Receiver Headphone Jack quality

D

donileo

Enthusiast
Ok, guys so Ive been testing around and I found something a bit shocking to me. So I have a Denon 3808CI receiver which up to now has been a great receiver and I went and plugged some good quality headphones (SuperFi 5 pros IEM) into the headphone jack. I played a track I'm familiar with and thought hmm.. ok.. the sound is ok, honestly it sounds veiled, lacks lows,mids and highs but hey.. I trust the DACs in the receiver so this must be whats in the actual music and I should just trust it.. This should be whats really recorded..

Well...I continued digging around and thought ok so this same song (same file) should sound exactly the same out of my ipod, iphone, and macbook all which have been tested to have ruler FLAT frequency response out of their headphone ports see--> http://www.kenrockwell.com/apple/ipod-touch-5g/audio-quality.htm and lo and behold the song sounds completely different when I listen to it on my iPhone. Now I definitely hear the bass the mids and the highs that I didnt hear through the receiver. The song sounds way better. Listening to the song on my macbook, iphone or ipod sounds exactly the same but the Denon receiver headphone jack sounds veiled and much lower quality.

So you'd think well, maybe your feeding the Denon low music via your computers DAC? Nope.. Im sending the audio in digital format via HDMI directly to the receiver. I made sure to disable the sound card on my computer and I can clearly see on the Denon that its reading a PCM Digital File. I am also not applying any equalizers anywhere, not on the PC and not on the iPod/iPhone/Macbook and I am comparing the same file/song played on the receiver to the same file/song played on my ipod / other devices.

Which leads to one of two conclusions: Either something is wrong with my reciever or Denon must've skimped on the headphone out quality which would be really weird.. Not only that, but it also begs the question, is the headphone out quality what the receiver is sending the speakers I'm using?? If so that would be really really bad.
 

Latest posts

newsletter

  • RBHsound.com
  • BlueJeansCable.com
  • SVS Sound Subwoofers
  • Experience the Martin Logan Montis
Top