Any recommendations?

I bought this for a 2nd system in my workshop, it performed really well for the money, however, I didn’t use it as a headphone amp, just to feed a hifi.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Behringer-UFO202-U-phono-Audio-Interface/dp/B002GHBYZ0/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1543573005&sr=8-1-fkmr0&keywords=beringer+usb+dac

If you want to spend a bit more this always gets good reviews. Never used one myself.

https://www.richersounds.com/headphones/headphone-amplifiers/audioquest-dragonfly-black.html

Don’t waste money on fancy cables and stuff.

Some Android devices need USB Audio Player Pro to output digital audio through the USB, others don’t.

http://www.extreamsd.com/index.php/products/usb-audio-player-pro

But I have already bought my headphones.Like I said before I`m not an audio snob and my own ears are probably not good enough to appreciate high end stuff. All I want is something that sounds “good enough” to me.

Reading others posts it sounds like a DAC could be a good investment in the future, and a cable will be better than BT.

You can’t beat the experience of personal comparison.

Get yourself down the shop.

Very true.

However, it’s the opposite of what the resident STW audiophile did.

Well quite. Being as my nearest Hifi shop is so far away I’d have to get on a plane, I had to resort to published reviews and advice from like-minded audiophiles on the Cult Of NAIM forum.

Fortunately, it worked out fine. When I lived in the U.K., personal auditioning was my preferred option, of course. What’s your point, BTW?

Don’t waste money on fancy cables and stuff.

Unless of course, having heard the difference, you don’t consider an improved SQ from better quality equipment to be a waste of money. And stuff.

In my V70 with the Premium Sound System upgrade from Dynadio.

https://www.dynaudio.com/car-audio/in-car-audio-the-history

The problem is you. As somebody once said, “the best sauce is hunger”. To put it another way, you’ve got to be in the mood. That applies to drinking wine, listening to music and pretty much any similar non-essential to life experience.

Having said that there are some situations (rigs?) that conspire against a good experience, so by all means follow the expert advice already given, but in the end you need to rejuvenate your taste buds. Unfortunately pot-soaked listening tends to mitigate against this. Try some (very) different music.

What’s your point, BTW?

That not everyone has the time, inclination or opportunity to do so.

Fortunately, it worked out fine.

How do you know if you have compared it side by side with other options?

Having said that there are some situations (rigs?)

Oh, rig. Definitely.

How do you know if you have compared it side by side with other options?

By ‘fine’ in this case, I mean that the improvement over the previous version of the rig was exactly what I was hoping for.

Don’t waste money on fancy cables and stuff.

Unless of course, having heard the difference, you don’t consider an improved SQ from better quality equipment to be a waste of money. And stuff.

Is this the difference to the signal passed that cannot be measured by any electrical engineers?

It’s certainly the difference that may or may not be heard by the human ear, to varying degrees or even not at all, from person to person.

Much as you would like to draw me into that tired old argument with your disingenuous query, I’m afraid I’ll have to decline.

I’d rather try and be helpful to the OP.

Have a nice day.

I think only one person has picked on the EQ questions so far.

So, anyone care to enlighten me on how to properly set one?

Try turning the noise cancelling off on the headphones see if they sound better.

Turn your Google play to use the highest quality. There is a difference when you turn up Google play to the highest setting.(you’ll probably need to redownload any offline music.)

As for the equaliser settings, use you ears basically. If it sounds harsh on the highs adjust the highs, my experice if mobile eqs on Android are rotten though.

I listen to music on some Sony mdr 7605, great for monitoring but they are flat, as intended, and make the highs a bit too crisp. So a slight adjustment makes them sound awesome for listening. I find a slight boost on the lows 20 to around 600hz and a slight drop around the 1khz to 4kz is just what they need. How I figured that out. Well close your eyes and adjust each sliider till it’s perfect. Go to the extremes then bring it right back to where you want it too be. That’s just on desktop though with a decent equalier mind and listening through a decent audio interface interface. Eq will only do so much if the equipment is deficient. But if the equipment is good you should be able to tune to your preference.

Every piece of audio equipment is coloured differently in some way though so there isn’t a one size fits all solution there.

If you want to understand eq have a listen to this dude rambling about it. Should educate you on what frequencies do what.

Trailwaggwr, do you want an EQ function so that you can adjust each piece of music that you listen to, to meet your tonal preference?

However you listen to it I’ll bet it’s better than me for the next month – secondhand from a pop-up ice rink in the car park, playing 5 year old plus pop songs at the volume where the speakers have started to distort. And they’ve not got enough music to cover 12-5 every day so there’s a lot of repeating. Going to be a long month!

So playing around then basically.

I guess what I was asking in a different way was how do I get to listen to the music the way the original producer intended? ie. if an EQ is off, is that the closest you will get or does the equipment your playing it through always make such a difference to the sound that you will never reproduce what the original producer heard

Trailwaggwr, do you want an EQ function so that you can adjust each piece of music that you listen to, to meet your tonal preference?

No, I`m asking what is the best way to use one. Should it never be touched? Should it be adjusted and played with to your own preference? Is there a standard default setting that works for most music?

watch the video I posted, that will answer lots of your EQ questions. Generally it is a case of just messing with it, but you can mess with it with a more educated understanding of what’s actually happening.

Is there a standard default setting that works for most music?

No, but, you’ll be able to find a setting that works for your equipment. but it’s variable to the equipment and person listening(everyone has different hearing abilities, and every bit of equipment is coloured in it’s own way). That’s all assuming equipment can replicate a decent sound(you don’t need to spend fortunes for this.)

As I said though, turning off the noise cancelling is your first port of call imo. (I googled your headphones, apparently the noise cancelling is rubbish.)

Well, from a ‘hifi’ point of view, EQ as an ‘in-system’ adjustment is an irrelevance.

The object of the exercise is deliver to your ears as close a copy of the original recording, however that has been encoded (streamed, CD, vinyl).

The downside to this is of course, if it’s a poor quality recording, it’ll sound poor quality (garbage in, garbage out, as was mentioned elsewhere).

I suppose it depends on how much you love a particular piece of music for it’s own sake, matching more than your baseline sonic acceptability requirement.

For instance, Jimmy Pages’ disastrous digital remixes of Led Zeppelins’ back catalogue have now rendered them unlistenable for me, but I’m not prepared to degrade my systems’ sonic veracity just to make them listenable at the expense of a lesser performance level for the rest of my collection generally…

I still recommend selecting the best performing non-Bluetooth non-NC headphones you can find, ‘Spotifying’ your mobile and buying a good quality cable.

I guess what I was asking in a different way was how do I get to listen to the music the way the original producer intended? ie. if an EQ is off, is that the closest you will get or does the equipment your playing it through always make such a difference to the sound that you will never reproduce what the original producer heard

Yes you are right. The only way would really know if you were listening to what the producer intended would be to use the equipment and room he monitored it on/in.

In a domestic situation the best chance you will have is good quality equipment (especially IMO power amps and speakers) and no EQ.

The object of the exercise is deliver to your ears as close a copy of the original recording,

The only way they could possibly do that is if a system was somehow able to replicate the sound of the the monitors and equipment used to mix the record, in every individual of recording. That info ain’t encoded in the file you are listening to, and your equipment isn’t looking for it.

Things are usually mixed on the basis of sounding good on a wide range of systems, that’s why people monitor with flat response speakers and will test on a wide variety of systems. flat response speakers ain’t the best things to listen to music on.

flat response speakers ain’t the best things to listen to music on.

That depends on the producer/type of music.

Yes you are right. The only way would really know if you were listening to what the producer intended would be to use the equipment and room he monitored it on/in.
In a domestic situation the best chance you will have is good quality equipment (especially IMO power amps and speakers) and no EQ.

Jeez, it must be so frustrating for producers to know that all the time and effort they put in, and no-one else will ever hear it as they intended it to sound ! What is the suicide rate amongst producers?

If you are saying no EQ, what happens if a person has a bad 2k – 4k dip in their hearing? Do they just ignore that? or should they adjust their eq to boost the EQ in those frequencies? They aren’t hearing these frequencies unless they turn it up. So they definitely aren’t hearing the music as intended.

EQ has it’s uses.

That depends on the producer/type of music.

yes absolutely, some music sounds awesome on flat response stuff. I’ve no argument there. Some doesn’t though.

That depends on the producer/type of music.

It ALL does! 😀

That info ain’t encoded in the file you are listening to, and your equipment isn’t looking for it.

There’s a thing. Surely in the digital age of music this could actually be encoded into the file and modern equipment have the ability to read it and reproduce the original sound?

copy of the original recording,

Or if you prefer, the encoded results released at the end of the process.

I agree with the comments re: flat response. Hence my previous about putting up with the likes of Jimmy “ Cloth Ears” Page…

My best advice is still the “Hifi” one within whatever is your affordable budget. Shop, ‘phones, Spotify, cable…

Good luck.

There’s a thing. Surely in the digital age of music this could actually be encoded into the file and modern equipment have the ability to read it and reproduce the original sound?

There’s more variables though, like room treatment(what you hear isn’t just what comes out your speakers, sound interacts with the environment) and as mentioned peoples actual ability to hear, plus there’s a billion different systems things are mixed on and intended to be played on etc. It’s a fairly futile exercise. And generally the idea isn’t just to give the person that spends 20k on their system a unique experience, it’s to give everyone a good experience, so the mixing/mastering process is, by it’s nature, a compromise.

That said, you will generally get a better experience if you spend more. How much more is up to you. Ultimately it’s about getting it to sound good to you. If it does, happy days.

When you’ve bought and used your choice, come back and tell us all about it. I’d love to know. 😁

All this talk about cables has prompted me to change mine, after realizing that I was using the wrong ones.

😆

Wow. I recommended one of the best low impedance/easily driven/no amp needed, no nonsense, industry proven headphones you can buy and people ignore it and go on about snake oil cables and expensive audio gear as an answer! Now I’m not saying they’re the best headphones by a long shot, but they are unbeatable on price, easy to live with and put some much higher priced pretenders to shame!

You might be able to EQ them JBL’s to sound a bit more like you want, depends how flawed the response is and whether they need an amp to drive them properly. JBL like many of the big names, Bose etc, use their pro brand image (dirty rip off merchants) to sell overpriced average performance consumer ranges with the odd decent product here and there.

There’ so much bullshit in the audio world it’s worse than politics!

Here you go, Dave Rat (5 part video) will help you out, if you have got a bit more brass to splash about!

Now I’m not saying they’re the best headphones by a long shot

Oh. Nice collection of dials and switches in that ‘tower’…

The only way they could possibly do that is if a system was somehow able to replicate the sound of the the monitors and equipment used to mix the record, in every individual of recording. That info ain’t encoded in the file you are listening to, and your equipment isn’t looking for it.

What about ‘auto configuration’ AV amps that use a room microphone and some wizzery to supposedly tune both the delays, volumes and tone output of the speakers?  My old Sony amp has a few settings which supposedly tweak the frequency response to match a few different specific ‘viewing theatres’  (rather than Yamahas ‘concert hall’, ‘stadium’, ‘jazz club’)

I guess what I was asking in a different way was how do I get to listen to the music the way the original producer intended? ie. if an EQ is off, is that the closest you will get or does the equipment your playing it through always make such a difference to the sound that you will never reproduce what the original producer heard

This is assuming that the producer was looking for total audio fidelity, but that’s not always the case; I read somewhere that one artist/producer listened to mixes through a cheap transistor radio, on the basis that that would be how the music would likely be reproduced. The fact is that recording quality can vary enormously, depending on who the producer and recording engineers were, and what the finished result was intended to sound like. Look up ‘Loudness Wars’ for an example of just how bad recording quality can get when the desire to make songs stand out when played on shitty phone speakers, etc. I suggest you track down a couple of very good books on music and read them, it’ll teach you so much more than you can get on here, and will also, with luck, teach you that you don’t need fancy equipment to really appreciate music, in fact the better the equipment, the more it can reveal flaws in the original recordings, or at least in how they were mastered. Listening to 320Kb AAC tracks played on my phone, and my old iPod Classic, through my UE TripleFi 10’s, or my Pinnacle P1’s, I can clearly hear differences in mastering quality on tracks as they play; music mastered by Bob Ludwig at Masterdisk has amazing subtlety and detail, and is very open, Paul Simon’s ‘Hearts And Bones’ is one of the best recordings I’ve ever heard, whereas the Jimmy Page Zeppelin re-masters of a few years ago are dire.

’How Music Works’, by David Byrne of Talking Heads is a great read, the ebook has actual samples of recordings he talks about, and ‘Perfecting Sound Forever’ by Greg Milner goes through recorded music history and the way technology has changed the way music is recorded and listened to

The thing is, a really good song can set your skin tingling when heard over a cheap radio, you don’t need a £1000 pair of fancy in-ear monitors plugged into a £1500 Sony Walkman to get that emotional response, I can get it from a pair of Apple EarPods plugged into an iPod Nano or my iPhone 6+, if the song itself strikes the right emotional chord, pun intended.

I’m not an audiophile by any stretch of the speaker cable but I know when something sounds good.

MP3s etc are compressed to save memory and this means much less quality. The source, the processor and the output device are all of equal importance.

CDs, although a forty year old media, are one of the fineses sources.

I listen to stuff on Spotify and if I like it, I order a CD.

My system is entry level but sounds very good.

Onkyo C7030 CD player (£200)

Yamaha R-S202D amp with tuner (including DAB) and bluetooth (£200)

DALI Spektor 1 speakers (£150)

and a pair of AKG K550 Mk iii (£150 although currently £100 on Amzn.)

Wow. I recommended one of the best low impedance/easily driven/no amp needed, no nonsense, industry proven headphones you can buy and people ignore it and go on about snake oil cables and expensive audio gear as an answer!

But I wasn’t looking for headphone recommendations. I was asking how to make the heaphones I already have sound better.

I’m not an audiophile by any stretch of the speaker cable but I know when something sounds good.

Snap!  Or so I thought.   Until last night after the other hi-fi thread when someone gave me age-related performance anxiety in the cochlea-dept, so I took this fun test to see if I could detect audio quality

4 out of 6 says I come up short 😤

I’d encourage anyone vaguely interested to try out equipment there when you have a quiet moment

The thing is, a really good song can set your skin tingling when heard over a cheap radio, you don’t need a £1000 pair of fancy in-ear monitors plugged into a £1500 Sony Walkman to get that emotional response, I can get it from a pair of Apple EarPods plugged into an iPod Nano or my iPhone 6+, if the song itself strikes the right emotional chord, pun intended.

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻+1

I often jump around in the kitchen first hearing something on the £30 Bush DAB echoing flatly and muddily around the room.  Then I check it out @ 320kbps on good headphones later on in the bedroom and it definitely looked better when the lights were off