02-28-2018, 11:08 PM
(02-27-2018, 10:47 PM)linus Wrote: I'm more of a word and picture than sound person (which is not to say I don't like music, only that I've never really been an audiophile) but I recently retired my 10+ year old Samsung K3 mp3 player (which served me well for several thousand runs and walks, but was starting not to stay charged, had strange lines on the display, and the fake chrome bezel had long ago worn off - not a bad deal for the 35 bucks I had paid for it though, refurbished). Anyhow, I fast discovered that while the mass market for digital audio players has just about dried up (phones and all), there's a booming niche market for upscale dacs: Astell and Kern is the schmancy brand, and the highest end walkman (remember those?) is thousands of dollars. But I was just curious enough to get myself a $139 FiiO X3 II, and woh-uh it sounds amazing (even to my analog-biased ears) - and you can stream through it (via usb). It does bare bones/acoustic recordings best - Joni Mitchell's "Woodstock" is pure magic, and the Indigo Girls doing "Come Together" sounds like they're in your living room - but pretty much everything is very improved over what I'm used to.
This kind of shows how much music is missing from mp3s.