[PinkyPowers]

It's also possible they are tuned in software differently. The AK240 is reported to sound warmer and bassier than the AK120ii, and most people will take that to mean the more expensive unit has a superior "analogue" sound. When in reality it just has a different EQ, running on the same hardware.

 

[Uberclocked]

It's also possible they are tuned in software differently. The AK240 is reported to sound warmer and bassier than the AK120ii, and most people will take that to mean the more expensive unit has a superior "analogue" sound. When in reality it just has a different EQ, running on the same hardware.

That could possibly be the case, but I'm not too sure.
Just as many people (if not more) couldn't tell the AKs apart, and frequency response variance is the same between the units.

 

[WCDchee]

How was this done?
Did you use an actual ABX switch box?
How fast did you switch?
How often were the switches?
How long were the intervals?
Did you know when something was switched, and did you only switch for the other device or did you plug it into the same one again once in a while to throw the listener off?
How many trials did you run?
Did you take breaks between switches?
How many times did you correctly identify which source was being used?
What observations did you make about how (if at all) the sources differed from each other?

Spoiler: Trigger Warning

I have not heard the AK380, no.

We could go on all day about the different was in which I didn't standardise the tests, but for the purpose of a simple comparison, if I could the players volume matched 10/10 times blind, then I think there must be something there.

If you must know how it's done, no switch box, each time my Friend would randomly plug into one of the players and play a specific segment of the song, about 20 seconds worth. And i would try to identify it.

I think all too often we get caught up about how this should sound different, this shouldn't sound different, but perhaps it would be best if we all took the Time to actually listen where possible. You can quote the specs. The numbers all you want, but at the end of the day this is a hobby where we're listening. I'm not saying to give in to hype and convince yourself of differences when they don't exist, but you have to hear it buddy. I don't see a point in trying to tell people how something sounds when you haven't heard it yourself.

 

[Uberclocked]

We could go on all day about the different was in which I didn't standardise the tests, but for the purpose of a simple comparison, if I could the players volume matched 10/10 times blind, then I think there must be something there.

If you must know how it's done, no switch box, each time my Friend would randomly plug into one of the players and play a specific segment of the song, about 20 seconds worth. And i would try to identify it.

I think all too often we get caught up about how this should sound different, this shouldn't sound different, but perhaps it would be best if we all took the Time to actually listen where possible. You can quote the specs. The numbers all you want, but at the end of the day this is a hobby where we're listening. I'm not saying to give in to hype and convince yourself of differences when they don't exist, but you have to hear it buddy. I don't see a point in trying to tell people how something sounds when you haven't heard it yourself.

There might be something to this if you could correctly identify which player was which in 10 trials.  Were you using balanced or se?  Maybe there was something wrong with one of the players?

 

[WCDchee]

There might be something to this if you could correctly identify which player was which in 10 trials.  Were you using balanced or se?  Maybe there was something wrong with one of the players?

Both were SE. Nothing was wrong with either players. The difference was very very clear to my ears, and no I do not claim to have golden ears. Soundstage, tonality, was all different. Again like I said, I hope you can hear them before you comment on how the 380 sounds, there's absolutely no point talking about how they sound the same when You haven't heard the 380.

 

[Uberclocked]

Both were SE. Nothing was wrong with either players. The difference was very very clear to my ears, and no I do not claim to have golden ears. Soundstage, tonality, was all different. Again like I said, I hope you can hear them before you comment on how the 380 sounds, there's absolutely no point talking about how they sound the same when You haven't heard the 380.

Was eq enabled?
I don't even hear a "very very clear" difference between my SBZ and the AK320 or any other competent source I've tried, for that matter.
Anyways, the chance of me hearing the AK380 is nil, as I don't know any place within 50 miles of where I live that has one.

 

[WCDchee]

Was eq enabled?
I don't even hear a "very very clear" difference between my SBZ and the AK320 or any other competent source I've tried, for that matter.
Anyways, the chance of me hearing the AK380 is nil, as I don't know any place within 50 miles of where I live that has one.

No the eq was not enabled. As in mentioned it is not just a matter of tonality, the whole presentation, the way they layer, stage, and image was clearly different. Everyone I have spoken to who has tried both players also mentioned the same differences I heard.

If you look at pictures of both players you'll also realise that the 380 is both wider and thicker than the 320. In the world of AK where design is given so much thought, I refuse to believe that they would make the 380 chunkier for no reason either

Another example would be the 380copper. Exact same specs as the 380, exact same circuit except for the chassis. I could not care for the price as it is ridiculous. But sonically, the 380 I do not like much. The 380cu on the other hand, I found thoroughly enjoyable and impressive. Bear in mind that I was a huge skeptic on the possibility of the sound being different because of the chassis and grounding material.

Again like I said there is nothing wrong with having doubts, but until you actually hear it for yourself I would personally refrain from making bold statements about how something sounds I try not to myself as well I agree, very often there's just so much hype, but sometimes, just sometimes, there's some truth to it.

 

[fattycheesebeef]

I always thought 320 was 380 without DSD.. 

 

[Uberclocked]

  I always thought 320 was 380 without DSD.. 

It should be and I'm still 99% convinced it's using the same hardware, but maybe as @PinkyPowers said, it might have a different tuning?  We'll have to get more impressions from other members.

 

[sawrym]

No the eq was not enabled. As in mentioned it is not just a matter of tonality, the whole presentation, the way they layer, stage, and image was clearly different. Everyone I have spoken to who has tried both players also mentioned the same differences I heard.

If you look at pictures of both players you'll also realise that the 380 is both wider and thicker than the 320. In the world of AK where design is given so much thought, I refuse to believe that they would make the 380 chunkier for no reason either

Another example would be the 380copper. Exact same specs as the 380, exact same circuit except for the chassis. I could not care for the price as it is ridiculous. But sonically, the 380 I do not like much. The 380cu on the other hand, I found thoroughly enjoyable and impressive. Bear in mind that I was a huge skeptic on the possibility of the sound being different because of the chassis and grounding material.

Again like I said there is nothing wrong with having doubts, but until you actually hear it for yourself I would personally refrain from making bold statements about how something sounds

I try not to myself as well

I agree, very often there's just so much hype, but sometimes, just sometimes, there's some truth to it.

That's interesting, thanks for your input in here and some time spent to do that comparsion. I can see that not only me is curious about it. I need to try it by mysefl but i don't have any store around either:/  

@WCDchee  did u do that blind test on IEMs or cans? 


@Uberclocked  i don't think u should guess looking at specs when question is: "What u hear?" ... Especially when U didn't hear 380 at all. 




 

 

[mcemce13]

  It should be and I'm still 99% convinced it's using the same hardware, but maybe as @PinkyPowers said, it might have a different tuning?  We'll have to get more impressions from other members.

 
 
I think so too, is very similar hardware with different tuning. Of course there is a lot of refinement in the tuning, its not just some EQ, but they can change a lot with their software.
 
Example of that are the software updates and how they change the sound signature. This is also that ak380 owners complained, software upgrades shouldn't change the sound signature, or at least give you the option to rollback updates in case you prefer older ones.

 

[dallan]

Question- my AK120 is geared toward iOS whereas I recall the AK240 was geared toward android. That was the death blow for me getting the 240. Now my 120 is approaching limited life and curious, is the AK320 android based or iOS?

 

[Uberclocked]

Question- my AK120 is geared toward iOS whereas I recall the AK240 was geared toward android. That was the death blow for me getting the 240. Now my 120 is approaching limited life and curious, is the AK320 android based or iOS?

???
iOS is NOT open source. If you're implying that AK built the AK100 series OS off of that, you're 100% wrong.  It's most definitely proprietary.
Anyways, I don't see any reason why you wouldn't get the AK200/300 series just because it's "Android based".  Their derivative of Android is such a closed system and so heavily modified that it doesn't really matter.
 
Anyways, the AK200/300 series OS is pretty much identical except for a few differences, such as a modified EQ.

 

[dallan]

I guess I mean that the 240 didn't work seamlessly with macs and was geared more toward pc's. With the ak120 you could just drag and drop files directly onto the internal and sdcards. When released I understood that it wasn't as easy with the 240, you needed software or something. I didn't reserch it well, just wanted to check.

 

[Iron-Buddha]

I have an AK100ii and AK320. Both are android based and require Android File Transfer to drag and drop files. It didn't work very well at first but my latest transfers went a bit more smoothly. At any rate, I don't think there are any material differences as far as mac compatibility between models.