Hacking DS sound quality for MP3

[DanTheManMS]

The hiss you get from low-volume areas of songs is very annoying, but aside from that I'm fine with using it as my mp3 player on a daily basis. I mostly just hook it up to my car stereo so I've got some decent music to listen to while driving.

 

[cubin']

Sounds horrible to my ears but I'm used to high sound quality.

If you don't notice the low sound quality it's fine for most ;0


PSP sounds really good. The recent Ipods have better sound quality than PSP and DS but the older version ipods are about the same as PSP. Pretty much anything will sound better than a DS

 

[hollabackitsobi]

Buy a Creative Zen 16GB. BEST PMP on the market right now, hands down. 16GB of fast, stable flash memory, plus a slot that accepts SD/SDHC and Micro/Mini/MicroSDHC cards with adapters for up to 48GB of flash memory. Lovely. WAY better than slow and fragile HDDs, IMO, but that's just me.

 

[DarkAura]

Meh, it's okay, but from the speakers, the sound is almost tinny. And the earphones and headphones give better sound. And also some speakers are good too. Plus the sound quality of your songs matter too. As long it's mediocre to awesome, I'm using it for music.

Edit: I was talking about the DS.

 

[bluebright]

Hmmm. I use my DS as an MP3 player everyday. I was going to buy a proper mp3 player, but i spent all my money on my wii...but using moonshell, the sound quaility is great, especially through my Seinhieser's (sic?). I love my music, but I'm not an audiophile, so theres probably something im missing.. I know moonshell plays dpg audio at 128kb, but what about mp3s?

 

[Destructobot]

AFAIK Moonshell can play MP3s at any valid bitrate. I've played 256kbps MP3s on moonshell without a problem. I don't remember if I've tried 320kbps MP3s, but very few people can tell the difference between 256kbps and 320kbps even on high quality audio equipment.

To my ears, the 256kbps MP3s sounded the same as the original wav files I ripped from the CDs when I played them on the computer (which has decent sound output; not great, but not bad). When I played them on the DS they sounded a lot worse, mainly in the high and low frequencies.

If this thread has made one thing clear, it's that audio quality is highly subjective. If MP3 playback on the DS sounds good to you, then by all means use your DS as an MP3 player. If not, use something else. The only way to tell is to listen for yourself.

 

[bluebright]

I dig the above post. Anyone else?

 

[Mars]

Buy a Creative Zen 16GB. BEST PMP on the market right now, hands down. 16GB of fast, stable flash memory, plus a slot that accepts SD/SDHC and Micro/Mini/MicroSDHC cards with adapters for up to 48GB of flash memory. Lovely. WAY better than slow and fragile HDDs, IMO, but that's just me.

I agree, the Zen is fantastic, though the SD system is somewhat flawed.

Back on topic, everyone has different standards. I can't stand the sound quality on a DS, though others may find it doable. Like Destructobot said, try it yourself to decide whether or not it is useable as an MP3 player.

 

[enarky]

The problem isn't the bitrate (well, kind of... but that's going a bit to far). The problem is the DSs digital-to-analog converter. It can only output sound by Pulse-width modulation with a sampling frequency of 32 kHz and a resolution of 10 bits (source). Which, ahem, isn't exactly Hi-Fi...

No offence, but you people who don't hear the difference most likely don't know how good audio has to sound.

 

[Salamantis]

No offence, but you people who don't hear the difference most likely don't know how good audio has to sound.

Agreed. Compared to the DS my speakers sound like they were heavenly. The audio quality is just so much better than the DS's.

 

[DarkAura]

I dig the above post. Anyone else?

Me! It's good for something that is meant to play games.

 

[bluebright]

I dig the above post. Anyone else?


Me! It's good for something that is meant to play games.

Good. I'm buying a 16gb micro sd card when they come out in june, and if anyone tries to beat me up, well them i suppose i'll jsut have to give them all my money.

 

[DarkAura]

I'm going to buy meself an MP3 player though, just cuz the DS is too bulky to carry around all the time. 70 bucks good deal jah?

 

[Twiffles]

Depends on how big it is, I'm quiet fine carrying my white DSL and iPod Touch around. Amazingly it doesn't take a huge amount of space.

 

[Requisite]

I actually sold my iPod Nano, i found that I used it less and less over time.
So, I just share memory cards between my phone and DS, and use my phone for music.

 

[23qwerty]

but i wouldn't recommend buying an ipod because they suck

and don't get a PSP unless you're going to hack it, not to mention it only accepts the proprietary sony memory sticks.

On the contrary iPods rule
I r teh hack my iPod

 

[VBKirby]

I just use my my Mp3 player. When I had an Ipod nano for a while before I gave it to my brother, I didn't notice ANY difference in sound quality between the over pricey Ipod nano, and my cruddy Mp3 Player. I use my MP3 player since it has actual buttons that are easy to press, rather than those actually very hard to use circle of flat buttons on an ipod. I like my MP3 player. I had noticed no superiority in sound quality in an Ipod nano than my Mp3 player. For those saying to use an Ipod rather than the DS due to better sound, you should have just gotten an mp3 player. Cause those have the same quality sound as any other recent music device. *prepares to get bombarded with "you're completely stupid" replies*

And Itunes is horrible. It is not user friendly compared to my mp3 players drag and drop mechanics. Itunes is unnecessarily complicated.

 

[bluebright]

And Itunes is horrible. It is not user friendly compared to my mp3 players drag and drop mechanics. Itunes is unnecessarily complicated.

That's another reason I'm determined to use my DS as an MP3 player, which is drag and drop. Plus every other mp3 player wants to sort my music out by the file info (artist, genre, album etc) and i can't stand that. Moonshell keeps my files in the folders i leave them in. Also, I take my DS everywhere and use it constantly so its just great to have games and music all in one box.

 

[MajinBuu]

if you want quality sound, ignore psp and ipod (since when have ipod had great audio hardware?) and buy yourself a flash player sandisk, creative etc.. they all have better audio hardware and can be modified to support almost ALL formats in the world thanks to rockbox . TRUE lossless not some itunes infested crap

 

[darquarma]

if you want quality sound, ignore psp and ipod (since when have ipod had great audio hardware?) and buy yourself a flash player sandisk, creative etc.. they all have better audio hardware and can be modified to support almost ALL formats in the world thanks to rockbox . TRUE lossless not some itunes infested crap

Are you serious? I've used Creative Zen, Ipod, and PSP for music before. While the Zen is definitely the best player, the iPod and PSP are not very far behind. You'd have to be an audiophile to tell the difference between them.

On another note, the DS's sound quality is pretty much crap for MP3's. I wouldn't recommend it.