Phillips Citiscape Uptown (Question for anyone else that owns it.)
Aug 8, 2012 at 7:29 AM Post #2 of 23
Sounds like you're just needing more power, a built-in laptop onboard chip probably isn't enough to drive these nicely and that's probably where the buzzing in the lows comes from. From experience Philips often have quite a lot demanding power requirements even in lower cost headphones.
 
At least burn-in won't fix this issue.
 
Aug 8, 2012 at 8:00 AM Post #3 of 23
Fwiw.....I hav jacked the uptown into my BCL amp..
The bass is well under control.

But dun be mistaken, this uptown is not a denon..or a pro900, it ain't no bass monster.
It's euphonic, captivating ...an all rounder.
I didn't do any special burn in....just enjoyed every song that I pumped thru the iPad.

One way out is to get an iPad :)
Or a samsung phone...
And rip your songs in lossless format.
 
Aug 8, 2012 at 1:01 PM Post #8 of 23
i just took out the uptown and plug it straight into the macAIR...no amp.
the volume isnt as high as i like it to be..so i went into the PREFERENCE setting and unchecked the SOUND CHECK button..
that gave me another 10% volume thereabout which is just right for my listening.
Does your laptop have a feature like tat...which modulates all the songs such that it stays within a certain volume range??
 
the bass is quite tight...but not thumping tight...abit of reverb on the ears as i played the album FOURPLAY.
 
edit : this uptown is fine...BILLIE JEAN is punching hard right this moment...i dun see anyone greatly dissatisfied with wats coming out of the uptown right this moment :p
 
 
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wait.....i just plugged it into my V-CAN amp...omg...Billie JEAN just went on STEROIDs....lol
 
Aug 8, 2012 at 1:17 PM Post #10 of 23
absolutely u will WANT an amp...this uptown is punching way up to the top cans i have heard.... at the cost of a penny.
wink.gif

 
Aug 8, 2012 at 5:10 PM Post #12 of 23
Quote:
Do you have one you would recommend for a beginning audiophile type person for just phone/laptop use that will be cheap as well? Also with an amp, it won't distort any of the sounds right? Im somewhat worried it will push to much power through the headphones and either blow the drivers or make it distort. I don't know to much about headphones/amp's etc so if it sounds absolutely stupid don't mind me just trying to learn heh. 
 
Also will this fix the really low end distortion? I guess from what im gathering from everything that was said is that it's distorting at the reallllllly low frequencies because it doesn't have enough power to push them rather than the drivers just not able to reach that range.

 
For a cheap amp you will probably end up with a Fiio. Though exactly how cheap are you talking? Sounds like an E7 could do you well, since it can be used both as a DAC/amp with your computer and as a portable amp. If that's already too expensive they have some cheaper amp only items as well.
 
You shouldn't have to worry about any of those things with an amp, unless maybe you have a very powerful one and blast your music to the point of hearing damage. If distortion is coming from not having enough power on the laptop, then having an amp with more than enough power will fix the problem. These can reach pretty low in the bass, and I haven't experienced any distortion. I saw someone else post about this same problem recently as well, so I guess some laptops are just too weak to power these. They work from my laptop just fine however, as well as from my portable player and the amp in my HRT HeadStreamer.
 
Aug 8, 2012 at 7:35 PM Post #14 of 23
Quote:
Can you explain what exactly a DAC is in contrast to an amp for me? Never really experienced using them obviously.
 
As far as budget would go for an amp, immediatly speaking I could spend somewhere between 20-30 max for an amp. In around a month though possibly 75ish. 

 
DAC stands for digital to analog converter and what it does is take a digital signal (1's and 0's) and converts it to analog sound. This happens all the time around you except usually the DAC is embedded in the device you are using. What this means is your home theatre receiver has a DAC. So does your iPod and your iPhone as well. The DAC does not increase or add any power to the signal, so it doesn't change the volume. What some people in this thread are saying is you need an amp (which amplifies) the volume. You don't really need a DAC unless you care about being really picky about how your music sounds. I can try to be more specific if you need.
 

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