Cowon J3 + FLAC + Sennheiser HD555 = Eargasm

[Dr_Evil]

I finally found the PMP I've been looking for. Another person told me about this after we got into a conversation about PMPs. I can't stand MP3s or just about any low bitrate audio files. Lossless/FLAC is about the only the only music format I can stand that isn't on a CD/DVD.

The model I got has 32GB internal memory. That is about the only thing I don't like. 64GB or more would've been nice. It does have a microSD slot though. Other owners have reported using 64GB cards with no problem.

The manufacturer reports 64 hours of battery time playing music. I don't remember the run times I've seen in reviews. I think most said 24+ hours though. The person I talked to said he uses it quite a bit before it needs recharged.

The device is really light for its size. That would be good for those that go running or do other stuff that might require you to use an armband. I prefer small PMPs for exercise use though.

I'd comment on video use but I haven't checked that out. Not sure if I will since that probably won't ever be used.

It also has play/pause, track up/down and volume buttons. This is nice since the screen doesn't have to come on for you to perform those fuctions. That is one thing that helps improve battery life. The track up/down buttons also serve as FF or rewind buttons if you hold them down.

It does a great job driving the HD555s. I'm not sure if I have the 50ohm or 120ohm version of the HD555s though. The volume does get pretty high. Then again, the volume doesn't have to be turned up much before I think it is loud though. I guess my ears are tougher than normal or I just did a good job of protecting them during my 11 years of working on aircraft engines and going through plenty of engine runs. I do tend to listen to music louder than normal though and my truck is loud.

The J3 also has BT connectivety. I'll be trying that out in my car. I'll get to that when I can since I'm not near it right now. The car also has a 3.5mm audio input jack though. I just wouldn't be able to use the radio controls using that method. My phone has BT connectivety to. I haven't tried connecting two devices at once so I don't know if it will work.

There is an internal speaker if you don't want to use headphones or they aren't available. It works but I haven't gave it a good test yet. Obviously it won't sound as good as headphones though.

I did have a problem with the USB cable at first. It didn't seem to go in very far so it kept diconnecting while I transferred music. That turned out to be my fault though. It just required a little more force to push it on all the way. I was afraid to try pushing harder in fear of breaking it off. I hate the small and thin USB connections you find on a lot of USB plugs.

Hotel California by the Eagles is one of my favorite songs to try out an audio system. It has to be the acoustic version from Hell Freezes Over though. It sounds great but so does just about everything else I've played on it.

Pictures may come later. I can't guaruntee if or when I'll post them.

 

[Seoul_lasers]

I finally found the PMP I've been looking for. Another person told me about this after we got into a conversation about PMPs. I can't stand MP3s or just about any low bitrate audio files. Lossless/FLAC is about the only the only music format I can stand that isn't on a CD/DVD.

The model I got has 32GB internal memory. That is about the only thing I don't like. 64GB or more would've been nice. It does have a microSD slot though. Other owners have reported using 64GB cards with no problem.

The manufacturer reports 64 hours of battery time playing music. I don't remember the run times I've seen in reviews. I think most said 24+ hours though. The person I talked to said he uses it quite a bit before it needs recharged.

The device is really light for its size. That would be good for those that go running or do other stuff that might require you to use an armband. I prefer small PMPs for exercise use though.

I'd comment on video use but I haven't checked that out. Not sure if I will since that probably won't ever be used.

It also has play/pause, track up/down and volume buttons. This is nice since the screen doesn't have to come on for you to perform those fuctions. That is one thing that helps improve battery life. The track up/down buttons also serve as FF or rewind buttons if you hold them down.

It does a great job driving the HD555s. I'm not sure if I have the 50ohm or 120ohm version of the HD555s though. The volume does get pretty high. Then again, the volume doesn't have to be turned up much before I think it is loud though. I guess my ears are tougher than normal or I just did a good job of protecting them during my 11 years of working on aircraft engines and going through plenty of engine runs. I do tend to listen to music louder than normal though and my truck is loud.

The J3 also has BT connectivety. I'll be trying that out in my car. I'll get to that when I can since I'm not near it right now. The car also has a 3.5mm audio input jack though. I just wouldn't be able to use the radio controls using that method. My phone has BT connectivety to. I haven't tried connecting two devices at once so I don't know if it will work.

There is an internal speaker if you don't want to use headphones or they aren't available. It works but I haven't gave it a good test yet. Obviously it won't sound as good as headphones though.

I did have a problem with the USB cable at first. It didn't seem to go in very far so it kept diconnecting while I transferred music. That turned out to be my fault though. It just required a little more force to push it on all the way. I was afraid to try pushing harder in fear of breaking it off. I hate the small and thin USB connections you find on a lot of USB plugs.

Hotel California by the Eagles is one of my favorite songs to try out an audio system. It has to be the acoustic version from Hell Freezes Over though. It sounds great but so does just about everything else I've played on it.

Pictures may come later. I can't guaruntee if or when I'll post them.

Yes, The cowon J3 has a wolfson Audio DAC built in, and can natively decode FLAC. I must admit though the COWON J3 lacks storage space... The Stennheiser series headphones are among some of the best sounding in the world along with the Denon headphones. I have a pair of HD650's with a pro-cable and need a significant headphone amplifier (300Ohm impedance). I run FLAC through my iPod touch using FLAC player. EARGASM

I think HD555 are generally 50Ohm and as such don't require amping. HD600's and higher require an external amp as they are 100's of ohms impedance..

 

[TomD]

Great to see a couple of portable hi-fi enthusiasts on board.

How's the battery life of the J3 playing FLAC based on your experiences?

 

[Dr_Evil]

Here's something I forgot to mention in the OP. It remembers where you left off when you turn it off. It will resume playing a song from where it stopped when you turned the player off.

Great to see a couple of portable hi-fi enthusiasts on board.

How's the battery life of the J3 playing FLAC based on your experiences?

I don't really know yet since I just got mine a couple days ago.

 

[Cyparagon]

 

[Wolfman29]

^ lol

 

[Bionic-Badger]

I might look at a J3 if it supports Rockbox. Until then I'll stick with my old iRiver H140. Even the Gigabeat S I bought used was too unstable. I think I'd miss the interface as well as the audio features such as crossfeed. I use some ER-4Ps on the portable rig. I like that it blocks out sound in addition to sounding good.

At home I use a pair of HD650 on a PPAv2 amp driven by the computer and Foobar2000 (accept nothing less). One of the best investments I ever made as I use it more than virtually anything else I've bought.

 

[TomD]

I might look at a J3 if it supports Rockbox. Until then I'll stick with my old iRiver H140. Even the Gigabeat S I bought used was too unstable. I think I'd miss the interface as well as the audio features such as crossfeed. I use some ER-4Ps on the portable rig. I like that it blocks out sound in addition to sounding good.

At home I use a pair of HD650 on a PPAv2 amp driven by the computer and Foobar2000 (accept nothing less). One of the best investments I ever made as I use it more than virtually anything else I've bought.

What kind of output from the computer are you feeding the PPAv2 with?

FLAC is just awesome as long as it's properly encoded. In my case, from foobar, the laptop has a toslink jack, which i connect to an ibasso d12 dac, then to a millett hybrid minimax, finally to a pair of grado rs1s.

Outdoors it's just an ipod classic with an lod going into a Mini³, and out to a pair of yuin pk1s--the best earbuds in town.

 

[Bionic-Badger]

What kind of output from the computer are you feeding the PPAv2 with?

It's fed from an M-Audio Audiophile 2496.

FLAC is just awesome as long as it's properly encoded. In my case, from foobar, the laptop has a toslink jack, which i connect to an ibasso d12 dac, then to a millett hybrid minimax, finally to a pair of grado rs1s.

How do you improperly encode FLAC? In the end it's all lossless.

Make sure you have Bauer's stereophonic-to-binaural DSP in Foobar.

 

[TomD]

It's fed from an M-Audio Audiophile 2496.



How do you improperly encode FLAC? In the end it's all lossless.

Make sure you have Bauer's stereophonic-to-binaural DSP in Foobar.

The 2496 is wicked (!)

There are still a lot who acquire FLAC from the cloud. I found some sloppy lossy files masquerading as FLACs recently.

I'll take a look at that DSP you mentioned. Thanks!

To the OP: You may want to check out the newer Senn HD598. It's no slouch.

 

[Bionic-Badger]

The 2496 is wicked (!)

Relatively inexpensive too for something that sounds that good. I've had mine since about 2002 across many computer upgrades. Rock solid soundcard, and good drivers.

There are still a lot who acquire FLAC from the cloud. I found some sloppy lossy files masquerading as FLACs recently.

Did they just take a lossy source and recompress it as a FLAC? That's definitely pointless.

I'll take a look at that DSP you mentioned. Thanks!

It's really nice for reproducing the audio that crosses over to your ear from the opposite channel that would normally be heard if you used speakers, but gets lost in the headphone speaker separation. It's also what the crossfeed DSP on Rockbox does, which REALLY helps with the sound and reduces ear fatigue.

 

[Seoul_lasers]

I might look at a J3 if it supports Rockbox. Until then I'll stick with my old iRiver H140. Even the Gigabeat S I bought used was too unstable. I think I'd miss the interface as well as the audio features such as crossfeed. I use some ER-4Ps on the portable rig. I like that it blocks out sound in addition to sounding good.

At home I use a pair of HD650 on a PPAv2 amp driven by the computer and Foobar2000 (accept nothing less). One of the best investments I ever made as I use it more than virtually anything else I've bought.

Actually its software supports native FLAC upto 96khz,
Which isn't common. Correct me if I am OTL on that.

 

[Bionic-Badger]

Actually its software supports native FLAC upto 96khz,
Which isn't common. Correct me if I am OTL on that.

I honestly don't think I would be able to hear the difference, or if the extra processing would be worth it.

 

[Seoul_lasers]

This is the rate of sample, 96Khz. It just means that the audio has been recorded at above the range of human hearing. What the headphones or speaker system you have generally will output up to 38-44.1Khz and no higher. We as humans can't hear anything above ~20-22Khz but full definition audio starts at a minimum of 40Khz.
If you look at the specs for the COWN J3 you'll see it handles 24/96 just fine. Whether or not you'll get theater sound quality depends on what you use to listen to it. For a player like this I'd be going with a proper PORTABLE head amplifier and a set of HD800's or Denon AH-D7000 , Grado D1000's or Beyer-Dynamic DT880-L .
$1000 for a headphone set is pretty standard in the pro-class. Good thing you never tried the electrostatic phones at $5K!

Sampling rate - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia