DAP's fault?

[uglijimus]

I just got back from the store trying some sets of headphones. While I'm a newbie here, I have been reading a lot of posts and remember some of the phones that have a good reputation. I tried one of them, the Sennheiser HD595, which I thought sounded horrible. The mids were out of control.

I started to think to myself, there are so many people on this forum who sing the praises of the HD595, it can't be them, it's gotta be me. What's wrong with me? Then I started thinking about through what I was listening to them. My little MP3 player. Costed probably around $90. I'm sure it's not a very high quality mp3 player and perhaps that has an effect on how I perceived the headphones?

Has anyone ever tried several DAPs through the same reputable set of phones and found a vast difference between them? If the DAP does play that big of a role, I'm afraid of buying a good set of cans that sounds good with my current DAP, and in the future if I buy a new DAP, it may end up sounding horrible with that!!!

 

[appophylite]

...And now you are seeing the dark, slippery slope that is Head-fi.

I think there are a couple of possible cases here. The first is that the problem may have been the DAP you were testing against. Different companies use different components and will look to cut cost as much as possible in manufacturing. As a result, the headphone or line-out on your specific DAP may be of poor quality. What DAP do you have (this info may help someone else on this forum better diagnose if your DAP is to blame).

The next likely case may be the source files you were playing back. You haven't mentioned what bit rate audio files you are listening to and what format they are in. For the sake of discussion right now, I'll assume you are using WMA or MP3. If the bit rate of the files is low (128 kbps or lower) headphones like the HD595 are going to reveal flaws in the digital audio more easily than cheaper phones. Start going up from 128 and you will start to hear more and more fidelity in your audio files until you reach a point where you can't do better (lossless files) or can't distinguish differences (In my case, I hit this point around 192-256 kbps on MP3).

The last case, may just be that, even though a lot of people praise the HD595 on the forums and state that it is a good pair of headphones, it does not have a sound signature that suits your ears. This is also something that has been noted on Head-Fi by several people because a large number of people will discuss a headphone, and then you, as the person doing the research will build up your expectations. Once you have the phones in hand, they will either meet expectation, exceed expectation or fall below expectation. That is something that is entirely up to you to decide with your ears though.

Quote:

Originally Posted by uglijimus /img/forum/go_quote.gif Has anyone ever tried several DAPs through the same reputable set of phones and found a vast difference between them? If the DAP does play that big of a role, I'm afraid of buying a good set of cans that sounds good with my current DAP, and in the future if I buy a new DAP, it may end up sounding horrible with that!!!

What you are concerned about here, pretty much outlines one of the big reasons so many people on Head-Fi have spent so much money. As you head down the Head-Fi path, you are going to end up trying different combinations of headphones, source and amp and are going to find that some combinations work better than others. Heck, I told myself that I wouldn't spend too much money here and, even though I'm clearly not too far along the path just yet, I've already got some 10 or so pairs of phones, multiple sources and an amp and find myself pairing different phones with different sources just because some work better together than others.

 

[filipelli]

YEP!!! That's why there is a whole AMP section, as well as portable audio section. Crap in crap out they say, also. If the internal amp of your DAP sucks, so will the sound quality of what is going through your headphones. Your headphones if well and carefully made, will show the quality in your music encoding and DAP.

For example....people tout the headphone out of the iAudio X5 while others condemn that of the Apple iPod (why head-fiers here use the line outs to hook up their amps). DAPs are made differently.

 

[uglijimus]

yes, unfortunately I have seen the dark side (^_^). I used only 320Kbps on all of my recordings. I guess I'm trying to buy the "perfect" headphone set on my first try without having ten of them. I guess it's impossible. Like you said guess I'll never know until I experiment with various types of phones.

I also think you're right about expectations. I've been thinking about getting some Grado SR60s but I'm worried if they'll meet my expectations.

thanks for the responses

 

[chesterqw]

it might be your player...

320kbps is already damn good...

personally, i cannot hear any diff between 320kbps CBR mp3s and flac...
other then the file size

 

[appophylite]

Quote:

Originally Posted by uglijimus /img/forum/go_quote.gif yes, unfortunately I have seen the dark side (^_^). I used only 320Kbps on all of my recordings. I guess I'm trying to buy the "perfect" headphone set on my first try without having ten of them. I guess it's impossible. Like you said guess I'll never know until I experiment with various types of phones. I also think you're right about expectations. I've been thinking about getting some Grado SR60s but I'm worried if they'll meet my expectations. thanks for the responses

If you are using 320 kbps files, then the problem is definitely either your DAP or that Sennheiser doesn't meet your auditory preference.

I'm going to go with most likely, the problem lies with the DAP.

 

[facelvega]

The power output of DAPs on the market now ranges between about 5 and 35mWpc into 16 Ohms. You can imagine that when it comes to driving full-sized headphones, this can be a very significant difference indeed, quite apart from the question of dac chip or other SQ issues between various players.

 

[HFat]

There are more powerful ones out there that don't comply with those silly regs... listening to DAP > DT880 right now.

 

[Assorted]

The HD 595 sounds least like the good Sennheisers, let alone "audiophile" quality. So it's not just you, you just have a different opinion.

 

[uglijimus]

I'm starting to wonder if Assorted is right. If the problem lied within the amp of my DAP wouldn't the sounds be weak and lacking? I've never had an amp before so can anyone explain what are the most common differences between a headphone set that needs to be amped and one that is already being amped?

The HD 595s weren't weak in any way. It just that it's mids sounded very hollow and cheap to me.

 

[rwest1389]

I'm with you. Ive tried 595s straight out of an ipod and did not care for them. I've tried them with several different amps. While they did improve, I just never like them much. I'm a Grado man myself, I love its mids.

 

[uglijimus]

I keep getting recommended the grados....hmmm, maybe I should just take the plunge and buy them.

btw, what's your avatar a picture of? looks like what's coming out of his mouth should be coming out of the mouth of my avatar!