A note on music sound quality for iPhone and iPad users thinking of a Nexus 7

[DrWu]

You could pick a song that you think sounds better on your iphone and then buy that same song in the Google Play store and then compare the iphone to the nexus using the same song. For science...

 

[DrWu]

That is a very unfair thing to write. I hope you acknowledge that and take it back. I am here posting in good faith. And what you say about my posts just isn't true. And I did not advise people not to switch (the one exception so far being if you need reliable voice dictation).

Did you even read my overall review so far which I posted yesterday, where I said I think the Nexus 7 is the better user experience (first link below).

Please see:

http://forums.androidcentral.com/go...est-user-interface-i-choose-nexus-winner.html

http://forums.androidcentral.com/go...ybody-tried-complete-restore.html#post3009831

http://forums.androidcentral.com/go...er-draining-report-really-not-bad-all-me.html

doug

No I did not read all of your reviews... I had read one from several days ago - my apologies for jumping to conclusions. Carry on.

 

[douglerner]

You could pick a song that you think sounds better on your iphone and then buy that same song in the Google Play store and then compare the iphone to the nexus using the same song. For science...

What about taking Google Play out of the picture altogether? Is there some video with great sounding music on it - like on YouTube - we can play on all the devices for comparison? Then we would be comparing the same data, right?

 

[ongre10]

Well, as I mentioned above, it may be that my music quality got lost in translation while being transferred via the Google Music Manager.

Is there something is independent of my music I can listen to to compare?

Thanks,

Doug

Certainly. Try loading some MP3s from your computer directly to your devices choose several with a decent bitrate hicher than 192 Or load winamp and use the shoutcast feed from a high bitrate provider ( high in streaming land is 128) of your choice classical or whatever. Apple has a shoutcast app now too just duplicate the source. choose the identical source/ sound/ song and play them together.

 

[douglerner]

Certainly. Try loading some MP3s from your computer directly to your devices choose several with a decent bitrate hicher than 192 Or load winamp and use the shoutcast feed from a high bitrate provider ( high in streaming land is 128) of your choice classical or whatever. Apple has a shoutcast app now too just duplicate the source. choose the identical source/ sound/ song and play them together.

Well, I may not be doing what you mean, but let me describe a test I just did.

First, in case Google's Music Player was part of the problem, the developer of iSyncr suggested I try Rocket Player. I have that installed with the premium EQ settings turned on.

Then I took one file which sounds very nice on the iMac and the iPhone 5 (Alison Moyet, "Windmills of the Mind", bitrate 256 kbs, unprotected file) and moved it into the Music folder of the Nexus using the Android File Transfer app.

I'm not sure what to say. I think, I feel (I know it's subjective) that when I switch back and forth between playing it on the Nexus and on the iPhone 5 the iPhone 5 sounds "richer" to me and the Nexus 7 sounds somewhat "tinnier" to me.

To be fair, if I were not comparing side-by-side I might not notice the difference. Sort of like my iPad 2 looks fine to me unless I compare side-by-side to the retina display of an iPad 3.

I'll try some more sources. Perhaps a singer with an obviously clear, straightforward voice, like some older Linda Ronstadt song.

doug

 

[Belcebu]

That last test is better for your purposes. Take Play Music off the equation, it's compression is terrible.

Enviado desde mi Nexus 4 usando Tapatalk 4

 

[douglerner]

That last test is better for your purposes. Take Play Music off the equation, it's compression is terrible.

Enviado desde mi Nexus 4 usando Tapatalk 4

I will say this though. The music directly transferred and played via RocketPlayer is clearly of better quality than the music synced and played via Google Play Music. That may have been most of the issue.

doug

 

[LuvMusic]

I've been following this thread but haven't contributed yet. I have a Nexus 7 2013 and a Galaxy Nexus phone. I'm a big music fan (see screen name) and a hobbyist bass player. I've been using android devices as a music player since the original Motorola Droid.

I really think the weak link in your audio chain is Play Music. I believe Play Music is a functional player but the audio quality has never impressed me. I think you are on the right path with experimenting with other music playing apps. I've seen a couple mentioned within the thread and I would suggest you also audition PowerAmp. This is a very mature android music player, has great support, features and sounds very good. Many have mentioned the quality levels used to produce the music files, how the player processes the files can also have a significant impact on how the music sounds. FYI, you mentioned lack of volume in one of your earlier posts. PowerAmp has a pre-amp gain control within its equalizer screen which you may find interesting.

PowerAmp is free to try and (IMHO) well worth the price of purchase. Good luck in your search for audio nirvana (it never ends! ).

 

[Rule9]

I used to own a BB Playbook (yeah I know, don't laugh! ) and it had front facing stereo speakers. I still have it around the house as a hand-me-down and I can tell you that the speaker placement on my N7 certainly hasn't disappointed me for volume or quality. In fact the virtual surround on it is very noticeable compared to a device that doesn't have that.

 

[douglerner]

Well, I wasted more time just now listening to the same track over and over again on my Nexus 7 and my iPhone 5, and even on my iPad 2: Linda Ronstadt's "Sentimental Reasons". She has a good, clear voice and a good range, so it's easy to tell "which is best" - or so I thought. I've also been having a side-conversation with Chris, the developer of iSyncr and RocketPlayer, and have been testing RocketPlayer's quality on the Nexus 7 as well.

Side-note: I feel sort of dumb spending so much time on this since (1) I am by no means an audiophile or music expert and (2) listening to music on any of my devices is not something I spend that much time doing. Usually I listen on my iMac at the end of the day, while relaxing with my java sparrows. Nevertheless...

Anyway, it's just not clear to me anymore (no pun intended). I listed via the Google Play Music version that gets "pinned" on my Nexus 7 (wherever that file is - I have no idea, so can't check the file size or bitrate info), RocketPlayer (the 256 bitrate AAC file I transferred directly to the Nexus with Android File Transfer) and on my iPhone 5 and iPad 2, via the standard iOS Music app.

It's not obvious to me whether Google's Play Music or RocketPlayer sounds best in this case on the Nexus 7. But I swear it sounds "clearer" and the dynamic range (the highs and lows of pitch) is greater coming out of the iPhone 5 speakers than the Nexus 7 speakers. I went back and forth a dozen times at the same point in the song, and when I switch back to the iPhone 5 Ronstadt's voice comes through clear as a bell, while it just doesn't seem as clear, or full of dynamic range when it comes out of the Nexus 7 speakers, in either app. It's maybe subjective, but if I had to choose one of the speakers I'd say the iPhone 5 sounds better between the two.

Meanwhile the iPad 2 blows them both away in quality. I honestly don't see how anybody can say the Nexus 7 speakers sound better than the iPad 2's speaker. There's just no comparison, in my opinion.

Yet between the Nexus 7 and the iPhone 5, I'm no longer sure which is technically "better". While the sound is undeniably "clearer" on the iPhone 5, I'm no longer sure the "quality is better." The more I listen, the more I hear intangible defects in the speaker I wasn't noticing before, such as "tinniness" problem I was complaining about on the Nexus 7. I suspect that the iPhone 5 is maybe "covering up" the defect for novices like me with a larger volume and throwing in more bass, or something like that, by default. But the iPad 2 is clearly better overall than either the Nexus 7 or the iPhone 5.

It's all very confusing. I'm going to try iSyncr anyway, to compare the overall UI experience, since Chris has been so helpful.

For getting the bottom of which speaker is better, it might be best to compare the same YouTube video of music on both devices using the Google YouTube player. Not sure anymore.

doug

 

[Grabber5.0]

2 speakers are always better

I think this experiment has take. Too much of your time.

 

[douglerner]

2 speakers are always better

I think this experiment has take. Too much of your time.

I'm not sure about your first statement, but I agree this has taken up too much of my time.

 

[carbon fibre]

As mentioned elsewhere, I'm a long term Apple, iPhone and iPad user and got a Nexus 7 out of curiosity and to see how easy it is for an iPhone / iPad user. Generally I am very pleased with it, but I would be negligent if I didn't mention the relative speaker qualities, when playing music.

To be honest, the Nexus 7 speaker quality is only "fair" - I wouldn't say it is "good." It's actually rather tinny. And using the Nexus "surround" setting only makes it worse (it is good that is off by default).

My iMac has the best music sound quality of the speakers I have. The iPad 2 is next best, and very good. The sound quality drops quite a bit by the time you get to the iPhone 5. But even the iPhone 5 sound quality is much better than the Nexus 7, which obviously has the worst speaker of the lot, even if you are not an audiophile (which I'm not).

In summary, for the mobile devices I own, the speaker quality for music is:

Best: iPad 2
So-so: iPhone 5
Worst: Nexus 7

I haven't done a comparison with earplugs or headsets of these devices. I know, for example, that music sounds beautiful on my iPhone 5 when I use the earplugs. So this is probably simply a speaker issue.

Note: I did try using my iPhone 5 and iPhone 4 earplugs on my Nexus 7, but the output sound into the earplugs was extremely low. Does anybody know if this is a Nexus 7 earphone jack output setting issue? Or maybe the Apple earplugs are just not compatible with the Nexus 7? Or could the output jack be defective? I had the "volume for music" in Settings turned way up but the sound coming through the earplugs was very low.

Anyway, if you aren't doing a side-by-side comparison with the iPhone 5 or iPad 2 the Nexus 7 sound may seem "oh, that's not too bad" to you. But as soon as you switch and do a direct comparison it's pretty obvious.

doug

I had a PlayBook (often mentioned as a good sounding tablet), and now have an
-iPhone 4s
-iPad3
-2013 Nexus 7

They all sound (including my departed but not missed PlayBook) somewhere between very poor and poor. They may be passable for dialogue, but for music, forget about it. Get some decent headphones or pipe the music through a wire/Bluetooth/AirPlay etc to speakers or accept the severe limitations of these devices for music.

For what it is worth, the least awful was the Playbook, followed by the Nexus 7.

 

[tflash]

I'm not sure about your first statement, but I agree this has taken up too much of my time.

You don't listen to Pink Floyd or Led Zeppelin much do you? Stereo separation is the key with this music.
The orig N7 had 2 speakers, but nobody thinks so because they weren't separated!

Talking about music quality by using an .mp3 source is laughable.

CDs were (are) about quality music sources, and you can only get that from full .wav files.

 

[tflash]

Compressed audio through a bluetooth speaker will always sound better than the uncompressed audio coming out of the stock speakers in a tablet/phone. Its simply physics and the space constraints in portable devices that prevents the speakers from sounding as good a dedicated portable speaker.

With the AptX codec, audio quality through a bluetooth speaker is pretty much impossible too differentiate between a wireless and wired connection.

Plus, most bluetooth speakers have an aux port so you really can't lose. Go and try one, im sure you will be surprised too hear how much sound comes from such a small package.

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You're right about the space constraints in tablets. I tried to listen to some Gorillaz on my 2013 N7. It had no bass at all - NONE.
I think some laptops could sound better than cheap BT speakers, but they can have lots of space for speakers compared to a tablet.
I don't think the N7 supports the AptX codec, but even then, a wire to a mini Jambox sounds exactly the same as the BT connection, so you got me there too.
I bet I could tell the difference between BT and wires on a good sound system, but only if the source was .wav or CD and not .mp3 or some other compressed audio.

I think the only way to test speaker quality is with uncompressed audio source and wired connections.

 

[msavic6]

You're right about the space constraints in tablets. I tried to listen to some Gorillaz on my 2013 N7. It had no bass at all - NONE.
I think some laptops could sound better than cheap BT speakers, but they can have lots of space for speakers compared to a tablet.
I don't think the N7 supports the AptX codec, but even then, a wire to a mini Jambox sounds exactly the same as the BT connection, so you got me there too.
I bet I could tell the difference between BT and wires on a good sound system, but only if the source was .wav or CD and not .mp3 or some other compressed audio.

I think the only way to test speaker quality is with uncompressed audio source and wired connections.

Yeah the nexus 7 doesn't support AptX, I confused it with my S4 that does support AptX. You must have really trained your ears too be able to notice a difference like that, I doubt I would be able too unles I was extremely familiar with the music.

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