[ttt123]

To give the Dutch credit, Philips coined “the compact disc” term and started work, independently from Sony, in the late 70’s, based on earlier work by Russell and an Italian, forgot his name - Rabbiani? Rubbiani? I believe Philips marketed the first commercial laser player and, together with Sony, created the Red Book standard.

To this day some of Philips’ laser mechanisms (discontinued but stockpiled by certain companies and now offered at premium prices) continue to be used in some seriously high end players on the market. Their Pro 2 mechanisms are legendary and there is a good chance your aspirational 10-30K CD player has one inside.

I had always respected Philips as a reputable, trusted engineering based company. An old experience with a Philips VHS Tape to CD-R burner made me suspect that they had been taken over by their Accountants and were being run by the bean counters, and the Engineers no longer made the decisions in the products. This was during the period when they had massive losses, and eventually exited the consumer audio business. Whether the bad engineering and shoddy products they were selling was a cause, or a symptom, I do not know, but it certainly made me lose trust in their products.

The VHS to CD-R burner I had was a neat, all in one device. Load a tape and a CD-R and start it, and the tape would be played, and burned onto the CD-R disc.
The problem was that it would freeze, sometimes on the 1st tape, but almost certainly on the 2nd tape you burned. Their service department said they tested it, and there were no problems when they tested. (They almost certainly tested it with the cover off)

So I put it aside as junk, and eventually decided to look into it. What I found was that the power supply ran very hot, and there was no fan, and NO VENTILATION HOLES in the case. It was like it was engineered to overheat after an hour of use. By design.
- If I ran it with the case top removed, no overheating.
- I drilled some holes for air intact, and installed a fan, and that solved the overheating/freeze problem.

But that experience caused me to lose confidence in their engineering integrity.

 

[Roland P]

Yes, but unfortunately I don't see where Philips made good use of the massive revenue... Sony has go in to cameras, media (Sony entertainment) and still super strong in audio.. Probably many other things I don't know about..
Maybe Philips invested heavily in semiconductor process. I've always like Philips...

I guess Philips went into cameras (broadcast) too, with BTS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadcast_Television_Systems_Inc.
Later it was a part of Grass Valley. I've seen both companies (Grass Valley and Sony) at the IBC, but Sony always have the biggest stands. They also showed the mentioned XEL-1 there.
It seems Philips' main focus is now medical equipment.

 

[MASA242]

Regarding SONY – did anyone mention Mini-Disc yet? I had a portable player and loved it so much for many years.
Grab CDs via light cable in the player itself. Not lossless but better quality than MP3. The discs were perfect in size and you could tag the files in the player too. Ahead of the time. It is said it was not a huge success overall, but many friends had players and selling wasn't too bad, especially in Japan.
Sometimes I miss a physical storage format like these discs, but a large Micro-SD card has its' benefits.
By the way, there are efforts to establish a new format (https://www.whathifi.com/news/theres-a-new-music-format-that-aims-to-deliver-the-pinnacle-of-sound). It's not portable though and I assume it will remain a niche product. People love their Vinyls
I wouldn‘t say I‘m a fanboy and try other brands too, but with the 707 in mind it seems I alway return to Sony.

 

[revenge]

If I would be to go back to analog today I would be hard pressed to pick vinyl over, for instance, a Nakamichi Dragon, or a Revox tape recorder. They were beautiful machines, over-engineered, built to last forever and they sounded superb.

About 10 years ago we did some tests because I had a friend who collected this stuff and of course, although the Dragon is almost half a century old now, it worked swimmingly, apart from the heads he had recently replaced. We recorded a CD on a Dragon and then listened to the two sources - the CD and the cassette recording - side by side. The Dragon won hands down and the difference wasn’t subtle. In fairness we didn’t use a high end CD player but the Dragon output was so musical and euphonic that we both agreed it was no contest.

This is what a good Revox looked like.

And this is what a Dragon looked like.

In my experience Sony were OK. They had good electronics, very decent speakers but they were never THIS good.

So, to go back to the previous controversy, I grew up with vinyl, valves etc. I am a sucker for an analog, refined, musical sound. It’s not the 707 is bad, maybe I haven’t been quite fair. But it’s the CD vs Dragon in the test above, the AM2 / ZM2 being of course the Dragon. 707 is a very competent DAP but AM2 / ZM2 go one step further and make this emotional connection, they deliver colours and nuances. Timbres are better defined, the presentation feels eminently relaxed, laid back. AM2 takes it time to deliver an enjoyable performance whereas 707 feels by comparison a bit rushed, mechanical, digital, lean and one note. It’s not a night and day difference but for me it justifies the premium.

Completely understand if you enjoy your 707, especially if you haven’t had the chance to compare it to an AM2. Another comparison that comes to mind is the Rossini vs Vivaldi. Rossini is a superb DAC and, until you hear the Vivaldi, you don’t really get what you are missing. But Vivaldi is the more musical of the two and delivers a bit more of everything, as you would expect from the price difference.

 

[jehutyset]

If I would be to go back to analog today I would be hard pressed to pick vinyl over, for instance, a Nakamichi Dragon, or a Revox tape recorder. They were beautiful machines, over-engineered, built to last forever and they sounded superb.

About 10 years ago we did some tests because I had a friend who collected this stuff and of course, although the Dragon is almost half a century old now, it worked swimmingly, apart from the heads he had recently replaced. We recorded a CD on a Dragon and then listened to the two sources - the CD and the cassette recording - side by side. The Dragon won hands down and the difference wasn’t subtle. In fairness we didn’t use a high end CD player but the Dragon output was so musical and euphonic that we both agreed it was no contest.

This is what a good Revox looked like.


And this is what a Dragon looked like.


In my experience Sony were OK. They had good electronics, very decent speakers but they were never THIS good.

So, to go back to the previous controversy, I grew up with vinyl, valves etc. I am a sucker for an analog, refined, musical sound. It’s not the 707 is bad, maybe I haven’t been quite fair. But it’s the CD vs Dragon in the test above, the AM2 / ZM2 being of course the Dragon. 707 is a very competent DAP but AM2 / ZM2 go one step further and make this emotional connection, they deliver colours and nuances. Timbres are better defined, the presentation feels eminently relaxed, laid back. AM2 takes it time to deliver an enjoyable performance whereas 707 feels by comparison a bit rushed, mechanical, digital, lean and one note. It’s not a night and day difference but for me it justifies the premium.

Completely understand if you enjoy your 707, especially if you haven’t had the chance to compare it to an AM2. Another comparison that comes to mind is the Rossini vs Vivaldi. Rossini is a superb DAC and, until you hear the Vivaldi, you don’t really get what you are missing. But Vivaldi is the more musical of the two and delivers a bit more of everything, as you would expect from the price difference.

Beautifully written, and thanks for the story I always love reading about the beautiful audio machines of the past like that dragon you talked about, before I purchased my ZX707 I had a ZX507 with terrible battery and was looking to upgrade and I really looked hard into the AM2 DAP and everything I saw led me to seriously consider it. Unfortunately in the end I could not justify the price tag is just beyond what I’m comfortable spending ( I may be too broke for this hobby lol).

I went with the ZX707 quite frankly because of the initial great reviews and the great discount I was able to get mine with the 10% off using the proxy site fromjapan. So far I’ve been pretty content with it and I know that is a very much middle of the road DAP and I’m ok with that. Hopefully in the future I can get in a better position to upgrade to the next step up.

 

[TheRH]

Does this have enough power for most IEMs?

 

[Iron-Buddha]

Does this have enough power for most IEMs?

I’m using high gain at around 15-20 on Andro, 35-45 for Mest mk2, 65-70 for Lirics. With the loudness equalizer on.

I would say it has enough juice for almost all IEM that aren’t exotic in some way and easier to drive headphones. It’s not throwing out monster power and it’s also not overheating.

If you want super loud, I can see this not getting there on some IEM but in those cases, I’d imagine you are damaging your hearing.

 

[grumpy213]

I’m using high gain at around 15-20 on Andro, 35-45 for Mest mk2, 65-70 for Lirics. With the loudness equalizer on.

I would say it has enough juice for almost all IEM that aren’t exotic in some way and easier to drive headphones. It’s not throwing out monster power and it’s also not overheating.

If you want super loud, I can see this not getting there on some IEM but in those cases, I’d imagine you are damaging your hearing.

Sorry to hijack the other blokes Q but was curious if you can hear any background noise in very sparse tracks or during silence on the Andros on your ZX707.

Was curious about the 707 but unfortunately Sony don’t really publish their measurements on it so I don’t really want to blind buy and find out my Andros are a bit hissy like on my current DAP.

 

[alwass89]

I'm wondering how high quality the front glass panel is, does anyone use the player without a screen protector, or do most people buy a screen protector?

 

[Click]

Does this have enough power for most IEMs?

The uncapped 707 will have more than enough power for most IEMs on high gain. It can even power most planar headphones well. It probably won't power the Abyss Diana properly though.

I'm wondering how high quality the front glass panel is, does anyone use the player without a screen protector, or do most people buy a screen protector?

I don't use a screen protector but use the official case, which has a flap cover like a book cover. No scratches and looks great. I usually wipe it down after every session with a microfiber cloth.

 

[Iron-Buddha]

Sorry to hijack the other blokes Q but was curious if you can hear any background noise in very sparse tracks or during silence on the Andros on your ZX707.

Was curious about the 707 but unfortunately Sony don’t really publish their measurements on it so I don’t really want to blind buy and find out my Andros are a bit hissy like on my current DAP.

I don't notice any noise in my usable range, 15-20 on high gain. There is the argument that the Andro should be played on low gain given how sensitive it is, but I am too lazy to toggle it.

That being said, I can hear minor noise starting at 35....becomes noticeable at 50+. At the same time, I would not play music at that volume as it would just blow my ears out. I had nothing playing and just turned the volume dial up. Wi-fi on.

In my limited experience with sources and the Andro, everything produces some noise once you get out of useable range. A few things were pretty noisy even at normal volume (like the Schiit Fulla 2 or 3 I had).

 

[Not so fat head]

Be careful, if you're reading Head Fi, then you most likely love music...
Treat your ears well, I'm in my 60's and have pretty good hearing. Hearing damage is irreversible

 

[Laurentinus]

Does this have enough power for most IEMs?

all my iems never goes pass 65 on high gain for zx707

 

[revenge]

The issue is not only max volume (peak) but the amount of time your ears are exposed to a certain volume. You can spend something like 8 hours at 65 dB but only 30 minutes are safe at 85dB. I don’t remember the exact numbers but they are in the ballpark.

Because of the wide dynamic range of modern recordings even if you listen at 65db, you can easily have peaks of 85 or more, which are now considered dangerous for any amount of time. However, if you attempt to prevent a DAP from ever reaching 85dB, either your baseline volume has to drop excessively low to maintain the dynamic range (Sony being an example), or you have to use limiters / compression. I am not talking about lossy data compression, but dynamic range compression which is much hated by audiophiles and for good reason.This means increasing the volume of the quiet passages and chopping off the peaks. Essentially ignoring the decisions made by the original sound engineers and “remastering” the recordings to a set dynamic range / volume.

Streaming services are already doing it.

https://productionadvice.co.uk/tidal-normalization-upgrade/

https://www.sageaudio.com/blog/mast...form-loudness-and-normalization-explained.php

This helps a capped DAP like Sony to maintain a reasonable volume throughout a track / album however, if you add to this “remastering” the watermarking applied to each track, which is audible and measurable, you will come to understand why serious audiophiles still prefer physical media to streaming. A watermarked, “normalised” album streamed on Qobuz or Tidal or Spotify is not quite the same thing as the real deal vinyl or CD.

 

[Not so fat head]

I remember my Telarc 1812 overture vinyl pressing where they tried to capture the actual canon sounds. The groves were so crazy that the stylus would pop out of the track. Increasing the dynamic range on vinyl never really worked. It's why I've gone CD (in all its forms) and haven't looked back.