[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Grado sr60, sr80 or something else
Fifer;164448 Wrote: I've owned a pair of SR-80s for 3 or 4 years now and they are excellent headphones. I also own Sennheiser HD-650s. The HD-650s are better phones, but not 3x better and they cost 3x as much. Although it's worth noting that the HD-580s are available (at Amazon at least) for $125, and they're 90% of the HD-650s. This is an absolutely stunning bargain, really. That said, I wouldn't recommend those to the original poster, because they're going to need an amp to be driven by most portable players (an iRiver player made them sound okay; an iPod couldn't get them to satisfactory volume at max settings; both would have benefited enormously from an amp), and they leak sound like crazy. But incredible comfort and sound quality matching that of $3K speakers for $125 is still an attractive proposition. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=30865 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Portable hi-fi
Evanus;162735 Wrote: Hi. I'm curious, do any of you know of any portable (pocket) stereo player that can yield really precise and good sound? Your best bet would be to take the player out of the equation entirely. The iRiver H140 (which has been discontinued for a while) has a digital output on it, from which you can go to an external DAC. Put that together with HeadRoom's Micro DAC/Amp combo, and you'll have a source that's a worthy match for any headphone. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=30642 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: 320kbps -- too much?
Patrick Dixon;162604 Wrote: I think you should definitely put that at the top of every post where you say that there is no (or an insignificant) difference between transports and DACs! It just goes to show how differently people listen to and hear music, and how unwise it is (IMO) to take advice from people re sound quality on internet fora. Out of curiosity, have you done a blind test between lossless and good-quality lossy music? I'd've sworn that I could tell 192kbps MP3 from FLAC, but using the ABX Comparator in Foobar (with MP3s encoded with LAME v2, which is about 190kbps), I was guessing. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=30594 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: 320kbps -- too much?
highdudgeon;162240 Wrote: Hi -- I've been having some drop outs with albums ripped under AAC at 320kbps. Airport Extreme network, 802.11b/g, 100% signal strength. Am I better ripping at a lower rate? Does it even matter, so long as it is above MP3? You shouldn't be having network-related dropouts unless you have lots of other network traffic (downloading something on a laptop, or the like). I routinely stream FLAC on a G network with no problem. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=30594 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Transporter reviews by owners please
flattop100;143154 Wrote: Wait, no, that's wrong. TP seems a little louder. Mids are clearer and more present. Mid-bass on down is much smoother, and there's more of it. And WOW is it a lot punchier - much more in the way of low-end dynamics. If the Transporter actually IS a little louder, you'd expect the other improvements to flow automatically, without any other benefit being necessary. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=28056 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: The modifying crowd and the Transporter
opaqueice;142809 Wrote: So all this argument over science having a long way to go, etc. is irrelevant to the main point, which is whether or not some or most of these mods are snake-oil. That can be decided cleanly and definitively in a few minutes. The fact that this is never done says a lot about the integrity of the industry. Rather, the fact that it IS done (I've read on the internet blind tests -- by people who were affirmatively looking to prove the positive -- of audio cables, power cords, and amps, all of which came out negative), but people buy the snake oil anyway, says a lot about the buying public. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=28080 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: What should be the first upgrade?
jmourik;143094 Wrote: That's kind of my problem... I -think- I want the outlaw 990/7125 + bw 803s, but I can't go to a shop and listen to that combination. Of course I can listen to the 803s, but the outlaw is internet only. So I don't know really where to start. Shall I order the outlaw, and see how it works in my current system, then go for the 803s? Or get a transporter first, then the outlaw, or ... Decisions, decisions... The speakers will completely overwhelm any other differences you might have. I say, find a pair of speakers you like, get them, and then find stuff that works well with those speakers. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=28256 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Optimizing PC Sound
cliveb;140937 Wrote: By the same reasoning, a Squeezebox is an external DAC with an Ethernet input, and it costs no more than the MicroDAC. Perhaps just buying another Squeezebox (and a $10 Ethernet hub if necessary) would be the simplest way of achieving equal sound quality. But it doesn't have the same functionality. A sound card (whether USB or internal) can be used for listening to games, DRMed audio, movies, or whatever other incidental sounds you might have. The Squeezebox can't do that. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=28023 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Transporter analog out questions
Pat Farrell;141120 Wrote: To start with, tags in a music file have to follow whatever hierarchical structure the files are in (unless, horrors, it is flat). What people care about is relational data, who the players are, writers, etc. Attempting to emulate a relational database in flat or hierarchical data is at best a ton of wasted work. Good thing that relational databases have been known technology for 30+ years. The trick is to make all the voodoo, selects, outer joins, etc. invisible to the user. A centralized database is a fine implementation choice for a particular player, enabling various sorts, filters, and views of the data. Which is why almost all programs, from iTunes to WMP to Slim to Foobar, use a database internally. But a database is a TERRIBLE place to use as the primary storage for a file's metadata. It's difficult to use with multiple applications, it's a single point of failure that can wipe out all metadata, and it means that files copied off somewhere else lose all their metadata. Metadata belongs in tags, and players that use metadata should build internal database caches of the metadata. Which is, fortunately enough, exactly the current situation. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=27946 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Transporter analog out questions
Pat Farrell;141143 Wrote: We are not talking about a particular player we are talking about SlimServer which is a music libary. SlimServer is a single application. Anything you put into SlimServer's database won't be available for all the other apps that you use to play your music, or all the other devices to which you sync it. That's fine for metadata you don't really care about in a primary fashion, I suppose -- if it's only useful to SlimServer, it's just as well that only SlimServer know about it -- but definitely not how you'd want to handle Artist/Title/Genre stuff. You are correct that moving files makes it harder to track the descriptive data, but it is by no means all that hard. I don't believe you understood what I was saying. Any time you copy files in a way that's not aware of the database -- by using a regular file copy in Windows Explorer, an FTP upload, a BitTorrent thing, whatever -- the metadata doesn't go along for the ride, and is lost. This is one of the well-known problems with centralized metadata stores, and one of the reason that in-file metadata is standard for essentially all types of files these days. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=27946 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Transporter analog out questions
Pat Farrell;141161 Wrote: The relational database is critical to what I want to do. I frankly don't understand what your objection is, I am not suggesting that I (or Slim) force you to do it my way. I just want the ability to do it the right way. I was just confused by your using the shorthand of the right way to mean the right way, assuming you never use any other software or devices, and never move or copy your files. Carry on. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=27946 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Transporter analog out questions
Pat Farrell;140597 Wrote: Right, Amazon only has mass market stuff. A lot of 'classical' CDs are lucky to sell as many as 10,000 copies, which doesn't even count for Amazon. AllMusic has many more, but I don't like their navigation to find them. Amazon actually has more CD covers than you think. The key is to search for Classical Music instead of Music. Apparently, Classical isn't a subset of music, it's an entirely different thing. I spent a few frustrating hours updating my album art in Windows Media Player before I realized that I was misusing Amazon. (And someone earlier in the thread asked how cover art was embedded. In most metadata schemes, it's possible to put the cover art directly into a tag in the audio file. Adding cover art to WMA via WMP puts the tag in and creates the jpg in the folder.) -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=27946 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Squeezebox Class D!
joncourage;136621 Wrote: What I don't really understand is a Class D award after JA saying that he could barely tell the difference from a component that (I'm guessing) got a Class A or B. The class-to-dollars correlation is shockingly high in Stereophile. The Transporter should be a shoo-in for at least Class B; if they make a $10K ultra-luxe version, it's got Class A written all over it. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=27452 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Using Transporter with DVD-A, SACD, HD DVD, Blu-Ray, etc
jeffluckett;134726 Wrote: That's very true. But even if they were to devise a PERFECT digital protection scheme, there's always the analog hole which is nearly impossible to plug. Someone with a bit of know-how could very easily capture the analog signals (by tapping into the speaker-outs if need be) and simply remaster a distribution. Granted, there will be some quality loss, but if done carefully, most people wouldn't be able to tell the difference. That's true for audio, for now. But it's already not true for video: Anyone making an HD-DVD or Blu-Ray disc can set the flag that prevents analog from seeing a resolution higher than 640x480.There doesn't appear to be any concerted movement to eliminate analog connections in audio, for a number of good reasons, but it's not impossible in principle. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=27136 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Transporter power supply access
jacobdp Wrote: I'm thinking of getting the HeadRoom Micro Amp with the desktop electronics module. The AC adapter they provide appears to be a fairly standard wall-wart It's not. The brick hanging in the middle of the cord is substantially larger than a normal wall-wart, about the size of the Micro Amp itself. Up until I got an Xbox 360, I thought it was pretty much the largest power brick I'd see... -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=26646 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Help: Headphones The Choices!
Kobe Wrote: I prefer Circum-aural or In-ear canal headphones, so im leaning towards E3c's or HD485's. I wouldn't by IEMs for a main headphone. They're more comfortable than you'd think, but not so comfortable you want to wear them for significant lengths of time in a daily basis. If you're going to be in noisy environments that you want to tune out (airplanes, say), they're indispensable; but for regular life, they're not entirely comfortable. Plus, while the sound quality is amazing compared to earbuds, it's not as good as an excellent circumaural headphone. Nor is it as consistent -- minor positioning differences during insertion (or as they shift around as you move) can radically change the sound. I'd recommend the HD-580. They're phenomenal headphones, with sound quality rivaling that of $3,000 speakers, and they're only $150. These are genuinely one of the best audio buys around. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=26363 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Squeezebox vs Xbox 360?
MUCHO Wrote: I was explaining my new Squeezebox to my boss so he comes over to check it out. Instead of buying a Squeezebox he decides to figure out how to stream music from his Xbox 360. If I'm using a digital out I would imagine there wouldn't be too much difference from using the Xbox360 vs the Squeezebox - unless I'm missing something? Anyone compared the two? I'm considering selling the Squeezebox for a 360 due to the additional utility but I'm not looking to sacrifice a lot of sound quality (Although I would be willing to sacrifice a little) Possible reasons to stick with the SB: 1. The Xbox 360 (I've read but not tested) resamples everything to 48KHz. 2. The fan in the 360 is loud, for audio gear. It's not running full-speed when working as a Media Center Extender, but it's still running loud enough to be irritating for music purposes. 3. The 360's UI isn't as nice as the Squeezebox's, and not just because you need the TV on to use the 360. (I'm talking here about the Media Center Extender version; the WMC version isn't better.) The primary advantages to the 360 over the Squeezebox are that: 1) It can play PFS DRMed tracks, and 2) it can do a LOT more than just play music. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=23614 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Headphone output
jacobdp Wrote: I'm just trying to figure out when (if) it would be worth using an external headphone amp. Obviously the DAC and analog line outputs of the SB2/3 are supposed to be audiophile-grade, and there's been a lot of discussion on them here, but I haven't seen much talk of using the built-in headphone amp for a good listening setup. Is it designed to the same level? Get an amp. The headphone jack on the SB2 isn't bad, but it's not great. It can drive the demanding HD-650 headphones to moderately loud volumes without much in the way of distortion; but the difference between the SB2's headphone jack and the output of a HeadRoom Micro Amp is huge, a genuine Wow moment if you've got the headphones to benefit from it. (For calibration of what I mean by huge: I think cables make zero impact, I think DACs in modern equipment make very little impact (I couldn't tell a difference between the SB2 and the SB2 through a Benchmark DAC-1), I think regular power amplifiers for speakers don't make much of a difference once you've gotten above a certain base quality level -- but I think speakers and headphones make a huge and obvious difference, and that lossless compression sounds noticeably better than 192kbps.) -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=23096 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: SB3 - Benchmark DAC-1 versus Analogue Out
rmasson Wrote: In comparing the SB3 analogue to the SB3 digital via the DAC 1 there is one important note to make: The output level on the SB3 analogue is significantly higher then the DAC-1 so this needs to be adjusted for prior to doing any valid comparison. My current amp (PS-Audio GCC-100) allows you set the gain of each input so I made sure they were as close as possible before the comparison, although it is important to mention I had to do this by ear as I do not have the appropriate electronic measurement tools to be able to ensure they were within +-1dB (if any one does I would like to see if you get the same results). Once this was done, however, the differences become apparent. One thing that's interesting to do in those kinds of situations is to do the initial test, then adjust the levels to equalize it (that is, turn up the one you thought was worse by a titch), then listen some more. It's surprising how often the one that you think is better ends up losing that title if you just titch up the volume on the other one. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=19850 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: SB-3 and external DAC
highdudgeon Wrote: I'm wondering how many people have done careful listening comparing the Squeezebox with and without a high-end external DAC? IE, is there much benefit to be gained? Little? None at all? I couldn't hear any difference at all between the Squeezebox straight-up and running through a Benchmark DAC-1, and ended up returning the DAC-1. That was on my main system, Parasound amplification to Paradigm Studio 100 speakers. I _think_ that I can tell a difference between it straight-up and running through the HeadRoom Micro DAC, but I wouldn't swear to that; I didn't do anything like a rigorous comparison, because I knew that I was keeping the Micro DAC no matter what (it has a USB input, and it's way way better than the sound card in my computer, so I use it to listen to music when at the computer) and didn't end up keeping it hooked up to the SB. Associated equipment on that was HeadRoom's Micro Amp driving HD-650 headphones. It's possible that my speaker system isn't good enough to reveal differences between the built-in and an external DAC, so if you've got a system that you've spent $20K on, you'll probably want to try it out anyway. But for the most part, I expect that differences between competent modern DACs are going to be very very subtle. At the very least, if you decide to try a DAC out, make sure you can return it. -- mkozlows mkozlows's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=62 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=17948 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Re: Will an outboard dac be an improvment over my Anthem AVM20
The CAL has tubes, right? If so, then it's clearly worse (in the measurable fidelity sense) than both the Anthem and the SB2; but if you like the tube thing, then get a tube DAC. -- mkozlows ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
