[plonkersaurus]

Right so it turns out that I have quite a few portable players and seeing that its hayfever season I decided to test out the sound quality of some of my old players vs current ones.

I have an Ipod touch(gen1), a 30gb Zune, a Sony NW HD1, a Sony MZ-R50 and a Sony MZ-E909.

I'm going to do this over a few days answering any questions anyone has, but to start off I compared the 3 mp3 players.

I'm listening through AKG K501's straight from the headphone out as I feel this will give the best measure of the quality of the player, I can later try with an amp.

My first song is Damien Rice - The Blowers Daughter

iPod Touch - Sound is warm and a bit too bassy for me, it seems lacking sound stage and everything sounds a bit flat. Compared to the other players everything sounds muddy and note quite musical, the emotion of the music is missing for me.

Zune - Sound isn't as warm as the iPod, there is less bass too, sounds more natural. The sound is more detailed and less muddy. It's quite a big improvement over the iPod in terms of detail, soundstage and musicality. All the guitar strums seem to have a sharper bite to them as does the cello solo.

Sony NW-HD1 - Sound is slightly colder than the Zune. Everything seems to be a bit tighter than the Zune, the difference here between this and the iPod is fairly large. This player, with these headphones seems to bring out more midrange magic than the other 2. The vocals, cello solos and guitar riffs seem to float into the air above everything else and my ears seem to just pluck them out. This player is a bit lightweight with the bass with these headphones, but for soundstage, detail, tonal balance it is incredible. There is real emotion in vocals that aren't there with the 2 other players especially the iPod.

I've always been shocked how much I liked the sound of the HD1 even over the EMU 0404 but recently it has lost favour to the Zune and got a bit forgotten!

So now I'm quite interested to see how the old MZ-R50 handles it (its charging right now) and to see if the order changes with other music.

Anyone got anything in mind that could beat the NW-HD1?

 

[PeeeMeS]

Legendary player of yesteryear = Sony Qualia 017












(joke answer and no I haven't heard it...)

 

[irjoe]

I owned the 1XX and 3XX series of the Irivers but not anymore.
those were the good old days..

 

[ulsanman]

Still using the imod 4th gen and x5l , great players with unique sound qualities and terrible battery life!!!

 

[R3SET]

I prefer my 1-bit Sharp Minidisc player to any other DAP i heard so far. Nice clean sound, very sparkling treble.

btw all music on the Sony NW HD1 is converted to ATRAC3, it has no mp3 support, just like MD players. To get the most out of it, use lossless wav files. Mp3 files will be re-encoded to ATRAC, wich results in even more quality loss.

 

[BIGHMW]

Quote:

Originally Posted by R3SET /img/forum/go_quote.gif I prefer my 1-bit Sharp Minidisc player to any other DAP i heard so far. Nice clean sound, very sparkling treble. btw all music on the Sony NW HD1 is converted to ATRAC3, it has no mp3 support, just like MD players. To get the most out of it, use lossless wav files. Mp3 files will be re-encoded to ATRAC, wich results in even more quality loss.

Actually as for Sony HDD/MD/Hi-MD units not supporting MP3 files natively, The (3rd generation series of HDD/Hi-MD players) MZ-RH1/MZ-M200 does support MP3 natively and so does the NW-HD5, but, with the HD5 you can't use the presets, the graphic equalizer settings or the VPF Acoustic modes, but, it will work with the (adjustable) bass/treble setups. I use those more than the graphic EQ because it brings out more of the the deep bass and tingly treble without fattening up on the mids too much.

BTW, I myself use 64k Atrac 3 plus (Hi-LP on Hi-MD players) for all of my HDD/Hi-MD files as it has a great balance between SQ and battery life, IMHO.

I also use the RM-MC40ELK inline remote and Japan Edition cling wrap-modded MDR-EX90SL IEM's as well.

ROCK ON!!!

This is your brain:

This is your brain while on Head-Fi living their now-trademark "sorry about your wallet" lifestyle, which causes you to blow your paycheck every two weeks on the latest in audio toys:

 

[Ross1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ulsanman /img/forum/go_quote.gif Still using the imod 4th gen and x5l , great players with unique sound qualities and terrible battery life!!!

my x5l has astonishingly good battery life with rockbox after 3 years of use. I get a good 40+ hours from each charge.....

 

[ricthaman]

I own the NW-HD1 myself, have owned the NW-HD5 and a couple of MD units including the MZ-RH1.

The player from those good old days that still gets my feet tapping is the sony NW-S705.
Wonderfull sound. I remember sony being pretty proud of the sound themselves too.... and they should be. The most enjoyable sound I've heard coming from a portable so far, and that includes the o so famous Cowon S9!!

Rgds

 

[raymondu999]

I still think the old iRivers (300 and 100 series) rocked.

 

[R3SET]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ricthaman /img/forum/go_quote.gif I own the NW-HD1 myself, have owned the NW-HD5 and a couple of MD units including the MZ-RH1. The player from those good old days that still gets my feet tapping is the sony NW-S705. Wonderfull sound. I remember sony being pretty proud of the sound themselves too.... and they should be. The most enjoyable sound I've heard coming from a portable so far, and that includes the o so famous Cowon S9!! Rgds

Please, could you maybe describe SQ NW-HD1 vs NW-S705?