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3 High-End iPod Speaker Systems Reviewed
phaedo00 writes "Ars Technica has put together a round up of three high-end iPod speaker systems, including the new Apple iPod Hi-Fi. From the article: 'With the seemingly unending success of the iPod, accessories for the popular digital music player have become a more and more popular option for companies looking to hop on the bandwagon and make a quick buck. Companies that once had no business selling product accessories for consumer electronics are now jumping into the game because of the success of the iPod. With the growing number of stores carrying the personal audio device and a growing crop of users desiring to hear their music in more places, speaker systems have become an increasingly popular accessory.'"
When I read this earlier, as soon as I saw that he strongly preferred the look of one of the speakers, I immediately predicted that he would like its sound the best. And, of course, he did.
It's important to do blind testing in audio. People just don't hear as well as they think they do.
Also note that everyone appears to hear differently. Vision is highly specialized, and differentiation between people is fairly low. That's why it's easy to pick out 'best' monitors, for instance. But audio isn't like that; each brain appears to figure out hearing a little differently. The brain uses, relatively speaking, very few neurons on auditory signals, which leads to (relatively) wide variations.
All sound reproduction is an illusion, and all speakers make tradeoffs, especially in the low end. It's important to listen to speakers for yourself, in blind testing, to find a set that fits your particular hearing strategy well.
Because of this, speaker reviews are much less useful than other kinds. Being geeks, we're used to being able to categorize and rank things by technical merit. Speakers just don't work like that.
Unfortunately, there's also a vast number of people in the audio business selling snake oil to take advantage of the poor hearing of most humans. So you DO have to listen for yourself.... but with BLIND testing. That's the only way to find out if a given effect is real, or just psychological.
I am disappointed that a Bose Sounddock was not included as one of the speakers compared. While I despise Bose products, they are a very popular seller to a large part of the iPod buying population.
Between crappy sound, non-portability, and lack of an auxiliary in, it is a terrible product. I would like to have an article I point people to and say "See, it is a crappy product and if you are so hyped up about buying a speaker system specifically for your iPod, there are better ones out there."
- (c) 2018 Hank Zimmerman
The iPod has a small power amplifier at its output, which is how it drives the headphones.
None of the speaker systems reviewed here connect through the headphone jack. They all use the dock connector.
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
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