Quote:
| *whisper*try the players yourself!*whisper* |
Amazing. took 2 pages, yet someone has finally become the true voice of reason. Well, my first instinct is to tell you to keep the iHP. However, I'm guilty of having an ulterior motive. That being, having you sign up to
Mistic River in order that you grace us with your beautiful mug at 150x150 px
(you could anyway ya know
)
Now for my real input:
Sound quality as you damned well know, shall always be a subjective matter. I own an IHP 120 and have spent a fairly good amount of time "listening" to a third and fourth gen iPod (recently at that, seeing as how two of my co-workers always have them on hand..and a mini as well) with my cans. All I can say about the whole "purity" thing, is that I do not get a sense that there's more of it when listening to the iPod over the iHP. To me, that's just not an appropriate word to use as a descriptive. I'd say that the colouring is "different", not non-existent. Some may prefer the colouring of the iPod and some the opposite. I personally think that they both sound very nice with good cans and well ripped/encoded music.
Both the iPod's and IHP's EQ sections are pretty basic, but I prefer the IHP in terms of post tweak sound. Some of the frequencies tend to distort lesser cans with the iPod...it's been proven many times over. But really, the ONLY way you'll be satisfied, is by trying the same exact music, with the same cans on BOTH DAP's. After that, it's a cakewalk IMO. I mean basically, if you think that the sound on both is too hard to compare, or that it's negligible, then all you have to do is place your priorities.
For me, it was having a useful remote (I don't like holding my baby unless I'm home or in the graces of a friends place, and I don't see the point of the one the iPod comes with..it's useless for navigating), drag and drop capabilities, not needing software AT ALL for the sake of connectivity, a line out ON the unit (yeah yeah, they say it's not real, but it sure works for me !) . The other PLUSES for me were the recording (which you have to pay extra for as an accessory for the iPod) and the FM radio (also another paid for extra with Pod)
As for the GUI/UI: This is the one thing which I suppose I'll argue about with people till the end of time. Yes sure, the iPods interface is pretty damned intuitive. It wins first in its class award. No argument there. But if I have to start insulting people, (and gosh darn it I will) for making it seem like those who are not blessed with an IQ of 210 would be reading manuals for days trying to figure out the IHP's UI, then so be it ! I REALLY just don't understand this hive mentality thing. I mean, am I the only one not afraid to say that people must be daft or stoned lazy if they suggest that the IHP is difficult to navigate ? No. It's not iPod navigation, NO other DAP will be. Get over it people. And when you've got features such as recording and FM radio built in, with x amount of buttons, you'd better believe that reading a sentence in an instructional booklette MIGHT be a necessity for some people who don't feel like fiddling with everything.
Outside of all that, I've no real brilliant ideas, comments or suggestions. Again, it's all about priorities. I doubt you'd be dissatisfied either way. Good luck and happy listening.
Doug
(BTW I didn't vote, never tried an ipod)
