- Choosing a Portable Music Player
- Playing Music on a Smartphone
- Playing Music on a Tablet
- Managing Music on Your Portable Device
- Improving Your Device's Sound Quality
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
Improving Your Device’s Sound Quality
When you play music on your portable music player or smartphone, you’re playing back audio files encoded with lossy compression, typically at a midgrade bitrate. That means the music isn’t that great to start with, but probably good enough for listening on the go.
That said, there are ways to make your iPod, iPhone, or whatever device it is you’re using sound better when you’re listening to your favorite tunes. I’m not talking about encoding at a higher bitrate or using lossless compression, both of which will increase file size and let you store less music on your device. Instead, I’m talking about improving playback by changing what you use to listen to your portable player.
Upgrading Your Earbuds (or Headphones)
Let’s start with the obvious. Whatever type of portable device you’re using, even one of Apple’s, the little earbuds that come from the factory are fairly low grade. Oh, they’re fine for most folks who just want background music, but they don’t have the fidelity that audiophiles and other serious music lovers are accustomed to.
To that end, the quickest and easiest way to improve the sound quality of your iPod, iPhone, or whatever is to upgrade from the stock earbuds. You can choose a better pair of earbuds or replace the buds with a set of good headphones. The difference in fidelity will be impressive.
How easy is it to switch from the stock earbuds? Very easy, since all earbuds and most headphones sold today either come with a mini-jack plug or with a mini-jack adapter for the traditional 1/4-inch plug. This makes it easy to connect just about any buds or phones to your portable device.
What kind of earbuds can you choose from? Here’s a short list of some of the more popular models—excluding low-end replacement items:
- Kicker EB101 (www.kicker.com, $39)
- Klipsch Image S4 (www.klipsch.com, $79)
- Bose IE2 (www.bose.com, $99), shown in Figure 27.20
- Beats by Dr. Dre iBeats (beatsbydre.com, $119)
- Beats by Dr. Dre Tour (beatsbydre.com, $149)
- Bowers & Wilkins C5 (www.bowers-wilkins.com, $179)
FIGURE 27.20 Bose’s IE2 “in-ear headphones.”
And here are some of the more popular headphones for portable use:
- Koss Porta Pro KTC (www.koss.com, $79), shown in Figure 27.21
- Sennheiser HD 558 (www.sennheiserusa.com, $179)
- Beats by Dr. Dre Solo HD (www.beatsbydre.com, $199)
- Bose QuietComfort 15 (www.bose.com, $299), shown in Figure 27.22
- Bowers & Wilkins (www.bowers-wilkins.com, $299)
- Beats by Dr. Dre Studio (www.beatsbydre.com, $299), shown in Figure 27.23.
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FIGURE 27.21 Koss’s affordable Porta Pro KTC headphones, complete with microphone and controls for iPhone use.
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FIGURE 27.22 Bose’s QuietComfort 15 noise-canceling headphones.
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FIGURE 27.23 Beats by Dr. Dre Studio headphones.
Of these units, the hottest on the market today are the various Beats by Dr. Dre. Listeners love the enhanced fidelity (and slightly pumped bass) you get from all Beats models; the higher-end Studio model is true audiophile quality. (My book editor got some Beats for his birthday and says he’s in nirvana—and not the grunge type.) They’re definitely worth a listen.
ULTIMATELY USEFUL
If you listen to your iPod or iPhone while cutting the grass, traveling on a plane, or in other situations where there’s a lot of loud background noise, consider investing in a set of noise-canceling earbuds or headphones. These units, such as those Bose’s QuietComfort line, use active noise-canceling technology to cancel out background noise and deliver a much cleaner listening experience. I’ve found they definitely reduce in-flight headaches when flying cross-country.
Adding an Outboard DAC
The other way to improve music playback on your portable device is to use an outboard digital-to-analog converter (DAC). That’s because most portable devices, especially smartphones, have fairly mediocre internal DACs. Bypassing the internal DAC with an external one provides much better conversion to analog, which will improve playback over either earbuds or headphones.
ULTIMATELY INTERESTING
Learn more about DACs in Chapter 24, “Playing Digital Music on Your Computer.”
The challenge is finding an outboard DAC that is compatible with the iPod’s digital audio output, via the dock connector. There are only a handful, including the following:
- Pure i-20 Digital Dock (www.pure.com, $99)
- High Resolution Technologies iStreamer (www.highresolutiontechnologies, $199)
- NuForce Icon iDo (www.nuforce.com, $249)
- Fostex HP-P1 (www.fostexinternational.com, $649), shown in Figure 27.24
- Peachtree iDac (www.peachtreeaudio.com, $999)
ULTIMATELY CAUTIOUS
Don’t assume that just any outboard DAC can connect via USB to your iPod or iPhone. Even though you can run a cable from the iPod’s dock connector to your DAC’s USB input, very few DACs can decode the encoded digital signal coming out of the iPod. That’s right, Apple encodes its digital signal and has only given the “keys” to a handful of DAC manufacturers.
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FIGURE 27.24 The Fostext HP-P1, designed especially for iPod/iPhone use.
The question is, is it really worth it to add an outboard DAC to your iPod or iPhone? It certainly does up your total expense. To be honest, you’ll get more immediately noticeable results by spending that same money (or less!) on a good set of headphones. But past that, if you really want the best sound possible, an outboard DAC does deliver—albeit subtly. Frankly, if you can notice the difference from an outboard DAC, you probably should be encoding your audio files at a higher bitrate, which also improves the sound quality.
It’s all a matter, I suppose, of how much effort and expense you want to go to maximize the sound quality of your portable playback. For some music lovers, no effort should be spared. For others, upgrading from the stock earbuds is effort enough. As with all things musical and digital, let your own ears be your guide.