[maira]

The problems with the EQ are still not solved?

 

[twister6]

The problems with the EQ are still not solved?

A few posts above @holsen mentioned Alicia Key track where something sounds not right with either EQ on or off, which indicates it's not the issue related to EQ. What does the others experiencing as a problem?

 

[Nayparm]

A few posts above @holsen mentioned Alicia Key track where something sounds not right with either EQ on or off, which indicates it's not the issue related to EQ. What does the others experiencing as a problem?

For me it didn't seem to change the sound of the selected frequency very much or in a way I would expect it to, it also distorted really easily.

 

[alexkonkov]

Maybe opensourcing MTouch would breathe more life into it allowing for 3rd party implementations or even Rockbox port. A really well engineered brick of M5s hardware deserves it.

 

[holsen]

A few posts above @holsen mentioned Alicia Key track where something sounds not right with either EQ on or off, which indicates it's not the issue related to EQ. What does the others experiencing as a problem?

Good comment but it's not just the Alicia Keys track, there are others - Dave Matthews and Tim Reynolds "Live at Radio City - Bartender" is another I can think of off the top of my head. And in both of those cases, using the same file on a different playback device produces a proper outcome.That Alicia Track is just the one I use as a reference because I know I can test it at 5:00 minutes.

 

[GoldenTooth]

Maybe opensourcing MTouch would breathe more life into it allowing for 3rd party implementations or even Rockbox port. A really well engineered brick of M5s hardware deserves it.

You are right , I couldn't agree more since i also feel like audio is far better in USB DAC mode than the play Stock music app . don't know if anyone else feel this (all windows sound enhancements turned off , EQ off , using default windows media player)
Which means that hardware is excellent and can be enhanced by a better software like rockbox .

 

[holsen]

Completely agree. I use it in USB DAC mode on Win 10 with JRiver playing FLAC and ALAC and its beautiful

 

[Shanling]

Since FW2.3 volatile sound and volume . Since FW3.0 , volume sometimes upwards goes down , down goes upwards Jump sometimes up to 15 steps just with 1 click . Sometimes even click but does not react . Video made with 1 step click , up.down .
Instead add that Tidal , please fix mist important part of the device .THE VOLUME
Regards
https://imgur.com/Inb2J0f

new update , amazing , wonderful .FW3.1...................and yet the problem with volume is not resolved
mine M5S goes on the shelf or on refund...will decide later
and I go back to a company that knows what they doing my trusted WM1
F...g helll

As other users said, please test it again on older firmware(you can get them on our website) to see, if it truly is problem of firmware or your hardware (in which case it's of course covered by warranty). We are not seeing other users reporting such problem.

I really want to come back and revisit this EQ I issue @Shanling Let me start by saying that I love my M5s, I have recommended and been responsible for a few of my buddies buying it and have even sold it to seat neighbors on transatlantic / pacific flights so I'm a fan. But with that out of the way this EQ really needs to be addressed. There are several tracks where the frequency in the bass just decays, degrades and crumbles into a horrible mess. I'll use one just for example. On Alecia Keys album Girl on Fire, the track 101 has some. Beautiful bass lines. At exactly 5 minutes the drums come crashing in and on the M5s with EQ on, EQ off and no matter what iems I'm using it's such a muddled mess that you can't even make out the sound. It's simply awful. So this morning I tried something. I used the M5s paired to a. BTR3 and the same track at the same time stamp sounded just fine. Then I took the same track; the same file in fact using the FiiO Music app to stream DNLA into the BTR3 at LDAC and again it was beautiful. I am a. Shanling fan. I see how responsive you've been on these threads and I believe in you as a company. And I'm sorry to bring a competitors name into this thread. But the M5s is your current flagship and the EQ is seriously flawed and I really want to encourage you, as a matter of priority, to find a solution. It's now become something of an obsession with me. I know what my music can and should sound like and it really bugs me that some tracks that sound excellent on other devices sound like #$&* on this one. Like I said., I'm a fan. You can see my reviews on Amazon and Music Tech but this issue has really gotten under my skin

Good comment but it's not just the Alicia Keys track, there are others - Dave Matthews and Tim Reynolds "Live at Radio City - Bartender" is another I can think of off the top of my head. And in both of those cases, using the same file on a different playback device produces a proper outcome.That Alicia Track is just the one I use as a reference because I know I can test it at 5:00 minutes.

Are you using single ended output or balanced? And which digital filter setting? And did you compare it only to BTR3?

I just tested this song on my M5s, comparing it to other Shanling players, my phone and few different players from other brands. With my IEMs (AAW W500 and Sony MH755), I didn't hear any messy bass. Only hearable difference between players was in their sound signature.

Anybody else having similar experience?

it seems they do not take seriously their products . I m done spend money on Shanling.

We are taking our products seriously and especially for M5s, we worked long time on its sound. But to be honest, we are always focusing on its stock sound, not altered by EQ.
But we understand that EQ is essential for small group of users and we are still working on improving it. We had few different EQ solutions for testing, sometimes they make changes too small, other times big changes with degradation to sound. We are still trying to find something ideal.

 

[holsen]

Are you using single ended output or balanced? And which digital filter setting? And did you compare it only to BTR3?

I just tested this song on my M5s, comparing it to other Shanling players, my phone and few different players from other brands. With my IEMs (AAW W500 and Sony MH755), I didn't hear any messy bass. Only hearable difference between players was in their sound signature.

Anybody else having similar experience?

I'm using Single ended as I dont have a balanced cable. I play the same track(same ALAC File) with JRiver going into a DAC and Also through my Sonos Connect into an External DAC and out to a B&O HiFi System. My only issue with that file is on the M5s ... I havent taken that particular track over to my phone, where I use Rocket Player and connect to an external BT DAC in my Car. I'll try it and report back.

 

[PopZeus]

I think the EQ on the M5s sounds fine. I've never noticed a drop-off in audio quality with it engaged and unadjusted. But it could be made a lot better with a few tweaks. #1 is the real engineering challenge, the rest are UX/UI fixes.:

1. Add a pre-amp control to allow changes to the gain before EQ. That way, the user can adjust the gain down depending on how far they push up a specific EQ band so that the audio never distorts. To me, this is preferable to an automatic -6dB drop that some DAPs implement with their EQ turned on. Since if you're not adding gain in a band, you never need to lower it everywhere else. But if you are adding gain, then you only need to reduce the overall gain by the amount you've increased it in a band. This would be the most work, but it would offer the biggest improvement to the audio quality.
2. Snap to 0dB. Maybe anything less than a +/- 0.5dB in the UI can snap to 0dB so that the user knows what looks like close to no change is, in fact, no change.
3. Along those lines, adding an instant-updating label telling the user what the numerical value of their adjustment is (in dBs), that updates while they're making the adjustments, would be very helpful. Is it a 3.9dB or a 4.1dB move? The label could solve that riddle.
4. Spreading out the bands so that my thumb doesn't accidentally start moving a band next to the one I want to adjust (and now I have to reset the whole thing again) would also improve usability.
5. Get rid of the tap anywhere function. Sometimes when I swipe right-to-left from low-to-high bands, I accidentally grab an EQ "knob" and it jumps to where my thumb lands. Why? If I want to adjust a band, I should have to grab the actual EQ knob and swipe it up or down to make an adjustment. Just tapping on the slider is really imprecise anyways. I don't know where the app registered my thumb along the EQ band until i pick it up off the screen because you don't have suggestion #3 as a feature. So it's an additional interaction that actually subtracts from overall usability.

Those are just my, uh, 5 cents. I'm a UX/UI person by trade, so these things really stick out to me as important. Others might disagree. I do think #1 would be a bigger deal to the head-fi community, but the rest add a lot of value too!

 

[holsen]

I'm using Single ended as I dont have a balanced cable. I play the same track(same ALAC File) with JRiver going into a DAC and Also through my Sonos Connect into an External DAC and out to a B&O HiFi System. My only issue with that file is on the M5s ... I havent taken that particular track over to my phone, where I use Rocket Player and connect to an external BT DAC in my Car. I'll try it and report back.

OK @Shanling I just put the Alecia Keys and the Dave Matthews file on my phone and both files play back an resolve nicely with EQ, without EQ and and no matter how much I boost 31, 62 or 125 kHz. There IS something funky at certain frequencies on the M5s .... Like I said, I'm a Shanling Fan. I generally love the M5s but there is something not right here.... All the muddiness and sound decay on both "Bartender" by Dave Matthews - Live at Radio City and Alecia Keys 101 are completely gone coming off my phone through the BTR3, The Audio Engine D3 and and my PC Jriver through the Topping D50. It's something in the M5s causing this problem. I can send you the exact files I'm listening to if you like. Alicia Keys 101: http://cloud.high-output.com/fd2fc1 Dave Mattews Bartender http://cloud.high-output.com/911176

 

[holsen]

Perhaps I've got a Hardware issue? Playing the same files in my Car off the M5 - sounds horrible With my phone to external dac - beautiful.....

 

[Shanling]

OK @Shanling I just put the Alecia Keys and the Dave Matthews file on my phone and both files play back an resolve nicely with EQ, without EQ and and no matter how much I boost 31, 62 or 125 kHz. There IS something funky at certain frequencies on the M5s .... Like I said, I'm a Shanling Fan. I generally love the M5s but there is something not right here.... All the muddiness and sound decay on both "Bartender" by Dave Matthews - Live at Radio City and Alecia Keys 101 are completely gone coming off my phone through the BTR3, The Audio Engine D3 and and my PC Jriver through the Topping D50. It's something in the M5s causing this problem. I can send you the exact files I'm listening to if you like. Alicia Keys 101: http://cloud.high-output.com/fd2fc1 Dave Mattews Bartender http://cloud.high-output.com/911176

Nope, still nothing out of ordinary. Anybody else can try them out and report back?

Possible hardware problem? Or maybe you just can't stand reproduction of AKM DAC?

Just to be sure, your problem with these songs on M5s is also without any EQ enabled, correct? And please what digital filter are you using?

I think the EQ on the M5s sounds fine. I've never noticed a drop-off in audio quality with it engaged and unadjusted. But it could be made a lot better with a few tweaks. #1 is the real engineering challenge, the rest are UX/UI fixes.:

1. Add a pre-amp control to allow changes to the gain before EQ. That way, the user can adjust the gain down depending on how far they push up a specific EQ band so that the audio never distorts. To me, this is preferable to an automatic -6dB drop that some DAPs implement with their EQ turned on. Since if you're not adding gain in a band, you never need to lower it everywhere else. But if you are adding gain, then you only need to reduce the overall gain by the amount you've increased it in a band. This would be the most work, but it would offer the biggest improvement to the audio quality.
2. Snap to 0dB. Maybe anything less than a +/- 0.5dB in the UI can snap to 0dB so that the user knows what looks like close to no change is, in fact, no change.
3. Along those lines, adding an instant-updating label telling the user what the numerical value of their adjustment is (in dBs), that updates while they're making the adjustments, would be very helpful. Is it a 3.9dB or a 4.1dB move? The label could solve that riddle.
4. Spreading out the bands so that my thumb doesn't accidentally start moving a band next to the one I want to adjust (and now I have to reset the whole thing again) would also improve usability.
5. Get rid of the tap anywhere function. Sometimes when I swipe right-to-left from low-to-high bands, I accidentally grab an EQ "knob" and it jumps to where my thumb lands. Why? If I want to adjust a band, I should have to grab the actual EQ knob and swipe it up or down to make an adjustment. Just tapping on the slider is really imprecise anyways. I don't know where the app registered my thumb along the EQ band until i pick it up off the screen because you don't have suggestion #3 as a feature. So it's an additional interaction that actually subtracts from overall usability.

Those are just my, uh, 5 cents. I'm a UX/UI person by trade, so these things really stick out to me as important. Others might disagree. I do think #1 would be a bigger deal to the head-fi community, but the rest add a lot of value too!

We are working on some changes to EQ UI too, thanks for your feedback.

 

[holsen]

Nope, still nothing out of ordinary. Anybody else can try them out and report back?

Possible hardware problem? Or maybe you just can't stand reproduction of AKM DAC?

I'm sorry but what kind of ridiculous reply is that? "that I just can't stand the reproduction of AKM". I am trying to report a real issue to you and I don't know how else to communicate with you. I'm not trying to be divisive or unreasonable; I've said over and over again I like this DAP and clearly that includes the AKMs inside. Go to Music Tecks site, the most recent review is mine. I've helped you sell many of these units with no financial interest or consideration. I'm telling you that The sound ON MY DEVICE on THESE TRACKS (and some others) is so degraded that the unless you knew what you were listening to you wouldn't even know what you were listening to. It's purely awful. I can't tell you at what frequency it occurs but I can tell you I haven't had the issue ON THESE TRACKS with a Wolfson chip, an ESS chip or even a different AKM Chip. I'm going to try to feed a 3.5 into my sound recorder and see if I can reproduce it into something you can hear for yourself.

As for filter used. I'll go back and try all of them. I've been pretty impressed with Shanling responsiveness on this forum and I don't know it's all been one individual or several of you but that comment above was really inappropriate completely out of context and has really pissed me off

 

[Shanling]

I'm sorry but what kind of ridiculous reply is that? "that I just can't stand the reproduction of AKM". I am trying to report a real issue to you and I don't know how else to communicate with you. I'm not trying to be divisive or unreasonable; I've said over and over again I like this DAP and clearly that includes the AKMs inside. Go to Music Tecks site, the most recent review is mine. I've helped you sell many of these units with no financial interest or consideration. I'm telling you that The sound ON MY DEVICE on THESE TRACKS (and some others) is so degraded that the unless you knew what you were listening to you wouldn't even know what you were listening to. It's purely awful. I can't tell you at what frequency it occurs but I can tell you I haven't had the issue ON THESE TRACKS with a Wolfson chip, an ESS chip or even a different AKM Chip. I'm going to try to feed a 3.5 into my sound recorder and see if I can reproduce it into something you can hear for yourself.

As for filter used. I'll go back and try all of them. I've been pretty impressed with Shanling responsiveness on this forum and I don't know it's all been one individual or several of you but that comment above was really inappropriate completely out of context and has really pissed me off

All replies are from me(Frankie).

I'm honestly trying to replicate this issue, I hope some others will try to have a listen to it and will report back what they hear, so we can have deeper look at this issue.

In written form, it's sometimes hard to exactly understand how severe some problems in sound can be. I probably underestimated how big problem with bass you are facing and I'm sorry.
Just wanted to share experience I gathered with AKM DAC. Higher AKM DACs with their Velvet sound have quite distinctive sound are simply strongly disliked by some people.