Hi!
Well, the newest might not be the best in all cases.
So i am glad i did not buy any new Iphone this year.
/A
> On 18 Oct 2016, at 21:17, John Gurd <j.g...@ntlworld.com> wrote:
>
> I got an iPhone 7 a few days ago and had it away with me on a weekend break
> with limited opportunities to play with it.
>
>
>
> Well, on this list there’s always someone who wants to know what the phone
> speaker sounds like. To dispense with that question quickly, it’s the best
> sounding iPhone (that doesn’t have a Plus in its name) I’ve heard so far.
> Not surprising, as it has two tiny speakers instead of one so Voice Over and
> books on Voice Dream Reader sound very pleasant. I don’t listen to music on
> a phone speaker and am always surprised when people give this aspect of
> audio serious consideration.
>
>
>
> Of course the iPhone 7 is the infamous one where they got rid of the audio
> jack. So I took my trusty B&w P7 headphones, my ancient and cheap but
> much-loved (for sentimental reasons) Koss Porto Pros and my Bluetooth
> Plantronics BackBeat Pros and the lightening ear pods that ship with the
> device. No DAC except the little lightning to 3.5mm convertor supplied by
> Apple.
>
>
>
> Here are my first impressions and I have to emphasis they were entirely
> subjective with no attempt at rigor. Imagine my shock when I tried my P7s
> and thought they sounded awful! The mid-range was thin with a hardness I
> never noticed before. The base was there but not particularly extended. The
> music sounded kind of flat with no real involvement. For the first time I
> felt I knew what was meant when components were described as unmusical. When
> I then tried my Koss Porto Pros whose basic design hasn’t changed since the
> 1980’s and which at one point retailed at around £25 I actually thought they
> sounded better but with the qualities described above still present, perhaps
> with more space and a warmer tone. The Bluetooth BackBeat Pros sounded the
> best with musicality restored and a warmth replacing the hard midrange. The
> Apple earpods were what you would expect: a good reason for buying decent
> headphones for your Apple device.
>
>
>
> The culprit, of course, was the $9 DAC provided by Apple for those folk who
> will insist on owning headphones with a 3.5mm plug. The frustrating thing
> was that as I was away from home I couldn’t try any other lightning to audio
> DAC. I did have my Arcam MusicBoost case but as it is made for the thinner
> iPhone 6 I didn’t fancy having my new iPhone 7 permanently wedged in it. Out
> of desperation I did gingerly try to insert it but gave up when it became
> clear it would end in disaster.
>
>
>
> What I didn’t do (and still haven’t done) was try the above headphones with
> the audio jack on my old iPhone 6 to see if it really did sound worse on the
> iPhone 7 or if it was just a trick of the mind because I was expecting
> better. Since arriving home I have tried my P7s with the Oppo HA 2 DAC and
> the iPhone 7 and I am glad to say they were back to being absolutely
> stunning. That’s a relief. I then tried them again with the little Apple
> supplied DAC converter and although they weren’t as shockingly bad as my
> first impression they still sounded seriously under par, and that also when
> for my little plastic Porto Pros. Yet I still feel even the Porto Pros
> sounded better with the old audio jack. It mostly came down to that sense of
> hardness and lack of musicality I felt I detected.
>
>
>
> Well, what do you expect for what amounts to a $9 DAC, I hear you say. Most
> people who have a cheap pair of headphones won’t notice or care and will
> just want them to work. I am quite sure that some headphones will even sound
> better for it. But as I don’t always want to carry a separate and cumbersome
> DAC around with me for casual listening I do wish Apple had spent just a
> little more on their convertor.
>
>
>
> John Gurd
>
>
>
>
>
