[Taphil]

From the people who know their stuff, I was wondering which is better in terms of sound quality only - the iPod or Nomad Jukebox?

I've had both, and the NJB was dull and lifeless, and it's amp could hardly power anything. But with the iPod everything sounds great and alive. And it can power my HD590's very well.

But I'm wondering in terms of just sound quality out of each one's headphone amp, which one is better?

Also, the Nomad Jukebox 3 claims to have "Audiophile sound quality of 98dB SNR." What does this mean? Is it just hype BS that has nothing to do with how it will actually sound? Nonetheless, Creative and users who've taken apart the NJB have noted that Creative does actually use high quality amp components. But does that make its sound quality better than the iPod?

 

[joelongwood]

Quote:

From the people who know their stuff, I was wondering which is better in terms of sound quality only - the iPod or Nomad Jukebox?

Quote:

I've had both, and the NJB was dull and lifeless, and it's amp could hardly power anything. But with the iPod everything sounds great and alive. And it can power my HD590's very well.

 

[NavyASW02]

It's been a while since I did anything with SNR, so I could be a little off here. SNR is signal to noise ratio. Basically its the ratio of music/sound you'll hear compared to the amount of background hiss. Usually a higher value is better. Now as far as this goes, I dont know if that will make much of a difference because a lot of the noise you'll hear will be coming from your mp3's anyway and not the actual player itself, so I wouldnt put all that much stock into that claim.

 

[lextek]

I had an earlier version of the Jukebox. I really didn't care for it too much. I now have an iPod and believe it has excellent sound. I know it drives Grados and Ety 4P's great. With the most recent firmware version the EQ was added. Of course it depends on you bit rate.

 

[DeanA]

Doesn't the IPOD also required a MAC?

 

[lextek]

Quote:

Originally posted by DeanA Doesn't the IPOD also required a MAC?

Yup. Mac w/Firewire.

 

[Taphil]

Quote:

Originally posted by DeanA Doesn't the IPOD also required a MAC?

NO NO NO! The cool thing is that the iPod works fine on a PC with a cheapo $20 firewire card. I've been using it on Windows XP and 2000 (it also works on 98SE and ME) without any single problem. So have hundreds/thousands of other PC users. Right now, you can get the iPod to work on a PC for free by downloading Xplay. You can either use Xplay, or easily modify the registry to make it work with EphPod - the premiere program for transfering/sycing/using the iPod with a PC and never ever ever ever ever need to plug a Mac into it. In the next month, you'll probably end up paying just $30 for Xplay, so that should still not be too much of a hassle to use the iPod on a PC.

joelongwood - "From the people who know their stuff" refers to you guys on head-fi who actually know you guys are talking about, in comparison to morons who make biased opinions based on nothing when talking about audio quality and performance of either mp3 player. I'm asking which has a higher quality output. When I had the NJB, I didn't think the sound was too good, and the volume was always low, but that's not the case with the iPod. But I'm still wondering if the NJB has better quality sound output than the iPod.

 

[jpelg]

Taphil -

I think what joelongwood was referring to was the fact that YOU seem to be one of the best people to do such an evaluation since you own both products. In fact, you seem to have already formed a conclusion for yourself.

Not that there is a problem getting reinforcing opinions from people here.