so only used for 10 minutes).

 

[DunninLA]

Forgot to mention -- this Sony DAP is SMALL!! It is exactly the size of my Mastercard from the top of the card down to where my embossed name starts... in other words 75% the size of a credit card, and very thin... almost but not quite Nano 2nd Gen thin. That's when it dawned on me... this is intented to be a NANO killer. At $138 delivered to US from advancedmp3players.com in Scotland (current dollar/Pound exchange rate), this should be a no-brainer for anyone not obsessively tied to Apple products.

 

[DunninLA]

I have confirmed my earlier impression about the SQ difference between the S639 and the Sansa Clip.

On Ry Cooder's CD Buena Vista Social Club, song 10, Amor de Loca Juventud, the first 30 seconds of the song has some nice delicate cymbal work in the back of the soundstage ... the audio is very clear with the Sony, and a little muffled (to my ear, of course) with the Clip.

My conclusion would be that either the Sony bumps the 4k region, or the clip starts a slow rolloff from 4k on up... I suspect the latter, but I don't have enough experience to really say... only that they are noticably different in the way they convey the cymbal information on that song. (I have the same mp3 V0 loaded onto both DAPS, and I did my best to play at the same volume). The phones used for this comparison were the Sennheiser PX 100 portables, in a dead quiet office.

 

[vedye]

Hey since i'm having both sony A729 (same as A82x) and S739 (same as S63x) i think i can contribute a bit of my opinion. I've mostly used sony ex90 on them and from last month the sennheiser IE8 (which is such an awesome pair of earphones btw)

I had A729 first for about half a year, then get the S739 with the liking of the much smaller size and FM (yay~) and other stuff (noise-canceling seldom used but 12 tones-sensing is kinda useful

.

But unfortunately i still like A729's sound better. In the shortest description: S739's bass is a bit tighter -- very noticeable to me though

. It sounds dry when compared to A729. I know ppl have different taste so this is only my personal opinions. I think for the bass the A729's quality is better while the S739 has more quantity.

Also A729 sounds a bit more extended, small instruments are little bit more noticeable. But of course S739 sounds awesome, I only feel this difference when compare them side by side playing the same song.

btw my EQ for IE8: cb+1, 0, 0, 0, 0, +2
(and for ex90 is: cb+1, 0, +1, 0, 0, +1)


And IE8 beats ex90 in almost every way! especially the sound stage, so much wider and clearer, layers of sounds coming from all around is such a great feeling

 

[LostPhil]

Quote:

Originally Posted by vedye /img/forum/go_quote.gif But unfortunately i still like A729's sound better. In the shortest description: S739's bass is a bit tighter

Did you mean the S739's bass isn't as tight?

 

[vedye]

Quote:

Originally Posted by LostPhil /img/forum/go_quote.gif Did you mean the S739's bass isn't as tight?

No, I mean it's kinda too tight. kinda dry for me. but only when compared to A729 i noticed this difference. If i only ever listened to S739 all the time, i wouldn't complain.