[kramer5150]

I don't post much to the portables forum, so please forgive me if this is on the noob side of the moon. I'm more of a lurker.

I think just about everyone who frequents the portables forum desperately wants a DAP that does not hiss, crackle, pop, motor boat, or grind when driving low impedance (~16 ohm) highly sensitive IEMs.

Im curious, Hypothetically IF someone were to make a player designed to drive these impedance loads cleanly... How would that player respond to sourcing an amp? Most portable amps present impedance loads in the 10kohm (give or take) range.

Do you think a player optimized for 16 ohm loads could sound just as good pushing the front end of an amp?

Curious...

?

 

[jolness]

The iriver clix 2nd generation is suposedly hissless even with verrrrrry sensitve iem's.
Not sure bout the amp thing though.

 

[Alleyman]

The zune is hissless on my EP630 which I believe are 16ohms and quite sensitive. Havent tried and amp with it but it cant be too bad since the output is clean.

 

[Culverin]

iaudio x5 on my westone UM2. about as hissless as you can get i think

 

[QQQ]

Never heard about the DAP with hiss..

 

[ZarakiSan]

QQQ, try a standard iPod 5,5 gen. I seriously needed Rockbox to listen to music, the hiss drove me mad.

I dunno, but my Archos gives me no hiss whether I use my amp or not. It's perfectly fine, somehow, though it doesn't sound all that special.

I might pick up a SansaClip for reference's sake.

 

[simpleworld]

Try a Teclast player.

BurrBrown DAC, plays FLAC and APE files and ZERO hiss with my ER4P's, even at full volume.

I use the C280, btw.

 

[faichiu]

My Teclast T39 has no hiss.

C280 support APE? amazing!

 

[shigzeo]

teclast is based on same hardware as d2 - that hisses, only a little but it hisses. with um2 it is very loud - the ipod is not much louder than that. i tried the 5.5 with my um2 and it was louder than the d2, but only by a little. my now ipod 3g hisses about the same as the d2 - so i imagine with um2 that it hisses.

the clix2 will hiss with um2. i think that some people do not hear hiss that is there - some of us hate it with a passion and it comes out very strongly even though others do not really hear or are bothered by it. i just gave up on sensitive phones - pointless for a variety of reasons: they are hard to drive by portables especially with ohm load of 12-16, even 32. my atrio are about as low on the imp scale as i want to go.

they still produce bass from even an ipod 3g but... just add an amp to the headphone out and it is much stronger. however, i hate taking amps with me to even the load to a higher level - it is too big. i would love to hear some of the players that people have said are hissless. i think it will be in a long while though - hear them with um2.

the er4p is not that sensitive so if it does not hear hiss then it is somewhat trivial. the search continues.

 

[faichiu]

Sorry but I cannot agree with your concept. You cannot say they have the same hardware and just imagine it will hiss. Hiss can be produced between dac and heaphone out where signal was amped.

Quote:

Originally Posted by shigzeo /img/forum/go_quote.gif teclast is based on same hardware as d2 - that hisses, only a little but it hisses. with um2 it is very loud - the ipod is not much louder than that. i tried the 5.5 with my um2 and it was louder than the d2, but only by a little. my now ipod 3g hisses about the same as the d2 - so i imagine with um2 that it hisses. the clix2 will hiss with um2. i think that some people do not hear hiss that is there - some of us hate it with a passion and it comes out very strongly even though others do not really hear or are bothered by it. i just gave up on sensitive phones - pointless for a variety of reasons: they are hard to drive by portables especially with ohm load of 12-16, even 32. my atrio are about as low on the imp scale as i want to go. they still produce bass from even an ipod 3g but... just add an amp to the headphone out and it is much stronger. however, i hate taking amps with me to even the load to a higher level - it is too big. i would love to hear some of the players that people have said are hissless. i think it will be in a long while though - hear them with um2. the er4p is not that sensitive so if it does not hear hiss then it is somewhat trivial. the search continues.

 

[shigzeo]

yes, but from your sig i don't see um2 for instance. i cannot believe anything that has an amp except pcpd or md player will not hiss with the um2.

 

[faichiu]

Do you understand why hiss produce?
When the signal become analog, the siganl can be distort by other circuit, lcd signal, harddisk ( Anything involved magnetic field ).
So even DAC go directly to output (which I don't think so), the hiss can be produce.

Quote:

Originally Posted by shigzeo /img/forum/go_quote.gif yes, but from your sig i don't see um2 for instance. i cannot believe anything that has an amp except pcpd or md player will not hiss with the um2.

 

[faichiu]

And believing or not, hiss can be reduce by adding resisitors to the output. So your concept of same hardware with same hiss just don't make sense to me.

 

[shigzeo]

yes, i am very familiar with hiss. i can only see hiss that is detectable from the human ear coming from an amped source. dac, or line out should not make much or any noise that we can hear as the signal is pure without any magnification.

i have never heard any non md or pcdp that has not had some sort of hiss - some have less and some have so much that they are unlistenable. currently the teclast has a few people chiming about how good it sounds. but it has same dac as d2 - the output i am interested in however i am quite sure that as with every single player, it hisses.

as you said, the hiss can come form variety of sources. hd, screen, flash memory, cpu controllers etc. and as you know, the teclast has all of these. but even simple players like shuffle hiss.

 

[QQQ]

Quote:

And believing or not, hiss can be reduce by adding resisitors to the output.

It's like killing a fly with a hammer.