wired.com — Old-time audiophiles must be spinning in their soundproof graves. Thanks to hardware modifications and headphone amplifiers, the humble iPod is earning a place at the heart of the most expensive and exacting sound systems.
May 16, 2006 View in Crawl 4
internetuserMay 16, 2006
I hate saying this because it's so flame-baity but I disagree strongly with the assertion that the iPod's sound processor is equivalent to a mid-range piece of stereo equipment. In my view, it's below the quality of other (and cheaper) portable music players like iRiver, Cowon and Rio. I have owned two iPods and three other mp3 players - all three were superior to the iPod in terms of sound quality. The sound lacks any kind of power in the low end and the eq effects are dreadful. Have you noticed that the volume setting is applied *after* the eq effects are applied to the sound? The result when using powerful eq settings is a distorted sound at low volumes - completely unacceptable - how did this get past QA ??This (and a lack of support for a couple of choice audio formats) puts me off buying another iPod. The style, interface, ease-of-use however is *excellent*. And for the majority of people the sound quality is more than acceptable. But to equate it with audiophile sound equipment is an insult.Oh, and I'm *not* one of those people who think vinyl sounds better! :p
beforesevenMay 16, 2006Submitter
I have my iPod hooked up to my hi-fi using Xitel's hi-fi dock. The iPod's dock connector is a direct line out (and therefore unamplified). Also, eq effects are not applied to the line out. I agree, though, that the eq effects cause distortion on the headphone out. I found this link (<a class="user" href="http://dapreview.net/e107_plugins/content/content.php?content.133)">http://dapreview.net/e107_plugins/content/content.php?content.133)</a> to be extremely helpful in solving this problem.
daftsavantMay 16, 2006
"For the truly discerning, Red Wine Audio will modify the iPod's hardware to turn it into a miniature, high-quality music server." @ <a class="user" href="http://www.americanwired.com/audio/imod/imod.html">http://www.americanwired.com/audio/imod/imod.html</a>