[shigzeo]

indeed this place is full of different views. my MD fetish ended when i heard one of the 'worst sounding' ipods, the 4G. it would be sweet if sony or cowon finally brought gapless playback to their players (i know cowon are starting to do this) as that is a huge loss.

 

[Sparky191]

A lot of the earlier iPods I didn't enjoy. The 1G Shuffle I do. So I'm a bit skeptical if someone says they all sound the same.

 

[Skampster]

Same here, they most certainly dont.

I still love the 1G shuffle. Wish i had kept it.

 

[Sparky191]

At one point I did blind ABX test for myself between my MD's and my MP3 players. I realised I prefered the 1G shuffle and the Zen Micro. The MD's stayed in the cupboard after that. Unfortunately both broke as did their replacements. So I moved on.

Another factor is I've had different earphones with different players. That makes as much a difference as the player! Even with low end earphones/buds/iems.

 

[dallan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Skampster /img/forum/go_quote.gif You just dont get it do you..............

I just don't get it??? What a discussion of the topic. No you just don't get it, this is a discussion about the Touch, until very recently the 2G. I haven't even posted a complaint just you limiting it to the brand new version for all of us when that isn't even what the thread is supposed to be about and is limiting the discussion of the topic.

If you want a thread on the new 3G touch, why don't you start your own?

 

[Sparky191]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dallan /img/forum/go_quote.gif .... I haven't even posted a complaint .....

What was this then? Praise?

Quote:

Originally Posted by dallan /img/forum/go_quote.gif I wouldn't know, I don't use mine for music at all, it has a different doc than the normal ipod classic or nano that I have and thus I can't even listen to music unless i use the headphone jack.... and we know about using ipod headphone jacks-worthless.....

Quote:

Originally Posted by dallan /img/forum/go_quote.gif ...I was unaware that there had been major upgrades to the headphone out of ipods. Do you have a source? I am interested since I own a touch.

In fairness. You say you haven't listened to it. Then say the HO worthless. Equating all iPod HO as the same. Can't really take that seriously. If you using a LOD and amp, your only using it as source. Thats really a whole different topic to someone who just using the HO.

 

[Skampster]

No Dallan, you not getting the point I was trying to make.

Basically people hating the touch especially if they haven't heard the 3G. Giving the touch bad credibility purely because of the old models.

 

[1235sam]

Quote:

Originally Posted by shigzeo /img/forum/go_quote.gif fair enough, but i think it would be better to leave SQ out of it. my any measurable margin, cowon are out classed by a hoard of daps from apple to zune, a-z. what cowon do more or less right is: low amounts of hiss in all/most of their players, and decent eq/sfx implementation. but the excitement you are hearing is only the accentuation by about 0.5-1dbl of treble. the cowon machines also have quite a poor stereo separation which is lower than most other companies, but that of course may be good for rock, jazz, many genres which you might want a bit more warmth i suppose. in that way, they are a quality of sound which is not heard on the ipod touch which, as you know, presents music in natural tones. apple's hands-off approach to sound engineering means that their line of audio products most closely resemble the sound of an engineer's workplace whereas other companies try hard to emulate a car stereo. i am a former cowon owner and all it took was the ipod touch 1g to convince me that i was missing out. what i missed when switching was the eq and of course, the rather clean sound of the d2 (the hiss on the ipod touch 1g is as bad as a meizu, or iriver player).

dude you are the most rational man when it comes to talk about sound quality .Most of the people seem to be biased

 

[shigzeo]

As this is the internet, I will have to admit that I don't know if you are being sarcastic or not, but I don't mind either way. I most certainly am biased! I need gapless and currently, only two players give me that without too much trouble: Zune and iPod. But, I don't use Windows, so only the iPod.

As for SQ, I am quite defensive when I hear things like bass sucks, treble sucks, bass is good, etc., when the gutteral explanations of many people don't match any measurements as later, we find out that 'sucks' means 'bass is weak'. The problem with assuming that is that under load, a player will tell you in very succinct terms whether it has bass or not; but you have to be willing to go the extra step, split the headphone out, record a square wave or do RMAA, and take a leap of faith.

I had myself convinced of the iPod's inferiority before I heard it. Then, when I heard it, it sucked. But, I hated Apple. Buying everything else, I did the best I could to enjoy Audiophile (cowon's old marketing name for their products) and a few other brands though their sound bothered me. the new s9 is quite decent, but it still suffers typical cowon problems. every brand has its problems, but i would in no way write off a brand because of... its brand.

 

[1235sam]

Quote:

Originally Posted by shigzeo /img/forum/go_quote.gif As this is the internet, I will have to admit that I don't know if you are being sarcastic or not, but I don't mind either way. I most certainly am biased! I need gapless and currently, only two players give me that without too much trouble: Zune and iPod. But, I don't use Windows, so only the iPod. As for SQ, I am quite defensive when I hear things like bass sucks, treble sucks, bass is good, etc., when the gutteral explanations of many people don't match any measurements as later, we find out that 'sucks' means 'bass is weak'. The problem with assuming that is that under load, a player will tell you in very succinct terms whether it has bass or not; but you have to be willing to go the extra step, split the headphone out, record a square wave or do RMAA, and take a leap of faith.

another thing is most people are prejudice .They read from somewhere that ipod's SQ is not good so they assume ipod's SQ "sucks".Or they have heard older ipod model which did not have "good SQ" so they think all ipod model have bad SQ.Actually Apple do tweak SQ and this was evident when last year they considerably improved SQ of ipod(esp touch 2g and nano 4g).Apple don't make fuzz about SQ in their feature list.

 

[Sparky191]

The Touch, 3Gs improved. No reports of the Shuffle, or the Classic though.

 

[shigzeo]

well the 3g shuffle which came out earlier this year has been proved to be one of the weakest shows by apple - at least in stereo separation.

Quote:

Originally Posted by 1235sam /img/forum/go_quote.gif another thing is most people are prejudice .They read from somewhere that ipod's SQ is not good so they assume ipod's SQ "sucks".Or they have heard older ipod model which did not have "good SQ" so they think all ipod model have bad SQ.Actually Apple do tweak SQ and this was evident when last year they considerably improved SQ of ipod(esp touch 2g and nano 4g).Apple don't make fuzz about SQ in their feature list.

That, along with Apple's presence in the marketplace are probably the two biggest reasons why people are so sure that Apple's sound sucks.

 

[Happyprozak]

Well I've had an iPod Touch 1G, 2G, and 5G classic along with a 2G shuffle, and a 1G and 3G Touch and a Zune HD.

I've done direct comparisons between a 1G Touch and a 5G classic, a 5G classic and a Zune HD, a 5G classic and a 3G touch, and a 3G Touch and Zune HD. I always hear people here saying that the 5.5G Classic is the best sounding iPod and I don't know how the 5G stacks up or if its the exact same thing, but I can tell you that I found the 1G and 3G Touch and the Zune HD all to have better sound than it.

The Zune HD I think had a very slight edge in sound quality, but unless you are doing an AB comparison I found it to be negligible.

Jen for Pocketables completely dismisses the sound quality of the 3GS iPhone and she said that the X1000 had better sound than the Cowon S9 and then she said without EQ's that the Cowon S9 had better sound than the X1000. It's headfi and we are splitting hairs and picking apart differences in taste.

I find that forums like these can make us care more about the hardware than what we are actually supposed to do with it, which is listen to music.

 

[warrior05]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Happyprozak /img/forum/go_quote.gif ... I find that forums like these can make us care more about the hardware than what we are actually supposed to do with it, which is listen to music.

I agree... but to a point. Yes, we can get caught up in the "hardware" and spout specs and the like but keep in mind the audience. You get to a level of SQ and a lot of differences does come down to splitting hairs and that's what forums like these are for. These types of forums are for fanatics of whatever to pick things apart. The difference in opinion makes it interesting and fun IMO. Sure - you get trolls and unreasonable people but a well run forum - such as Head-Fi - keeps those posters to a minimum.

As for me: I kind of prescribe to the journey being half the fun. Trying various headphones and equipment, performing endless comparisons and doing various mods a big part of this crazy hobby. What makes it all worth it though is when I sit down with whatever 'phone/source that strikes me and have a nice long listening session.

 

[Jack Mono]

I am cheap. I would have never bought an other PMP if the Touch had a reasonable SQ for music. It is fine for CarTalk, but music is dead with it. I wish it wouldn't be, I had $120 more in my pocket... and a SONY S639 less... and that would be a shame! I have to admit it is newer than my Touch... and I bough the touch without listening to it... the wifi and safari alone made worth it that time.