do or don't

[WalkGood]

Originally Posted by lem7

Enthusiast... I like it! =D

Cant believe I called everyone Audiophiles when they weren't xD

lol, I actually take offense to that name

[CrowdAds]

[steinburger1109]

I've been refraining from commenting, but I shall now.

Originally Posted by WalkGood

lol, I actually take offense to that name

I was thinking the exact same thing! I mean, I know that I like my music, and I like it to sound good, but audiophile has always felt just a tad too extreme for my liking....

[Adub]

Indeed and it's such a pretentious moniker to be associated with, which is why i was a little pushy earlier. I think most audiophiles are quite ignorant (lolcables, lolhead-fi) and adopt the title to feel like they are in a special social group. Audiophiles play their hardware not their music!

[Ultimate Viking]

Originally Posted by Adub

Audiophiles play their hardware not their music!

Well said.

[Marvin the Martian]

Originally Posted by Adub

Audiophiles play their hardware not their music!

Epic, and true!

[bikertrash]

The term audiophile is good for posers with money who are always trying to buy the latest and greatest and brag about the graphs.
Just buy a cheap setup and take the money you save for awesome headphones, then save up for the latest MicroTosh J3 Zen. But without good phones, anything you get will suck.

[Adub]

Originally Posted by bikertrash

But without good phones, anything you get will suck.

To a certain degree, with a shitty source it doesn't matter how good your phones' are they are going to sound like crap. Source is definitely the most important aspect.

[bikertrash]

The thing is that with most of the mainstream players you really don't have to worry about sound quality and the thing that does set players apart are the sound enhancements. You really have to go out of your way to get a crappy sounding player. Take away the J3s sound enhancements and it's just another run of the mill player. knowing that, I disagree, a 40 buck Clip+ and 200 buck Senns or whatever are a fine combo, and the phones will go well with whatever upgrade you make in the future.

[Zuniq]

Originally Posted by bikertrash

The thing is that with most of the mainstream players you really don't have to worry about sound quality and the thing that does set players apart are the sound enhancements. You really have to go out of your way to get a crappy sounding player. Take away the J3s sound enhancements and it's just another run of the mill player. knowing that, I disagree, a 40 buck Clip+ and 200 buck Senns or whatever are a fine combo, and the phones will go well with whatever upgrade you make in the future.

I don't agree...many players under 100 euros (except Clip) sound like crap (with or without enhancements)...and it seems that most of the people use these players...(at least in my country). Also, I hate enhancements...they are altering the original frequency content...they give you something artificial, far from the original studio work.

I would say that good portable audio quality is a combination between the output quality of the source and the quality of earphones.

Sennheisers suck IMO...

[Adub]

Sound enhancements such as EQ, Xfeed and personally to a lesser degree BBE are very important when talking about sound quality. Which is why a clip/cowon/rockbox player is going to make lesser headphones function at a much higher level than something like a zune or an ipod with their functionally retarded sound enhancements. So i still stand by the fact that source makes a bigger difference hands down.

Originally Posted by Zuniq

I hate enhancements...they are altering the original frequency content...they give you something artificial, far from the original studio work.

Sennheisers suck IMO...

I have a hard time taking anything seriously when said by someone with such opinions.

[Marvin the Martian]

Originally Posted by Zuniq

Also, I hate enhancements...they are altering the original frequency content...they give you something artificial, far from the original studio work.

That sounds like "audiophile-speak" to me.

Originally Posted by Zuniq

Sennheisers suck IMO...

Maybe you didn't try one of the good models.....there are good and bad Sennheisers.

[steinburger1109]

Alright. These are my last two cents in this topic (I think) ANYWAY. Regardless of what you get or what you want, you will NOT find a better sound quality value than the Clip+ and a pair of Panasonic RP-HJE900. Both of those together will cost you around 120-130 USD. Strictly talking sound quality to price ratio, a better deal is a physical impossibility (and yes I feel that strongly about the Panas) And I must agree with Adub, Rockbox is a heavenly bit of software, and a must in most players that it is actually coded for.

[sracer]

Originally Posted by WalkGood

I believe you misunderstand the definition of audiophile, glad to see you looked it up and learned. I think everyone here is definitely a hobbyist or enthusiast to some degree but what you stated originally is not correct. An audiophile uses specially recorded CD’, perfect LP’s, FLAC or other high bit lossless audio compression. They tend to believe that every little tweak to either power line (AC filtering), cables and every little component a long the chain makes the difference in their quest for perfect audio reproduction. BTW most hard core audiophiles do not believe in EQ …

I prefer enthusiast or hobbyist but I'm sure others will post their thoughts ...

You were on the right track, but you comment about the EQ is incorrect. Most hard core audiophiles DO believe in EQ... but NOT for the same reasons that non-audiophiles use it. Enthusiasts and hobbyists use the EQ function to adjust the emphasis on frequencies to their own personal preferences.

Whereas audiophiles use an EQ to do just that... equalize the sound based on the acoustic properties of the room. Speaker placement, furniture placement, wall hanging, flooring, humidity, etc. can all affect how sound is absorbed and reflected. The proper use of an EQ can compensate for those things.

[lestatar]

Wow, this thread took a massive left turn and even more amazingly, I had absolutely nothing to do with it!

@OP, seems you have decided on the J3. An excellent choice IMO and I am betting you will love it, especially the tasty sound toys and being free from Zune software walled garden. Enjoy!

Originally Posted by steinburger1109

Alright. These are my last two cents in this topic (I think) ANYWAY. Regardless of what you get or what you want, you will NOT find a better sound quality value than the Clip+ and a pair of Panasonic RP-HJE900. Both of those together will cost you around 120-130 USD. Strictly talking sound quality to price ratio, a better deal is a physical impossibility (and yes I feel that strongly about the Panas) And I must agree with Adub, Rockbox is a heavenly bit of software, and a must in most players that it is actually coded for.

But yeah ^...what steinburger says! The Panas + pretty much any DAP/PMP is a total winning combination IMO.

BTW, FWIW, music enthusiast is my personal choice - it sounds snazzy and just barely pretentious enough while still remaining humble and understandable.

[Zuniq]

Originally Posted by Marvin the Martian

That sounds like "audiophile-speak" to me.

Nope, I don't use golden plated cables and speakers which cost millions...

An audiophile for me is someone who has much money to spend on gimmicks...

I love to hear records in the way they were produced, not in the way I like.

Originally Posted by Marvin the Martian

Maybe you didn't try one of the good models.....there are good and bad Sennheisers.

You are right, my px100 headphones and my hd600 sound great. I have tested most of the sennheiser earphones though and I didn't like them at all. I haven't tested IE series though...

[medion]

I just don't see a true audiophile using a PMP with lossy codecs...

[bikertrash]

Originally Posted by medion

I just don't see a true audiophile using a PMP with lossy codecs...

Hight bit rate or FLAC would work. I really like my Zen with Grado SR60s, I couldn't possibly reproduce that sound on a speaker system for under a grand. I don't use the equalizer at all with the Grados, and it's fine. I've gotten lazy because of that because I find I don't want to deal with the equalizer with my cheap phones, which I always used to tweak the equalizer with my PortaPros on, but now I just figure I'm outside, outside noise will enter, why bother?

[Adub]

You can pickup a pair of Wharfedale Evo2-10 monitors for around $650-700 and a decent stereo receiver for around $100-150 and a 10" sub to make it up to $1000. A system like that would put pretty much any headphone/source combo to shame unless it was a really high quality setup like HD650s and a nutty amp. The SR-60 and Zen would not stand a chance, hell they wouldn't stand a chance in comparison to my stereo system and it's nothing special.

[Marvin the Martian]

bikertrash:I really like my Zen with Grado SR60s, I couldn't possibly reproduce that sound on a speaker system for under a grand. I don't use the equalizer at all with the Grados, and it's fine.

I love my Grado SR60i's, have ever since I got them in the spring of 2009....but you're exaggerating their capabilities when you say it would take a $1k speaker setup to reproduce their sound, I think. Don't get me wrong, I love them and use them almost every single day.....but you may be overestimating their capabilities a bit.

[steinburger1109]

@Adub, I'd be VERY surprised if you couldn't put together a $1000 full-blown stereo system that had worse sound quality than ANY earphones. :P