[Kammex]

Hey Head-Fier's,
 
I planned on buying the Galaxy S7 (and I am a mouse click away from buying it), but I found out that it uses the generic Qualcomm audio codec, unlike the Galaxy S6 which has a Wolfson Microelectronics WM1840 audio codec which is said to have a small V-shape sound signature (my preferred signature) and be able to power harder-to-drive headphones.
 
Since I plan to use my phone to listen to music a lot (3-5 hours a day) with my ATH-M50x (38 ohms), should the difference be negligible?
 
Thanks! 

 

[Foolwolf]

Can't say, but if you buy a phone for music, the S7 would not be my recommendation. I have it and find the audio qulaity to be subpar of that of SONY and Oneplus phones by quite a noticeable bit. I haven't listened to the S6. If you are determined to get a Samsung (cause the S7 except sound quality is a great phone) then I would suggest you to look at the new line of DragonFly external DAC's from Audioquest and plug one in for longer listening sessions.

 

[Kammex]

Can't say, but if you buy a phone for music, the S7 would not be my recommendation. I have it and find the audio qulaity to be subpar of that of SONY and Oneplus phones by quite a noticeable bit. I haven't listened to the S6. If you are determined to get a Samsung (cause the S7 except sound quality is a great phone) then I would suggest you to look at the new line of DragonFly external DAC's from Audioquest and plug one in for longer listening sessions.

Glad to hear your advice. I ended up getting the S6 over the weekend, and I don't regret it at all. Saved a couple hundred bucks too. Since I'm at school, I don't have very long listening sessions so and external DAC/amp is a little too much.

 

[Blinxat]

I had s6 and now s7 edge both exynos and they sound great. A little more airy htc one m8, which is slightly warmer imo. The HTC had more volume reserves though.

 

[cel4145]

Codecs, shmodecs. You can't tell much based on chipsets. Implementation is way more important, especially in the noisy environment of a phone.

Read the audio part of the reviews at gsmarena where they do measurements.

http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s6-review-1227p7.php
http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s7-review-1408p7.php

Clearly, these are close in audio quality, and its excellent. My Note 5 has similar kickass audio quality. Samsung has gotten their act together with their flagship phones and is now easily competing with iPhone, if not exceeding them.

 

[Kammex]

Codecs, shmodecs. You can't tell much based on chipsets. Implementation is way more important, especially in the noisy environment of a phone.

Read the audio part of the reviews at gsmarena where they do measurements.

http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s6-review-1227p7.php
http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s7-review-1408p7.php

Clearly, these are close in audio quality, and its excellent. My Note 5 has similar kickass audio quality. Samsung has gotten their act together with their flagship phones and is now easily competing with iPhone, if not exceeding them.

Got my info from http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/test-centre/mobile-phone/best-audio-phone-2016-uk-whats-best-phone-for-music-3633585/
And you are definitely right, I found the GSMArena reviews and the S7 doesn't seem bad at all.
My S6 has a very loose home button so I'm returning it, and I might upgrade

 

[cel4145]

Might as well upgrade if you have to return it

 

[Foolwolf]

Well, I have another new recommendation, try the USB Audio Player Pro, it isn't the best feature wise player, but boy did it do wonders for sound! Hope you get along well with your new phone!

 

[capac]

I own M50X, and in my experiance, they are pretty easy to drive. Also, they won't benefit from an amp that much, so I guess you can't really hear the difference between the two phones. I use them with iPhone 5c when I'm travelling and they sound pretty good IMO.

 

[selkin]

well if you compare it to S3 or S1 it's 2 steps behind in audio quality. I would not say it's audiophile.

 

[ProtegeManiac]

 
I planned on buying the Galaxy S7 (and I am a mouse click away from buying it), but I found out that it uses the generic Qualcomm audio codec, unlike the Galaxy S6 which has a Wolfson Microelectronics WM1840 audio codec which is said to have a small V-shape sound signature (my preferred signature) and be able to power harder-to-drive headphones.
 
Since I plan to use my phone to listen to music a lot (3-5 hours a day) with my ATH-M50x (38 ohms), should the difference be negligible?

 

Haven't heard those specific phones, but between my Wolfson SGS, Qualcomm SGS3, SGS5 (not sure what's in it), Wolfson Note 3 and Note 4 (not sure what's in it, but all these are T-Mobile) it's actually the smaller phones (and considering the original, that also means regardless of what brand DAC is in it) that has a "v-shaped" sound sig. Between those the smaller phones had boosted bass and more emphasized treble (ie, both ends boosted vs midrange) on every IEM I had: 16ohm Mee M6i, 40ohm VSonic VSD3, 32ohm Aurisonics ASG-1.3. For all we know it comes down to the firmware, although the SGS3 was a tad brighter though looser in the bass than the original SGS, while the SGS5 had tighter bass.

 

Personally though I'd just use Adapt Sound anyway, but then again, the way it works (ie boost reliant, as opposed to cutting peaks) might not work with your earphones, although it works fine on my ASG-1.3 (that said, it boosts the treble, although if I manually EQ-d, I'd cut the bass). Failing that, try Neutron. Overall if you can get the S7 for not a lot more money vs the S6 I'd get it for the SD card slot.