Honestly these listening comparisons are almost completely worthless unless you carefully level match them and listen blinded (not knowing what you're listening to). The expectation of something being supposed to sound awesome is a powerful thing.
+styx85 I think you're mistaken. I love headphones and have 9 different sets to listen to. I can tell immediately when one set up sounds better than another and why. I think that optimizing the eq and then comparing them also is incorrect. I want to know how they sound straight out of the box. Adjusting the eq to each persons personal tastes can be done later, because that is the most subjective part. I found this review helpful because I could tell his knowledge about sound quality by the way he described things. I think he gets it well enough to be able to tell if one thing meets the standards for "sounding better" The second thing that tells you if this review is worth paying attention to or not is his genuine, visceral reaction to the music. On all the other phones he was 'listening' to the music on the Axon he seemed to be 'feeling ' the music. That kind of response is very hard to fake. I think it's a good review, I had already suspected the Axon was going to have good sq based off of the technical specs, having seen this review it feels like it confirmed my suspicions.
m. west Who said anything about EQ? I'm just talking about level matching (ie. sound volume). It's very easy to mistake a couple of dBs of higher volume for higher quality (and more "feeling"). And I'm not saying he's "faking it" it or lying, I'm just saying that people's subjective perception of sound and music is notoriously unreliable and subject to *many* different kinds of bias. It's a very well documented phenomenon. As an example, the fact that you've read the spec sheet and expect the Axon to have good sound quality might subjectively make them "sound" better to you, even if there is no actual discernible difference. Blind listening on a volume-matched setup is the best way to neutralize these biases and give a much more accurate assessment.
That's correct. This is what I do for a living. I compare SQ of different components on a daily basis. At the very least you need to level match everything. Its very hard to listen around different volume levels. You also have to do some real listening. To think you can quickly listen to each one for a few seconds and know how it sounds, is just plain silly.
YES this test is completely subjective and there are millions of variables! Sound is an incredibly subjective topic so please take this video for what it is. The intent was not a forensic level discovery but instead to see how the phones sounded straight out of the box (as a normal consumer might use them) !!!
+Tx3089 Gaming well, that's all this was ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ an "ears on" first impression video, and the Axon has mad audio hardware, so it did better than others. I see where you're coming from, but like.. meh. I don't see why people are this angry.
Hey Lou, when you made this the Axon was the only phone with a decent DAC in it, but as it isn't a very high end phone no one was actually ever going to consider it. However, now we have the V10 which is an actual amazing phone that just so happens to have a 32 bit DAC inside. So I think a comparison like this between the current flagships would be so relevant, and introduce more people to a spec that the layman just doesn't understand. I know that you now the eargasm feeling of listening to a well produced track, uncompressed, properly converted to analogue, and massaged into your ears by quality phones. If we get more people giving a shit, the manufacturers will start valuing it more too. With rumours that apple are going to be making a big deal over 'HD audio' with their next phone, I think it's relevant. Cheers.
I tested both the iPhone 6 and S6 against a Onkyo external DAC and both phones have low level bleed in noise. It is not designed for pristine audio quality. In essence, it is a high power radio transmitter and receiver. It will always have noise.
The Axon is my daily driver and all I can say is that it's amazing. Costs $199 and honestly, sounds better than ANY other phone. Even better than the S6!!!
I received Axon 7 yesterday, and didn't care much about "hifi" and Dolby Atmos that it had.... And then I played a song.... Blew my mind! It's like IMAX in a palm of my hand. I'm in no way audiophile, and I can definitely tell the difference between Samsung Note 3, HTC, BLU Pure XL and Huawei mate 8.
just subscribed because you made this video. I know 1 out of 7 million doesn't mean much but I really appreciate this video. no one puts out reviews of how new phones, especially phones made for audiophiles sound. to me its the most important spec on a phone whether is phone calls or listening to music at work or home. I hope you make another one when the new htc u 11 and zte 7s come out.
Liam Davy Hopefully the September 2 IFA press release will introduce something with a Snapdragon 820 and a new design. The leaks images looks really good.
most phones aux outputs compress the audio and add a huge EQ overlay, such as the iPod and iPhone. phones such as the HTC m8, m9, and A9 all have aux outputs that play audio without the compression and pure audio without the huge EQ overlay found on other phones.
My guess is that this is more to do with a specific "sound signature". I know the m9 uses some Dolby software, it could be a slightly more V shaped profile, hence the low end emphasis.
All the Qualcomm phones should sound very similar. My oneplus one sounds virtually indistinguishable from my last two phones, the Nexus 5 and Nexus 4. The differences in sound between the One M9, Galaxy S6 and LG G4 are likely due to software DSP.
***** The DAC is EXACTLY the same in all the phones he presented. One thing I have heard about the axon though is the abysmal battery life and not so great graphics. Lou should feel free to make sponsored vids but I would atleast like to be notified first, this is a commercial just as his promoting of beats is (which are definitely NOT the best headphones around, sennheiser and bose to name a couple are much better both headset wise and earphone/in-ear wise than beats overpriced crap). Thanks for the video anyway lou, I appreciate your hard work, and I'm happy you're as successful as you are, would just appreciate a little more transparency.
***** that is a bot he never uses beats and the link is probably a virus to get your information lou never does a give away in the comments and come on beats is a fucking joke I know some one who disagrees with that but he says that is my taste. I think you should look further than your taste but I think he never used another headphone. he also says that beats is the best because alot of dj's use them.
HTC has three eq'S for earbuds on ear and in ear , HTC boom sound is not just for the speakers . and furthermore it actually supports and plays flac 24 bit 196khz , I was amazed that you didn't mention this, it would be amazing if you could test this against some high end audio players I'm curious , as you can tell I'm a m9 owner and am happy with flax files on my phone.
That's not how you compare audio devices. Your are merely comparing the short term memory. Google Plus music is garage. It doesn't matter what you use. It's going to sound as good as garbage can sound. It's easy to make a music player to play sound. Not so easy to make one that can deliver MUSIC. BTW, FLAC is merely a file type. Not a guarantee it will sound good.
He is right. I have a Zmax. I've owned phones from just about all the major manufacturers, except an iPhone. the zmax phone produces music that sounds as if it's coming from a large stereo. Playing it using Bluetooth in my car is just amazing. The music is Crystal clear and super loud
DAC's play a huge role... And the people saying you can't hear a difference are insane. Almost every smart phone have shitty DAC's built in and is why a lot of audiophiles get portable DAC's. So for him to say a phone with a better built in DAC sounds better than the rest is 100% possible... DAC's translate binary to an analog signal, the quality of a DAC makes all the difference in that conversion process and as far as I'm concerned he easily could have heard the difference. Even at lower quality bitrate sources.
***** Shit, forgot I was submitting my thesis to my english prof dewddddd, got tired of correcting autocorrect so I gave up and left it. Thoughhhh I could make the argument of it being a part of awkward plurals and abbreviations which makes the apostrophe useable for more than possession. For example "She used 6 and's in her sentence". That stays true with weird abbreviations, normally those with numbers AND letters. But I could make the argument. REKT! Kappa123
Younes Berrada most likely the Fiio E10k purely because it would have way more leg room to fit all which is needed and free from the electrical distortion and noise the internals a phone may produce (Processor, RF interference, etc).
Norberto Castro Hey, I also recently got my new smartphone (Z3), and what is making me sad is that I don't get the Hi-Res option anywhere in the options, even though I have the right headphones. Is it because of the newest update? That my walkman icon is gone and now it just says Music? Please help someone, I also want to hear that Hi-Res quality you guys are talking about!
rannopleisss All you need is the right hi res audio file and you´re good to go ( and a very good pair of headphones) if you just want to enjoy your mp3 files then use the DSEE HX option and you´ll hear the diference.
The DAC's in all those devices are great. Samsung and Apple use Wolfson ones, which are excellent, HTC focuses on audio consumption with their flagship lineup since quite a while and LG is also known for producing a very good audio output.
for my opinion, you could just modify the equalizer for a better result, I'm using an S4 with Philips headphone and its sound really great, all the bass kicked in.
Sound quality is a difficult topic on smartphones since there are several levels of equalization that may change the listening experience. For example: I've got the LG G2, and out of the box the sound was an abomination. After trying enhancing the sound, I found that LG had programmed a system wide equalizer into their Android version, that they did an awful job in setting it up, and it was literally impossible to deactivate it (overrides other equalization apps after a few seconds). Then I've installed Cyanogenmod, and I got the best headphone listening experience with my own equipment EVER. To get to the point: software level is much more important than you may think
Nasser Ali None are the best, phones are completely and utterly subjective. I don't understand how people have such strong feelings over what is 'the best'.
hopefully these other larger and more well known companies will learn a thing or two from these headphones that seem to work in great synergy with the companies phone products. love vids like this. learn something new every time.
I'd like to see someone connect them to an A to D converter with a "Y" adapter and record the phones playing some test files. You could compare the result to the originals and see exactly what's going on. The A/D's impedance should be so high it shouldn't affect the response.
Nothing will beat the G6 and V20 that I can guarantee. HiFi quad dac literally makes a $10 pair of Sony earbuds sound close to beats, it's that amazing.
Umm... i dont get this video.. or commercial? At all. Im always addicted to listen to galaxy s6 and s6 edge tv ad and watch it on my z3, and what youll hear is amazing, so with my sth30 headset.. you use both of those amazing things... the sound that comes out is amazing. My point is xperia z3 has better, if not, crisper sound than most of these devices, why dont you put that thing here in the comparison?
+Sly Cooper can't comment on that but I don't believe it is superior to sony's high res smartphone. I am an audiophile and I have compared a bunch of phones and the Z5 sticks out! actually, for a phone it is very pleasing!
+Sly Cooper who gives a crap about speakers apart from 16 years Olds? I am talking about the performance with 300,- headphones and lossless audiophiles. The Z5 is state of the art worth the audio processing.
Just bought my 3rd ZTE +++++++++++++++ they are awesome... I had a 1st generation then I got the Axon 7 mini now today the larger new model I can hardly wait... Takes great photos too I love these Arizona sky's and this phone really nails what im seeing all the time consistently... Thanks ZTE.. Ed in Phoenix writes
+UnboxTherapy hopefully these other larger and more well known companies will learn a thing or two from these headphones that seem to work in great synergy with the companies phone products. love vids like this. learn something new every time.
Your testing is very biased and unprofessional. You could at least TRY to eliminate bias out of your review by doing a blind test where someone else switches the phone for you and you say which one sounds better without looking. But nope. Axon may be better or it may not be, but we will never know because you got payed to do a biased review. Even if you didn't mean to be biased subconsciously you still were. So yeah.
i'm going to skip everything and elaborate explaining the hi-fi functionality for this phone: a) Luis's trick was on playing streaming sounds/music b) if you want a high sound/music, you need to have them saved on *.flac c) *.flac files are humongous in size, but you dont have external memory. d) All of my *.mp3 songs which being played by BBZ30, Sony Xperia Z3 Compact or Lumia 930 were fine e) some of my music sounded distorted on the ZTE axon pro unless if its played over soundcloud or youtube f) you can go to gsmarena and search for phones that have the hi-fi function or DAC and go with the known brands. for me, it was a bad 2 and a half months experience with this phone that i should have bought anything else
The Axon Pro looks great. Really. There are only 2 problems I have with that. No microsd expansion slot and no removable battery. If it had those two, people would be on it like crazy.
LG V30 with their Hi-Fi Quad DAC gives superior sound to any phone out there and they know it since they actually include half decent B&O in-ear headphones with the phone and not the complete garbage you usually get and have B&O branding on the phone itself. Sony has been pretty average imo though I haven't had a possibility to test their latest generation of phones.
I bought a Sony Xperia M4 aqua for the "walkman" bit of it but I can say that it's nothing but a gimmick. The only sound aspect of it is that it digitally enhances the bass frequencies which can be easily done by any third part app these days. The hardware is weak at best.
Sony's headphone output has been pretty average like you say, so no reason to include them if you are going for top of the line. The LG V30? Definitely excellent, and gets a nod for being the loudest. However, for audio quality through a passive 3.5 jack, that record is still held by the now-discontinued HTC M8. If you are going to go beyond the 3.5 jack and into active headphones, then USonic is a total mind blower. I've been a studio engineer for years, and HTC USonic is the only thing that comes close to what the musicians and producers hear in the studio control room.
It's about time someone does a review with smart phones with headphones audio review. Need more I love music and listen to it loud but I love to listen to the music as if it was live. A live concert play list I can listen for hours. Thanks......
Obviously the HTC One sounds the best from a speaker standpoint but the audio jack is seriously hard and subjective to decide which is the best as every pair of headphones will react differently to each audio jack and not only that but every person will have a difference in opinion to what sounds are actually better. Either way good video Lew, interesting that you said the G4 didn't sound crispy tho. Try some different headphones with it, the Bose Soundtrue's sound amazing with the G4.
Gebruikersnaam10011 Hey, I also recently got my new smartphone (Z3), and what is making me sad is that I don't get the Hi-Res option anywhere in the options, even though I have the right headphones. Is it because of the newest update? That my walkman icon is gone and now it just says Music? Please help someone, I also want to hear that Hi-Res quality you guys are talking about!
Without a double blind test with volume levels matched, you can't use this test to make any claims about sound quality. There's expectation bias, placebo, different volume levels and a thousand other things influencing the validity of the test.
Axon = artificial gimmick. 32bit prcessor? Good lick trying to process a sh*tty 9mb 320kbps mp3 file. It's all fucking digital gimmicks. True audiophilists cringe at videos like this. We just shake our heads and *sigh* Oh and by the way, i own my own hi-fi audio business. Hence please stop throwing the word, HI-FIDELITY so loosely. Purists and those who are deeply sowed into the REAL HIFI audio realm laugh. Please stick to phone or tech videos and let the REAL audio gurus do audio.
Du sköna nya värld Astell&Kern AK2400. If you can't get one of those due to price, just get a ipod. But most important part about getting the best possible audio quality is source. People always seem to gimp out on the source by using mp3 or streaming. And if that's the case, it's really not worth upgrading any kind of audio hardware.
It totally depends on what you are looking for. If you want a phone with a great looking screen, and is splash and dust resistant buy the moto x style If you want a phone with a aluminium body and has great specs buy the oneplus 2 The cameras are both great but on the moto you can get more detail then the oneplus. Hope i helped :-)
FINALLY!!!! Hope more and more will take this to heart when they Review phones and/or headphones even though sound-taste is very personal. Great job Lew, and thank you. Hope more phone-makers listen and put more work in their sound over a good headphone
"If you're an aficionado..." you realize this is an absolutely worthless video. I like your channel, but these audio videos are immensely flawed, to the point it'd be better for the casual person interested in audio not to watch them at all.
Great Video I've been pondering why no one has done something like this before. It really is a great idea because iPods are outdated and add clutter in your bag or pants that your smartphone could easily help you avoid. I have gone through quite a few phones and half of them had terrible or poor audio performance. Sometimes they lacked the power to drive headphones to ample volumes not loud but above what would be 50% volume on an s6 and it really pleases me to see this.
HTC started the trend of hi-res high quality audio ! HTC has the best phone speakers, also the new HTC A9 has the most powerful audio amp and the best onboard DAC topping most expensive hi-res. players.
I use a external USB dac with my note 4 and I've never been impressed with the dac of ios dacs but your reaction hase wanting that ZTE just on the basis of not needing three connections between the headphones and the phone, please to see they emphasise the highs more though. Nice video bud love your work.
My Ad-block blocked the whole video :/
Dammmmmnnnnnnñmmmmmnnnnmmnmnmnmnmnmmnmmnnmnnnmnm
*face palm*
FIRE
sam farley Oh Snap!
shots fired
I had to watch a commercial before I watched this commercial 😑
Rene Bernardino OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOGET REKT
Stfu
Clever wp
Rene Bernardino Get Adblock?
Connor Werts the point of his comment was to highlight that the actual video is a commercial
Honestly these listening comparisons are almost completely worthless unless you carefully level match them and listen blinded (not knowing what you're listening to). The expectation of something being supposed to sound awesome is a powerful thing.
+styx85 This is the truth right here.
+styx85 I think you're mistaken. I love headphones and have 9 different sets to listen to. I can tell immediately when one set up sounds better than another and why. I think that optimizing the eq and then comparing them also is incorrect. I want to know how they sound straight out of the box. Adjusting the eq to each persons personal tastes can be done later, because that is the most subjective part.
I found this review helpful because I could tell his knowledge about sound quality by the way he described things. I think he gets it well enough to be able to tell if one thing meets the standards for "sounding better" The second thing that tells you if this review is worth paying attention to or not is his genuine, visceral reaction to the music. On all the other phones he was 'listening' to the music on the Axon he seemed to be 'feeling ' the music. That kind of response is very hard to fake.
I think it's a good review, I had already suspected the Axon was going to have good sq based off of the technical specs, having seen this review it feels like it confirmed my suspicions.
m. west
Who said anything about EQ? I'm just talking about level matching (ie. sound volume). It's very easy to mistake a couple of dBs of higher volume for higher quality (and more "feeling").
And I'm not saying he's "faking it" it or lying, I'm just saying that people's subjective perception of sound and music is notoriously unreliable and subject to *many* different kinds of bias. It's a very well documented phenomenon. As an example, the fact that you've read the spec sheet and expect the Axon to have good sound quality might subjectively make them "sound" better to you, even if there is no actual discernible difference.
Blind listening on a volume-matched setup is the best way to neutralize these biases and give a much more accurate assessment.
That is true
That's correct. This is what I do for a living. I compare SQ of different components on a daily basis. At the very least you need to level match everything. Its very hard to listen around different volume levels. You also have to do some real listening. To think you can quickly listen to each one for a few seconds and know how it sounds, is just plain silly.
Did you at least check if the EQ is turned off on all devices ?
Why would they be on
it shoud be off for comparison -_-
YES this test is completely subjective and there are millions of variables! Sound is an incredibly subjective topic so please take this video for what it is. The intent was not a forensic level discovery but instead to see how the phones sounded straight out of the box (as a normal consumer might use them) !!!
Unbox Therapy has the macbook winner been announced ?
Loved the video and BTW that shirt looks good on you.
Unbox Therapy I think the alcatel idol 3 is best sounding
Nice video, I wouldn't have thought that they would have been able to make such an improvement over such high end competitors.
Unbox Therapy when are you announcing the winner of the mac book
Felt like I watched a commercial for the Axon Pro.
***** oh you did lol
Yeah... And its kinda lame for that guy.
+Tx3089 Gaming Because it is ! Most ofhis videos are commercials of certain types of products. DISLIKE !
+Tx3089 Gaming do you make this same comment on every positive review you find?
+Tx3089 Gaming well, that's all this was ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ an "ears on" first impression video, and the Axon has mad audio hardware, so it did better than others.
I see where you're coming from, but like.. meh. I don't see why people are this angry.
please do this again with the new ones such the galaxy s7, iphone 7, the new LG v20,
S7 has the best sound quality, with the HTC coming in second.
The iPhone 7 would be a bit problematic...
The v20 should technically win it has a quad sabre dac from ess
Don't forget Sony
i second sony.
Hey Lou, when you made this the Axon was the only phone with a decent DAC in it, but as it isn't a very high end phone no one was actually ever going to consider it. However, now we have the V10 which is an actual amazing phone that just so happens to have a 32 bit DAC inside. So I think a comparison like this between the current flagships would be so relevant, and introduce more people to a spec that the layman just doesn't understand.
I know that you now the eargasm feeling of listening to a well produced track, uncompressed, properly converted to analogue, and massaged into your ears by quality phones. If we get more people giving a shit, the manufacturers will start valuing it more too.
With rumours that apple are going to be making a big deal over 'HD audio' with their next phone, I think it's relevant.
Cheers.
You should have done a blind test.
DM yes
That's is a REALLY good idea! Would have been more interesting too!
DM Exactly. This is very biased test.
I'm about to slide into you
He should've
The Axon is pretty damn ugly.
Erik Michel Looks cheap asf with all that plastic as well.
Not really, its kinda simmiler to the M8
Erik Michel yeah it looks like a smartphone from the pre-iPhone era
Chris McLeod that's your opinion
wolfstar its metal not plastic
I tested both the iPhone 6 and S6 against a Onkyo external DAC and both phones have low level bleed in noise. It is not designed for pristine audio quality. In essence, it is a high power radio transmitter and receiver. It will always have noise.
The Axon is my daily driver and all I can say is that it's amazing. Costs $199 and honestly, sounds better than ANY other phone. Even better than the S6!!!
SimmonSays the s6 sucked because it uses qualcomms crappy dac builtin to the soc.
axon 7 mini?
Axon, Axoff.
Anonymous Well played.
Unbox Therapy rip sony ?
Unbox Therapy alcatel one touch idol 3 is the best sounding phone out there.
Anonymous Take the day off man, you just won internet of the day.
Anonymous Axon, Dendron.
LOL he says TANKS very much for watching guys! UnboxTherapy vids are just so addicting...
LOL!!!!
MrAlexanderHwang ComedyShortsGamer?
Alwhalid'z16 Ha! Wait... maybe he is asian...
I received Axon 7 yesterday, and didn't care much about "hifi" and Dolby Atmos that it had.... And then I played a song.... Blew my mind! It's like IMAX in a palm of my hand. I'm in no way audiophile, and I can definitely tell the difference between Samsung Note 3, HTC, BLU Pure XL and Huawei mate 8.
Biased. Should've done a blind listening test.
Agreed
Agreed
agreed
Placebo.
Yeah he should've compared them in a blind type of test.
That's what I thought
breezyashell or recording and looking at the sound with a software.
More like he got paid off by axon
***** what a virgin.
feels like a sponsored video by ZTE.
go away iSheep
Orbital but it's true tho it does feel like a sponsored video
How does that make him an iSheep?
Orbital there are 4 other phones in the video, why on earth would you call him an iphone fanboy ?
I agree. This vid is clearly emphasized on the zte phone. Unsubscribed.
just subscribed because you made this video. I know 1 out of 7 million doesn't mean much but I really appreciate this video. no one puts out reviews of how new phones, especially phones made for audiophiles sound. to me its the most important spec on a phone whether is phone calls or listening to music at work or home. I hope you make another one when the new htc u 11 and zte 7s come out.
It's fun to come back here a year later when ZTE has the Axon 7
You should've unboxed and reviewed the ZTE Axon in another video
Lol, there are plenty of unboxing videos on the Axon. What's the difference between this phones packaging and an iPhone, a Galaxy S or a Moto X?
Tristan Hoekstra None with the quality of Mr. Unbox Therapy
Tristan Hoekstra A hole in the top of the box to show off the two cameras?
Compare it to a Sony Xperia (Z3)
Liam Davy Hopefully the September 2 IFA press release will introduce something with a Snapdragon 820 and a new design. The leaks images looks really good.
Hi-res rigth!
Arbi Daci thats what i got (moving from an s4) and the quality is just mind blowing!!!
Arbi Daci I view this video finding to see my Xperia Z3 compared
Arbi Daci yeah, Xperia has the best EQ settings no doubt, clear bass is just fucking awesome!
most phones aux outputs compress the audio and add a huge EQ overlay, such as the iPod and iPhone. phones such as the HTC m8, m9, and A9 all have aux outputs that play audio without the compression and pure audio without the huge EQ overlay found on other phones.
My guess is that this is more to do with a specific "sound signature". I know the m9 uses some Dolby software, it could be a slightly more V shaped profile, hence the low end emphasis.
Try agianst z4.
munroe R and there is the Marshall London
harold lau what???
munroe R new smartphone by Marshall, focused on audiophiles
Aditya Parama Hadi ahhhh thx!
A z4 is a car isn't it?
All the Qualcomm phones should sound very similar. My oneplus one sounds virtually indistinguishable from my last two phones, the Nexus 5 and Nexus 4. The differences in sound between the One M9, Galaxy S6 and LG G4 are likely due to software DSP.
***** The DAC is EXACTLY the same in all the phones he presented. One thing I have heard about the axon though is the abysmal battery life and not so great graphics.
Lou should feel free to make sponsored vids but I would atleast like to be notified first, this is a commercial just as his promoting of beats is (which are definitely NOT the best headphones around, sennheiser and bose to name a couple are much better both headset wise and earphone/in-ear wise than beats overpriced crap).
Thanks for the video anyway lou, I appreciate your hard work, and I'm happy you're as successful as you are, would just appreciate a little more transparency.
Corinn Heathers +bendybow Keep in mind, the S6 using Wolfson WM1840 dac
***** that is a bot he never uses beats and the link is probably a virus to get your information lou never does a give away in the comments and come on beats is a fucking joke I know some one who disagrees with that but he says that is my taste. I think you should look further than your taste but I think he never used another headphone. he also says that beats is the best because alot of dj's use them.
***** Isn't only the Exnyos version? Or did Samsung quit using different chips in the NA and International versions?
Corinn Heathers Newest Samsung 2015 flagship now using exynos for all region.
I find that the quality of sound from the phone speaker (or speakers) is important too. I would have liked to see (hear) that.
HTC has three eq'S for earbuds on ear and in ear , HTC boom sound is not just for the speakers . and furthermore it actually supports and plays flac 24 bit 196khz , I was amazed that you didn't mention this, it would be amazing if you could test this against some high end audio players I'm curious , as you can tell I'm a m9 owner and am happy with flax files on my phone.
That's not how you compare audio devices. Your are merely comparing the short term memory. Google Plus music is garage. It doesn't matter what you use. It's going to sound as good as garbage can sound. It's easy to make a music player to play sound. Not so easy to make one that can deliver MUSIC. BTW, FLAC is merely a file type. Not a guarantee it will sound good.
'Best sounding' and 'smartphone' can't be in the same sentence
Sincerely, audiophiles
shadowlago95 best sounding smartphone out of the smartphones he tried
shadowlago95 a snobby audiophile spotted!
+gigglemybox boom! Thank you guy.
+shadowlago95 Do you think you're better than the rest of society?
+shadowlago95 You just put those 2 words in the same sentence. Sincerely, Mr. technicality.
also try LG V10 & SONY Z5
He is right. I have a Zmax. I've owned phones from just about all the major manufacturers, except an iPhone. the zmax phone produces music that sounds as if it's coming from a large stereo. Playing it using Bluetooth in my car is just amazing. The music is Crystal clear and super loud
DAC's play a huge role... And the people saying you can't hear a difference are insane. Almost every smart phone have shitty DAC's built in and is why a lot of audiophiles get portable DAC's. So for him to say a phone with a better built in DAC sounds better than the rest is 100% possible... DAC's translate binary to an analog signal, the quality of a DAC makes all the difference in that conversion process and as far as I'm concerned he easily could have heard the difference. Even at lower quality bitrate sources.
Dino Barberino wich was is the best in audio quality ,this phone's dac or Fiio E10k ? please answer
***** Shit, forgot I was submitting my thesis to my english prof dewddddd, got tired of correcting autocorrect so I gave up and left it. Thoughhhh I could make the argument of it being a part of awkward plurals and abbreviations which makes the apostrophe useable for more than possession. For example "She used 6 and's in her sentence". That stays true with weird abbreviations, normally those with numbers AND letters. But I could make the argument. REKT!
Kappa123
Younes Berrada most likely the Fiio E10k purely because it would have way more leg room to fit all which is needed and free from the electrical distortion and noise the internals a phone may produce (Processor, RF interference, etc).
Dino Barberino thx
that sponsorship money though.
Sony Z3 has Hi Res Audio.. And its not here.. I really dont understand people..
Norberto Castro Hey, I also recently got my new smartphone (Z3), and what is making me sad is that I don't get the Hi-Res option anywhere in the options, even though I have the right headphones. Is it because of the newest update? That my walkman icon is gone and now it just says Music? Please help someone, I also want to hear that Hi-Res quality you guys are talking about!
rannopleisss All you need is the right hi res audio file and you´re good to go ( and a very good pair of headphones) if you just want to enjoy your mp3 files then use the DSEE HX option and you´ll hear the diference.
rannopleisss get the HTC 10. It has a High-Res audio built in
The DAC's in all those devices are great. Samsung and Apple use Wolfson ones, which are excellent, HTC focuses on audio consumption with their flagship lineup since quite a while and LG is also known for producing a very good audio output.
Where is the marshall London?
I don't think it was available in the US for import at this point
why you never Unboxed!! the HTC 10 ... I think its the best sounding phone yet....
The ZTE Axon 7 is equal to the audio on the htc 10
does it have dolby ?
Htc m9 have same audio with front facing stereo speakers.
for my opinion, you could just modify the equalizer for a better result, I'm using an S4 with Philips headphone and its sound really great, all the bass kicked in.
Sound quality is a difficult topic on smartphones since there are several levels of equalization that may change the listening experience.
For example: I've got the LG G2, and out of the box the sound was an abomination. After trying enhancing the sound, I found that LG had programmed a system wide equalizer into their Android version, that they did an awful job in setting it up, and it was literally impossible to deactivate it (overrides other equalization apps after a few seconds). Then I've installed Cyanogenmod, and I got the best headphone listening experience with my own equipment EVER.
To get to the point: software level is much more important than you may think
Try the Nokia N91 old but good bo music player beats it the best sounding hands down
iphone 6 best
No.
Nasser Ali lmao,
fuck off.
Nasser Ali good one ! HAHAHA
Funniest thing ever when people get pissed off at people having an opinion.
Nasser Ali None are the best, phones are completely and utterly subjective. I don't understand how people have such strong feelings over what is 'the best'.
hopefully these other larger and more well known companies will learn a thing or two from these headphones that seem to work in great synergy with the companies phone products. love vids like this. learn something new every time.
honestly it seems like you were just sponsoring that phone and your review seemed to favor the ZTE for more reasons then just the audio quality
The ZTE has a 32bit dac and there is two dacs which is the same as the ZTE Axon 7 and that has better output than the other phones on his video.
Where's the Xperia Z3+!? It's the best integrated DAC!
Consider the Marshall London -- which is not at all a flagship phone but is designed around audiophiles in mind.
I'd like to see someone connect them to an A to D converter with a "Y" adapter and record the phones playing some test files. You could compare the result to the originals and see exactly what's going on. The A/D's impedance should be so high it shouldn't affect the response.
compare it to a walkman :3
Walkman > All
Clark Kent ikr
+Luis Antonio Santiago Walkman has a plastic screen like a phone from 5 years ago.
Wavestrike Electronics yes I know but the sound quality is what we compare here, not the physical appearance...
Luis Antonio Santiago Onkyo DP-X1 would be a good one to compare a decent DAC if just for the sound.
The real question is; how much did you get paid to do this? :)
That axon looks cool too, which is definitely a plus!
Nothing will beat the G6 and V20 that I can guarantee. HiFi quad dac literally makes a $10 pair of Sony earbuds sound close to beats, it's that amazing.
Umm... i dont get this video.. or commercial? At all.
Im always addicted to listen to galaxy s6 and s6 edge tv ad and watch it on my z3, and what youll hear is amazing, so with my sth30 headset.. you use both of those amazing things... the sound that comes out is amazing. My point is xperia z3 has better, if not, crisper sound than most of these devices, why dont you put that thing here in the comparison?
Alvin Zahran Majid he probably used what he had at the time and might not have had a xperia phone
john li i hope so
So... How much did ZTE pay you?
I liked this video just for using the song "Instant Crush". Absolutely beautiful song.
i wish you would have recorded the output of each of the phones and uploaded them so that we could hear the difference
Xperia Z5 >>> the rest in terms of audio performance.
Except the HTC One M9 ofc
+Sly Cooper can't comment on that but I don't believe it is superior to sony's high res smartphone. I am an audiophile and I have compared a bunch of phones and the Z5 sticks out! actually, for a phone it is very pleasing!
+Chris Conrad HTC has always had the best speakers with their dual front facing Boom sound speakers with Dolby audio. trust me, its the best 😊
+Sly Cooper who gives a crap about speakers apart from 16 years Olds? I am talking about the performance with 300,- headphones and lossless audiophiles. The Z5 is state of the art worth the audio processing.
+Chris Conrad Better than Dolby digital surround sound? I was under the impression Dolby is best in the business, better than even Sony
Switch the G4 with the V10
yeah LG team here!
wohaa
+Rudo Douglas LG? II'm kinda suffering the lack of EQ in LG G3...
+Unbox Therapy , I recommend a phone sold in India, that is the LENOVO VIBE X3... It has DOLBY ATMOS speakers and a lot of tech in its headphone jack
Just bought my 3rd ZTE +++++++++++++++ they are awesome... I had a 1st generation then I got the Axon 7 mini now today the larger new model I can hardly wait... Takes great photos too I love these Arizona sky's and this phone really nails what im seeing all the time consistently... Thanks ZTE.. Ed in Phoenix writes
are u sure it's not a placebo effect?
do a blindfold test.
Under the 301 clu.. Oh wait..
+UnboxTherapy
hopefully these other larger and more well known companies will learn a thing or two from these headphones that seem to work in great synergy with the companies phone products. love vids like this. learn something new every time.
I clicked on the video but for some reason it wouldn't start, but then realised I had the ad blocker on.
Your testing is very biased and unprofessional. You could at least TRY to eliminate bias out of your review by doing a blind test where someone else switches the phone for you and you say which one sounds better without looking. But nope. Axon may be better or it may not be, but we will never know because you got payed to do a biased review. Even if you didn't mean to be biased subconsciously you still were. So yeah.
now try with the old nokia n91 ;)
i'm going to skip everything and elaborate explaining the hi-fi functionality for this phone:
a) Luis's trick was on playing streaming sounds/music
b) if you want a high sound/music, you need to have them saved on *.flac
c) *.flac files are humongous in size, but you dont have external memory.
d) All of my *.mp3 songs which being played by BBZ30, Sony Xperia Z3 Compact or Lumia 930 were fine
e) some of my music sounded distorted on the ZTE axon pro unless if its played over soundcloud or youtube
f) you can go to gsmarena and search for phones that have the hi-fi function or DAC and go with the known brands.
for me, it was a bad 2 and a half months experience with this phone that i should have bought anything else
The Axon Pro looks great. Really. There are only 2 problems I have with that. No microsd expansion slot and no removable battery. If it had those two, people would be on it like crazy.
Sony is a music company sooo....
Sony is shit its hardly to find Sony phone with good speakers
Sony only put Qualcomm integrated DAC for their phone since Z5, but they still offer Bluetooth LDAC in the flagship.
LG V30 with their Hi-Fi Quad DAC gives superior sound to any phone out there and they know it since they actually include half decent B&O in-ear headphones with the phone and not the complete garbage you usually get and have B&O branding on the phone itself. Sony has been pretty average imo though I haven't had a possibility to test their latest generation of phones.
I bought a Sony Xperia M4 aqua for the "walkman" bit of it but I can say that it's nothing but a gimmick. The only sound aspect of it is that it digitally enhances the bass frequencies which can be easily done by any third part app these days. The hardware is weak at best.
Sony's headphone output has been pretty average like you say, so no reason to include them if you are going for top of the line.
The LG V30? Definitely excellent, and gets a nod for being the loudest. However, for audio quality through a passive 3.5 jack, that record is still held by the now-discontinued HTC M8. If you are going to go beyond the 3.5 jack and into active headphones, then USonic is a total mind blower.
I've been a studio engineer for years, and HTC USonic is the only thing that comes close to what the musicians and producers hear in the studio control room.
Bias sponsored video lol
It's about time someone does a review with smart phones with headphones audio review. Need more I love music and listen to it loud but I love to listen to the music as if it was live. A live concert play list I can listen for hours. Thanks......
Obviously the HTC One sounds the best from a speaker standpoint but the audio jack is seriously hard and subjective to decide which is the best as every pair of headphones will react differently to each audio jack and not only that but every person will have a difference in opinion to what sounds are actually better. Either way good video Lew, interesting that you said the G4 didn't sound crispy tho. Try some different headphones with it, the Bose Soundtrue's sound amazing with the G4.
Test it against Sony z2/z3 with hi-res audio.. The real deal
Gebruikersnaam10011 Hey, I also recently got my new smartphone (Z3), and what is making me sad is that I don't get the Hi-Res option anywhere in the options, even though I have the right headphones. Is it because of the newest update? That my walkman icon is gone and now it just says Music? Please help someone, I also want to hear that Hi-Res quality you guys are talking about!
They actually removed it with the lollipop update.. :(
What the hell?
Not worth watching - sony is not there.
reported :)
reported again :)
reported again :)
reported :)
+1sonyzz REPORTED
Without a double blind test with volume levels matched, you can't use this test to make any claims about sound quality. There's expectation bias, placebo, different volume levels and a thousand other things influencing the validity of the test.
The Earphones from the ZTE doesn't always fully support other brands so the sound may vary.
Not "zee" its "zed"
In north America its "zee". it doesn't matter anyway. Its the same thing in the end.
Nick Uchiha it the philippines, it's Zay...like Gay
So when you were learning A B C D.... In childhood you used to end that like X Y zee not zed?
+Maitreya M (MM360X) yes. That's how we are taught to pronounce it.
ZTE is no a well known device in the smartphone world, all I know is iPhone
+jamen brooks sad tbh. ZTE is the 4th largest smartphone market in the US. but still not well known.
+ＧＯＤ 死 死 They are very popular here in the west but their popularity is not comparable to the gigantic smartphone producer samsung is
I never thought I see the day an iPhone stands out in size in a phone comparisons with other flagship phones
I don't mind the buffer
I don't mind the ads
but when the ads buffer, I suffer
and I suffered a lot in this video!
The Xperia Z3 is the best sounding smarthphone then comes the m9
The psp haz the best sound system
I have had HTC, LG, and Samsung....They ALL sounded Great with headphones!
interesting video... on my iPhone I have my EQ settings to "Late Night" and I found that it gives it a much better sound than the default EQ.
Axon = artificial gimmick. 32bit prcessor? Good lick trying to process a sh*tty 9mb 320kbps mp3 file. It's all fucking digital gimmicks. True audiophilists cringe at videos like this. We just shake our heads and *sigh*
Oh and by the way, i own my own hi-fi audio business. Hence please stop throwing the word, HI-FIDELITY so loosely. Purists and those who are deeply sowed into the REAL HIFI audio realm laugh.
Please stick to phone or tech videos and let the REAL audio gurus do audio.
I cringed even more at your superiority complex.
jsong21 You sir, are the poster-child for the snobbery audio-file community.
jsong21 if they build the correct instruction sets into the processor it should handle it just fine
jsong21 But what do you recomend? as portable music player.
Du sköna nya värld
Astell&Kern AK2400.
If you can't get one of those due to price, just get a ipod. But most important part about getting the best possible audio quality is source. People always seem to gimp out on the source by using mp3 or streaming. And if that's the case, it's really not worth upgrading any kind of audio hardware.
One plus 2 or moto x style
Style
Style/Pure all the fucking way!!!!!!!
anagha shinde style all the way
It totally depends on what you are looking for.
If you want a phone with a great looking screen, and is splash and dust resistant buy the moto x style
If you want a phone with a aluminium body and has great specs buy the oneplus 2
The cameras are both great but on the moto you can get more detail then the oneplus.
Hope i helped :-)
Dragon of magic wtf? Specs on the pure is beast, almost as much as the s6!
FINALLY!!!! Hope more and more will take this to heart when they Review phones and/or headphones even though sound-taste is very personal. Great job Lew, and thank you. Hope more phone-makers listen and put more work in their sound over a good headphone
i have been waiting for this for so long .. thanx man ..
where is the sony z3+
Scott Williams It's not there because it sucks like all sonys products.
"If you're an aficionado..." you realize this is an absolutely worthless video. I like your channel, but these audio videos are immensely flawed, to the point it'd be better for the casual person interested in audio not to watch them at all.
Great review covering a topic nearly every other reviewer ignores.
If we could get a revamp of this comparison including the Marshall London, that would be great.
HTC all the way
Great Video I've been pondering why no one has done something like this before. It really is a great idea because iPods are outdated and add clutter in your bag or pants that your smartphone could easily help you avoid. I have gone through quite a few phones and half of them had terrible or poor audio performance. Sometimes they lacked the power to drive headphones to ample volumes not loud but above what would be 50% volume on an s6 and it really pleases me to see this.
god damn, didn't know they still make 1CM thick phones
HTC started the trend of hi-res high quality audio ! HTC has the best phone speakers, also the new HTC A9 has the most powerful audio amp and the best onboard DAC topping most expensive hi-res. players.
Should do the same test, but have someone else switch it to different devices while you are blindfolded, and then talk about how it sounds.
DO more of these with the remaining good phones on the market!
I use a external USB dac with my note 4 and I've never been impressed with the dac of ios dacs but your reaction hase wanting that ZTE just on the basis of not needing three connections between the headphones and the phone, please to see they emphasise the highs more though. Nice video bud love your work.
you should do a similar test, but over bluetooth. see if any one device transmits better sounding bluetooth audio than another.
+Michael Bouman Bluetooth audio is digital so the dac is skipped.
You should have tested a Blackberry, these things sound really nice even with the speaker. Even they are not made for media and that stuff.
Try "Bohemian Rapsody" from Queen, it has a really REALLY wide range of highs and lows.