been playing with my new FP2 for a little now. I had to realize that the audio quality from the headphone output is not sufficient for my needs. Do you think this can be a solvable software problem or might hardware limit the possibilities too much?
I have tested with the exact same audio files on the FP2 and my old S3 mini multiple times, no additional Equalizers on either device; the Samsung’s sound has a much higher resolution, sounds a lot more crisp and clear. As I really enjoy details and ‘crispness’ when listening to music this is kind of disappointing as I actually like the phone itself (I have to get used to the big screen size for sure but that’s a different topic).
I often use my phone to play music, so if I really want to keep this one for ~5 years, I’d have to rethink that plan if there is no way to get a better sound out of it.
Thanks for the tip, but I’ve already been using Poweramp Pro on my old phone for a long time and also played my comparison songs in Poweramp It is a great music player indeed.
Yes, I tried that. I have quite decent headphones and they also sound better with my old phone
It’s a possible explanation but I don’t think a worn out headphone jack sounds like this?
Actually it’s 4-6 hours to early to write this post, as my FP2 will be delivered today (!) and I can listen to myself, but this got me worried so much I just had to write. It would be very disappointing if the FP2 lacks in audio quality. My Sansa Clip+ broke down, but as the Fairphone is such a hefty thing that barely fits in a trouser pocket, I was planning not to replace my Sansa Clip but use the FP for music. My usual left pocket stash is phone, mp3, eye drops and clean handkerchief and with a Nokia 1100, it all fitted nicely, but the FP2 is supposed to replace both my Nokia 1100 and Sansa Clip. If the audio is that poor, I’d probably have to buy a belt clip indeed for my Fairphone and buy a new mp3-player.
Just did a quick 5 minutes of testing 3 different songs on my FP2 and my Laptop, playing them in sync and switching my headphones back and forth. I can’t say I notice any difference in audio quality. Bass and treble seem to be the same, max volume seems to be a bit higher on the FP2 than on my Asus laptop. My headphones are certainly no high quality ones, but I’ve been happy with them so far and so for me the FP2 sound output is fully sufficient…
Regards,
Could it be a possibility that they need to much power (in terms of impedance) which your FP2 could not provide and the S3 could?
do you use normal MP3s (kbps?) or as a semi-audiophile some kind of FLAC etc.?
Can anybody do a comparison between FP1 and FP2 with same track, same headphones and same player?
(I only can do when my blue FP2 arrives…)
For the FP1 I am quite happy with my Sennheiser PMX60 headphones (impedance 25 Ohm) , average MP3s and the standard music player (using the equalizer).
I have now tried a little more, but no different results. However I think I can live with it although I still believe it sounds a bit dull and lacks precision
I didn’t order the FP for using it as a high end music player but for known other reasons. I love pretty much everything else about the phone. This is why I’ll most likely keep it and if I really should get annoyed by its sound, I might just buy a good portable music player
Streaming via dlna works fine, by the way. no difference to my other devices. Haven’t tried Bluetooth yet as my sound system doesn’t support it.
My opinion, voiced in the First impressions topic:
And I agree with you on the sound being a bit dull, but I think that it stems from the device being new and not having played enough. What I always do when finding the sound dull, is let the device play lots of sound before judging:
I did find an app called Pink Noise on the Play Store that’s playing now on my Fairphone. From my experience with other device, it might take a full 24 hours of playing lots of different music or a few weeks of playing the device now and then, for the higher frequencies to sound well (I didn’t have access to pink noise, though what I would sometimes is play the radio without any station picked up, just the noise).
Well, it’s a phone not actual hifi…and most people will be playing MP3s on it (which always lose a LOT of high frequency detail and compress the volume range) but I think it’s pretty good. Better than my old motorola defy anyway.
Using some decent quality SHURE in-ear headphones in high bit rate MP3’s sound as good as they’re going to get. I also tried with some Grado SR80 “hifi” head phones, and those, whilst very detailed, are a bit quiet and thin on bass - harder to drive presumably as they’re designed to work with a dedicated headphone amp.
Now I admit, I’m a bit deaf and need hearing aids to hear much above 6kHz … but tweaking up the top two eq bands does exactly what my hearing aids do.
If I want quality I put the big hifi on and play wav files through my 1.5m tall loudspeakers :¬)
I guess some of you with young ears can hear the deficiencies - in the MP3s as well as in the player!
I tried some 30 € gaming headset and my Sennheiser Momentum Over-Ear (18 Ohm). That impedance should be fine I think
The songs I tested with were .wma at 160kBit/s. I usually don’t really care about the format, it works fine for me that way. Actually I never compared audio quality of the same song in two different formats. Still I don’t use .wav or flacs, simply because of the file sizes.
I’ll let some pink noise run through the phone and eventually report back if I can hear a difference.
I’m really just a SEMI-audophile guy, so all my statements might not sound very professional and represent my very personal impressions
Listening to music is a very personal experience, it can lead to nebolous discriptions of characteristics like dull or vivid sound… Try to listen to details or differences in complex (accoustic) music on good headphones. Playing a lot (pink noise) won’t change anything in the hardware. Perhaps it will change something between your ears.
It is a great music player indeed.
. I’m 45.
Still I don’t use .wav or flacs, simply because of the file sizes.