[reorx]

Hi all,

I did a search but didnt find a specific answer to my question.

As far as i can remember, the ipod headphone out was always vilified as "dirty" and "distorted"...that amping thrugh the headphone out defeats the entire purpose of amping (since you just amplify distorted sound)...and that some people couldnt "stand" the headphone out of the ipod.

I personally have yet to find any distortion or palpable advantage of lineout over headphone out...so i sought to look for raw data on the matter, and found this:

RightMark Audio Analyzer test: comparison

Can anyone please explain this in plain english? And if indeed line out is superior to headphone out in those numbers, is the supposed numerical difference detectable by normal human hearing? I mean, is the added "distortion" of the headphone amp so gross and big that line out is simply the way to go?

 

[Elluzion]

to me personally.... a line out + amp doesn't sound different from a headphone out... to me it isn't worth it and if their is any difference, it is very very subtle. same with recable...

 

[Lil' Knight]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elluzion /img/forum/go_quote.gif to me personally.... a line out + amp doesn't sound different from a headphone out... to me it isn't worth it and if their is any difference, it is very very subtle. same with recable...

That's great still. At least it'll save you some bucks on the cables. lol.

 

[vkvedam]

Leave your amp a part, I can just pick up the difference when you hear to your music through LOD. First point you will notice would be the 100% diminished hiss, much better highs, lush mids and great bass and vocals with no distortion. Of course, my Sony 1-Bit DAC PCDP still beats it in all aspects with its full bodied sound. Just give it a try with just dock and an attenuator and I feel iPod doesn't need an amplifier, better spend somewhere else.

 

[knights]

IDEAL way is LO + amp... better go this route..

 

[Nocturnal310]

The difference can be felt even on my MX400 earbuds...

 

[tstarn06]

To me, the LOD cable plus my MiniboxE+ blows away the HP out (both Touch 2G and 5.5g iPod Video). That's my experience. No comparison.

 

[Kicksonrt66]

I don't know about ipod, but 1 factor on players I've had is line-out is a constant level not dependent on the volume control. So you don't have to adjust between using that and phones.

 

[DJGeorgeT]

Quote:

Originally Posted by reorx /img/forum/go_quote.gif Hi all, I did a search but didnt find a specific answer to my question. As far as i can remember, the ipod headphone out was always vilified as "dirty" and "distorted"...that amping thrugh the headphone out defeats the entire purpose of amping (since you just amplify distorted sound)...and that some people couldnt "stand" the headphone out of the ipod. I personally have yet to find any distortion or palpable advantage of lineout over headphone out...so i sought to look for raw data on the matter, and found this: RightMark Audio Analyzer test: comparison Can anyone please explain this in plain english? And if indeed line out is superior to headphone out in those numbers, is the supposed numerical difference detectable by normal human hearing? I mean, is the added "distortion" of the headphone amp so gross and big that line out is simply the way to go?

just add a 16 ohm load to the headphone output and retest. Under noload conditions, are as you show, both the headphone out and line out are not very different. The line-out needs to go into an amp since this arrangement requires an amp. You should see some interesting differences then.