# Alpine iDA-X305 USB Sound Quality



## Billk1002 (Aug 23, 2009)

Does anyone have any expirience with the Alpine iDA-X305.
The thought of being able to take a digital signal off of my ipod using a 2.0 USB port sounds incredable.
The Alpine iDA-X305 uses the same 24bit BurBrowns as the 9887.
I would be able to have multiple cd's in an apple lossless format on my ipod and not have to just listen to 1 cd at a time or have to change a cd while driving. In theory this sounds awsome!!!!


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## ixi (Jul 26, 2009)

Are you asking about connecting your ipod via the ipod connection or are you asking about connecting a hard drive (or other media player) through the USB connection? 

I've never used the USB connection but I've been very happy with the ipod connection. It's the most intuitive ipod interface with a car that I've used so far. Its very fast and I have a few ipods full of lossless music. When I compaire lossless side by sided with 320 mp3s I honestly don't think I can tell a difference, especially when driving, but that's a whole other 20 page topic.


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## FunkPnut (May 16, 2008)

I have an IDA-X100, very similar to the IDA-X305.

I use the USB connection with a 5th gen iPod using Apple Lossless and it sounds very good. If there is an audible difference using this configuration and a CD, I cannot tell.

I'm happy.

BTW, the IDA-X305 only has basic tuning capabilities. You need to get the PXA-H100 as well for T/A, EQ, active crossover...


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## ixi (Jul 26, 2009)

FunkPnut said:


> BTW, the IDA-X305 only has basic tuning capabilities. You need to get the PXA-H100 as well for T/A, EQ, active crossover...


Yep, very basic. I've added the H100 and have an active two way up front with single sub in the rear and have been quite happy with the tuning abilities the h100 adds. I got the x305 for around $230 shipped and the H100 for around $125 shipped.


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## Billk1002 (Aug 23, 2009)

If you had it to do again...would you buy the 305 again?
I like the way that the ipod sounds using the 9886, but there is no comparison to the way the cd player sounds using the 24bit d/a's in the 9886.
The 305 steps up to the 24bit burbrown d/a's and a USB 2.0, the SQ w/ a lossless file must be outstanding!!!!


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

........


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## diamondjoequimby (Jun 30, 2009)

the 305 will sound great as long as the material on the ipod is recorded/ripped at a high bit rate. Now the preamp is another story, but the ipod will sound good.


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## Billk1002 (Aug 23, 2009)

Yes I noticed that the preout voltage is only 2volts. Alpine puts its best d/a's and a nice full color display and then skimps out the output voltage????
I do not compete, this is my every day driver. Do you have any personal expierence with the HU?


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## FunkPnut (May 16, 2008)

Billk1002 said:


> Yes I noticed that the preout voltage is only 2volts. Alpine puts its best d/a's and a nice full color display and then skimps out the output voltage????
> I do not compete, this is my every day driver. Do you have any personal expierence with the HU?


They skimp out in hopes you'll buy the PXA-H100 (bastards!) which adds 4 volt pre-outs. You'll just need to bump the gain up a touch.


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## zerodistortion (Jul 23, 2009)

I have a ida-x305 for almost 2 months now and tested it with many different amps and speakers. The ipod and usb interface is very user friendly. Much better than most HUs in the market, when it comes down to selecting music from a large library. The 2 volts pre-outs is not much of a problem for your front and rear, but the sub pre-out is VERY weak! At first, I thought the sub amp I had hooked up was weak, but tested that amp with a different HU and there was a lot more output. In terms of sound (even with 24bit DAC)....just can not compare to cds. Just my thoughts.


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## FunkPnut (May 16, 2008)

zerodistortion said:


> The 2 volts pre-outs is not much of a problem for your front and rear, but the sub pre-out is VERY weak! At first, I thought the sub amp I had hooked up was weak, but tested that amp with a different HU and there was a lot more output. In terms of sound (even with 24bit DAC)....just can not compare to cds. Just my thoughts.


I've heard Alpine head units have weak sub outputs (not sure if this is myth or not).

I had 2 Pioneer head units before switching over to Alpine and I had to turn up the gain on the Alpines more than the Pioneers to get reasonable volume on the sub.

What did you rip your CD's at? If you were comparing a 256 Kbps MP3 to a CD, thats really not a fair comparison.


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

FunkPnut said:


> I've heard Alpine head units have weak sub outputs (not sure if this is myth or not).
> 
> I had 2 Pioneer head units before switching over to Alpine and I had to turn up the gain on the Alpines more than the Pioneers to get reasonable volume on the sub.
> 
> *What did you rip your CD's at? If you were comparing a 256 Kbps MP3 to a CD, thats really not a fair comparison.*


If ripped correctly, it's more then fair. What isn't fair is to compare the two in anyway other then a proper blind test.


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## Billk1002 (Aug 23, 2009)

I looking forward to demoing my ipod filled with apple lossless files through the 305. I'm sure the SQ will be just fine!!! Iam a little worried about the 2v preouts, but the more that I think about it, since iam running Zapco DC Ref amps with balanced line drivers to boost the signal i don't think it will be a problem???????????????????? 
Anybody have any noise issues with 2v preouts????


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## zerodistortion (Jul 23, 2009)

Again, the 2 volts is not an issue with the front and rear. I only had to set the gain about 1/4 for front/rear pre-outs. Didn't pick up any noise. I had to set the gain for the sub amp almost all the way up.


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## zerodistortion (Jul 23, 2009)

I use high quality MP3s, not the standard 256. This HU doesn't play cds at all, so I was comparing this to different decks. I've never tried Apple lossless, so can't speak for that comparison. I've tried to test FLAC files, but this deck can't read FLAC files.


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## korndawg (Sep 22, 2009)

I have a X100 and as long as the mp3 is good, the SQ from the HU is good too. I love my HU.


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## zerodistortion (Jul 23, 2009)

Well if anyone is interested, I'll be posting my ida-x305 for sale this weekend. It's almost new and comes with everything including manual, wiring, original box, etc...Look for my posting if interested.


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## diamondjoequimby (Jun 30, 2009)

yeah the problem w/ the sub out is that it gets up to the 2 volts at max sub output (which most units do) but it is so gutless that the lack of headroom becomes painfully obvious.


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## zerodistortion (Jul 23, 2009)

Apparently, this HU is highly demanded. I posted mine up this weekend and received several PMs instantly, and it sold in 5 mins!!! Today is my first day without it and I already miss the convenience of having all my music on 1 flash drive....I'll have to start sorting out my cds later.


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## Billk1002 (Aug 23, 2009)

Bought it on a Sunday, shipped out on a Monday w/ a tracking #, thanks go out to Zerodistortion!!!
I've already started cleaning out the cd's in my car!!!
I can't wait to have about 270 apple lossless songs at my finger tips w/ a full color display for the album art.
I WILL NEVER HAVE TO CHANGE A CD AGAIN!!!!!!!!


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## zerodistortion (Jul 23, 2009)

I really hope you enjoy the new HU. Estimated arrival will be either Wednesday or Thursday.


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## zerodistortion (Jul 23, 2009)

Bill, with this HU, you can also download different wallpaper from the Alpine website and upload it onto the LCD screen. Just thought that might be something that would interest you since you like the album art displayed on the screen.


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## norcalsfinest (Aug 30, 2008)

reason for "weak" sub outs is to keep morons from blowing up their subs.

Alpine built in a failsafe. The subout only outputs full voltage when the Subwoofer Level Control is set to 15/15.


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

norcalsfinest said:


> reason for "weak" sub outs is to keep morons from blowing up their subs.
> 
> Alpine built in a failsafe. The subout only outputs full voltage when the Subwoofer Level Control is set to 15/15.


And if they were to set it any other way, say at 0/15. What would that mean when you set it at any point after that? Clipped distorted outputs.

The sub control is meant to be used as an attenuator. You set your gain on the sub amp to a level louder then you will listen to with the headunit sub output at max, then you pad it down on the headunit for normal listening. You then have some clean sub headroom gain to play with.


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## fastlane (Apr 6, 2009)

I loved my X305. I will definitely agree on the subwoofer output though. I set up my amps on the DMM, and even with the output set to 15 it was much weaker than other decks. The gain's had to be attenuated a bit more for compensation. I recently sold it and upgraded to the 404, for the double din capability. The larger display is nice, the cover art still tends to distort though unfortunately. I do hope that Alpine comes with a firmware update. When attaching large music files (I have over 3,000 lossless songs on my Ipod at a time, and up to 8,000 on rare occasions), the unit is really buggy. It will slow to a crawl when searching, and the screen blanks out when backing out of songs. I wish they would take some hints from Kenwood on the GUI. Kenwood's decks are so much easier to search music. I love the Alphabet above, where I can click right to the song title I want via touching the corresponding letter. Ipod's % search is archaic in comparison. I will give a slight edge to CD's as opposed to Apple lossless, but it's freaking close, and I don't think anyone would notice once the noise floor increases. Also the 404 offers a ton of redundant tasks. The touch screen is tough to navigate, especially while driving. Trying to hit the tiny buttons to pause/skip/etc, turns into something totally different like listening to the radio or the like. It's completely unneeded as well as everything you can do via the touch screen can be accomplished by a hard button immediately next to it. I wish they would have foregone the touch portion and dropped the price another hundred bucks. Also, I find the unit clips at a much lower volume than previous decks. When setting up via the DMM, my Arc's clip input would kick in at just over 55% volume. Now 1k test tone's are murder, but with other decks I didn't notice this issue.


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## norcalsfinest (Aug 30, 2008)

t3sn4f2 said:


> And if they were to set it any other way, say at 0/15. What would that mean when you set it at any point after that? Clipped distorted outputs.
> 
> The sub control is meant to be used as an attenuator. You set your gain on the sub amp to a level louder then you will listen to with the headunit sub output at max, then you pad it down on the headunit for normal listening. You then have some clean sub headroom gain to play with.


with anything, you need to know the proper way to set it up.

I was just throwing the facts out. I couldn't get **** for output voltage with the sub control at 0. And then someone who has close ties to alpine let me in the loop. 

For something that's been discussed so many times, it is crazy how many people don't know that. It's basically impossible to clip the sub out at the deck this way. Which is nice. Any clipping that happens after that is due to improper gain setting, or it is already present in the original media.

Don't even get me started on MediaXpander...


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## Billk1002 (Aug 23, 2009)

The unit arrived today Wednesday!!!! It looks great, scratch free and with the original box and all of the goodies.
My thanks go out to zerodistortion.
I will try to get it installed tonight or tomorrow and leave a review.
No more cd's, a digital signal off of my ipod run through a set of 24bit Burrbrown D/A's....Woooo Hoooo


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## zerodistortion (Jul 23, 2009)

Have fun with the new toy!


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## jooonnn (Jul 26, 2009)

I owned the IDA-X305 for a month.

Pros:
Great sound quality from IPOD overall on bass response
Beautiful Screen at night
Excellent Price
Very nice looking HU 
Easy Navigation 

Cons:
Incredibly Bad washout 

http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum...ne-ida-x305-screen-defective-pics-inside.html

A "Muddier" (blanket over sound) quality to music as opposed to my CDA-9887's ipod reproduction
WEAK sub pre-out

If it wasn't for the bad washout I probably would have kept it. I just don't know how to describe it but despite the claimed Burr-brown, it doesn't feel anywhere near on the level of the 9887. The 9887 just feels overall more articulate than the 305 despite its analog signal. Would I pick the 9887 over the 305 after owning both? 10/10 times yes. It's just something you have to A/B yourself to hear what you're missing imho.


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## Billk1002 (Aug 23, 2009)

The new iDA-X305 is in and has not disappointed.
The first thing that I noticed was that my ipod was not as bright using the digital connection. I will assume that the Burbrown D/A's are a little more laid back then the ipods D/A's. Without touching any amp gains things are as well balanced as they were before with the 9886. I did not notice any difference in the level of the preouts for the sub.
Now that being said I did go from 4v preouts with the 9886 down to 2v preouts with the 305. So I did plug in the laptop and bump all 5 channels up slightly, about .2v


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

Billk1002 said:


> The new iDA-X305 is in and has not disappointed.
> *The first thing that I noticed was that my ipod was not as bright using the digital connection.* I will assume that the Burbrown D/A's are a little more laid back then the ipods D/A's. Without touching any amp gains things are as well balanced as they were before with the 9886. I did not notice any difference in the level of the preouts for the sub.
> Now that being said I did go from 4v preouts with the 9886 down to 2v preouts with the 305. So I did plug in the laptop and bump all 5 channels up slightly, about .2v


As opposed to connecting it to the same headunit by an analog aUX or something similar?


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## Billk1002 (Aug 23, 2009)

The 9886 took an analog signal off of the ipod using the ipods D/A's.
The 305 takes a digital signal off of the ipod and does the D/A on board using 24bit Burrbrown's, I hope that was the answer you were looking for.
After listening for the last 1/2 hour Iam absolutely amazed at the sound quality of the 305. The ipod now sounds better than the cd player ever did in the 9886.


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## korndawg (Sep 22, 2009)

Does the X100 do the same as the x305 as far as taking the digital signal off the ipod? The x100 is what I have. If so, then why does adjusting the EQ on the ipod affect the sound coming out of the HU? Shouldnt it just bypass it all?


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

korndawg said:


> Does the X100 do the same as the x305 as far as taking the digital signal off the ipod? The x100 is what I have. If so, then why does adjusting the EQ on the ipod affect the sound coming out of the HU? Shouldnt it just bypass it all?


Yes.


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## Billk1002 (Aug 23, 2009)

korndawg said:


> Does the X100 do the same as the x305 as far as taking the digital signal off the ipod? The x100 is what I have. If so, then why does adjusting the EQ on the ipod affect the sound coming out of the HU? Shouldnt it just bypass it all?


Yes, the X100 bypasses the ipods D/A's.
The equalizer in the ipod is manipulating the data in the digital realm before the D/A conversion not after.

Are you using a lossless format for SQ or compressed for storage?


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## korndawg (Sep 22, 2009)

Billk1002 said:


> Yes, the X100 bypasses the ipods D/A's.
> The equalizer in the ipod is manipulating the data in the digital realm before the D/A conversion not after.
> 
> Are you using a lossless format for SQ or compressed for storage?


That makes sense. Right now, I use 320 kbps mp3's but after some research on here, I think i'll be moving over to the AAC format. Its a shame the FLAC isn't supported  Itunes is just so damn spendy, and as a network admin for a phone/tv/internet company, I don't feel comfortable using torrents anymore. We bust atleast 2 people a week for downloading illegal stuff via torrents.


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## Billk1002 (Aug 23, 2009)

You will notice a huge jump in sound quality when you start to rip your CD's using apple lossless. 
An apple lossless file is approximately a 2:1 compression ratio leaving you a bit rate somewhere around 900 - 1100 Kbs. Your ripping an mp3 at 320Kbs which is about 1/3 of a lossless file. Think about all of the information thrown away never to be retrieved again ruining your SQ.


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## korndawg (Sep 22, 2009)

Billk1002 said:


> You will notice a huge jump in sound quality when you start to rip your CD's using apple lossless.
> An apple lossless file is approximately a 2:1 compression ratio leaving you a bit rate somewhere around 900 - 1100 Kbs. Your ripping an mp3 at 320Kbs which is about 1/3 of a lossless file. Think about all of the information thrown away never to be retrieved again ruining your SQ.


Haha, I hate 'buying' CD's  But i guess if thats what i takes for SQ.


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

Billk1002 said:


> *You will notice a huge jump in sound quality when you start to rip your CD's using apple lossless. *
> An apple lossless file is approximately a 2:1 compression ratio leaving you a bit rate somewhere around 900 - 1100 Kbs. Your ripping an mp3 at 320Kbs which is about 1/3 of a lossless file. Think about all of the information thrown away never to be retrieved again ruining your SQ.


No you won't, you THINK you do. In 99.99999% of the music available, a _properly ripped and encoded_ 320kbps MP3 file (look up what that mean for details) is indistinguishable from the original in a *double blind test*. 

That is scientific fact, no ifs, ands, or buts about it. 

Try it, come back and prove me wrong.


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## korndawg (Sep 22, 2009)

t3sn4f2 said:


> No you won't, you THINK you do. In 99.99999% of the music available, a _properly ripped and encoded_ 320kbps MP3 file (look up what that mean for details) is indistinguishable from the original in a *double blind test*.
> 
> That is scientific fact, no ifs, ands, or buts about it.
> 
> Try it, come back and prove me wrong.


Just hoping the one's I'm getting are ripped using LAME. I know it's prolly for the best that I do it myself or go thru itunes. I have yet to find a good site for downloading them that consistently offers quality rips. I'm constantly changes volume and other levels when i move from one CD to the next.


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

korndawg said:


> Just hoping the one's I'm getting are ripped using LAME. I know it's prolly for the best that I do it myself or go thru itunes. I have yet to find a good site for downloading them that consistently offers quality rips. I'm constantly changes volume and other levels when i move from one CD to the next.


I've read iTunes is not that good for mp3. IIRC, EAC is the standard for ripping CD's to a PC, not too sure about which compression encoder works best after that though.

I think also "replay gain" is a lossless level matcher that takes lower recording level back to the highest upclipped point without compressing the peaks.


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## Billk1002 (Aug 23, 2009)

t3sn4f2 said:


> No you won't, you THINK you do. In 99.99999% of the music available, a _properly ripped and encoded_ 320kbps MP3 file (look up what that mean for details) is indistinguishable from the original in a *double blind test*.
> 
> That is scientific fact, no ifs, ands, or buts about it.
> 
> Try it, come back and prove me wrong.


My 9886 had multiple inputs, CD, USB, analog ipod.
By far the best sounding was the cd player using Alpines 24bit D/A's.
A distant second was the analog ipod using an apple lossless file.
A close third was the USB thunb drive using Alpines 24bit D/A's loaded with 320Kbs files untill you turned up the volume and then it was blatantly apparent that you were listening to a compressed mp3 file.
This is just my opinion from listening to the different sources over the last year. Weather this was caused by poor encoding by itunes I do not know.


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## Grathan (Nov 2, 2009)

I have a question about the x305 SQ. 

I can't get it to sound good. And perhaps my unit is faulty?
The radio sounds horrible as does the mp3s from flash or ipod regardless of bit rate.



I've tried manipulating every option inside the deck. Mx on level 3, graphic/parametric, speaker distances. The factory eq presets all sound lame. Loudness on, tone defeat off, 3-way on h100 etc...


I currently have the pxa-h100 feeding back into the 305 which feeds the speakers. My only other thought left is perhaps the amp inside the 305 is not so good and the people here getting good audio are using a dedicated amp?


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## tnbubba (Mar 1, 2008)

more fyi!

Who has best DAC's? Burr Brown, Cirrus Logic, Analog Devices, AKM, Wolfson? - Club Polk


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## tnbubba (Mar 1, 2008)

lloks like an 8761 would be a good pin comnpatable replacement


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## Stearnzy (Jan 18, 2011)

This may have been touched on but, sq and usb should never go together i dont care how you rip or get your music it will never sound the same as the original recording which is the hole goal to creating a sq system. try riping a cd to your ipod at a high bit rate then plug your ipod in and the cd into the player, play the cd then play the ipod you will never have it sound the same the cd will alway be better. the reason being that anything in your computer can cause the riping procces to loose quality from opening and closing programs to even the proccesor getting boged down from your own ripping proccess


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

Stearnzy said:


> This may have been touched on but, sq and usb should never go together i dont care how you rip or get your music it will never sound the same as the original recording which is the hole goal to creating a sq system. try riping a cd to your ipod at a high bit rate then plug your ipod in and the cd into the player, play the cd then play the ipod you will never have it sound the same the cd will alway be better. the reason being that anything in your computer can cause the riping procces to loose quality from opening and closing programs to even the proccesor getting boged down from your own ripping proccess


That's absolutely not true. Unless something is _unusually_ wrong, the rip will be a sample perfect rendition of the CD samples.


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## tnbubba (Mar 1, 2008)

yes T3 ..correct..
somebody need to check out cd freaks..er clubmyce...
there are indications that a ripped/burned cd actually sound better than the original because it can reduce jitter errors.. usb form flash drive should be jitter free.!
i want to know what lossless riles I can put on a 305S that will read off a USB. manuals only say compressed audio..!!


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

tnbubba said:


> yes T3 ..correct..
> somebody need to check out cd freaks..er clubmyce...
> there are indications that a ripped/burned cd actually sound better than the original because it can reduce jitter errors.. usb form flash drive should be jitter free.!
> i want to know what lossless riles I can put on a 305S that will read off a USB. manuals only say compressed audio..!!


Try PM'ing user "Jim Walter" he might be able to find the scoop on that.


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## Stearnzy (Jan 18, 2011)

t3sn4f2 said:


> That's absolutely not true. Unless something is _unusually_ wrong, the rip will be a sample perfect rendition of the CD samples.


i dont care what you do any time you do anything on a computer expecialy taking music file and compressing it to a mp3 you are going to loose someting thats why its called compressing you are taking a large file and removing parts of data to make it a smaller file and using programs to reinterpret what you ripped of the original, try and tell me that in that proccess you will not loose someting. and show me one computer that dosent have something running in the background that could cause a problem, have you ever riped a song went and listened to it and had a little bilip of sound in a wierd area im sure everyone has and its usualy cause your doing someting else on your computer at the same time, well think about it, even if your not touching your computer it is procesing things all the time even just to show you an immage on your screen or if your screensaver pops up. i have use multiple types of ripping software and i have always had small issues so i would love for you to tell me that the average person without an amazing proccessing speed computer is going to make a completley perfect rip


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## tnbubba (Mar 1, 2008)

YEP check out club myce.. I can rip.. burn rip burn rip burn u get the idea and use a bit checker and it's a bit perfect copy!! of course I only use the best Plextor drives.. and EAC, Plextor Or DBpoweramp software.. Before you make such uneducated statments you really need to spend 6 moths reading thru the archives a clubmyce.com.. or hydrogen audio..or google EAC.. making a bit perfect copy of a cd is fairly easy with even decent drives.


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## tnbubba (Mar 1, 2008)

oh so a dsp ar d/a convertor is not a computer?? hell we might as well go back to 15" ips tape reels in our cars//LMFAO


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

Stearnzy said:


> i dont care what you do any time you do anything on a computer expecialy taking music file and compressing it to a mp3 you are going to loose someting thats why its called compressing you are taking a large file and removing parts of data to make it a smaller file and using programs to reinterpret what you ripped of the original, try and tell me that in that proccess you will not loose someting. and show me one computer that dosent have something running in the background that could cause a problem, have you ever riped a song went and listened to it and had a little bilip of sound in a wierd area im sure everyone has and its usualy cause your doing someting else on your computer at the same time, well think about it, even if your not touching your computer it is procesing things all the time even just to show you an immage on your screen or if your screensaver pops up. i have use multiple types of ripping software and i have always had small issues so i would love for you to tell me that the average person without an amazing proccessing speed computer is going to make a completley perfect rip


Take a CD track, rip it, and burn it _accordingly_ to CD audio. Put it on your favorite CD player and send the analog outputs to a quality ADC and record the track. Take the original CD in the same player and record the track. Open up both track in a sound editor. Align both tracks from the beginning (sample wise). Invert sample values on one track. Play them both together and see what you hear. 

Nothing down to >-90dB _relative to the fundamental sample_ (I've gotten that result countless times from iTunes ripper/Nero burner). That is sample perfect in the analog domain and if you wanna compare digitally recorded streams you could call it bit perfect down to infinity, although I did not mention it that way since I wanted to also include any DAC jitter due to any supposed digital jitter recording and playback anomalies that we here about.

Don't forget that we not only introduce the rip error you claim but the more then assumed likely burning errors in this experiment.


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## Stearnzy (Jan 18, 2011)

so in my first reply i didn't put in that i was talking about mp3, so i agree that if you use a fully lossless format like flac files then you can make a very good quality copy, but most people use mp3 and considering that through usb, unless you convert your ipod to play flac, will not play a flac file through usb 

I didnt feel like typin all this our so i found it on another site

Audio compression comes in two forms: lossless compression, and lossy compression.

The MP3 format is one that uses lossy compression. This means that it loses some of the audio information found in the original to make the compressed file much smaller. The information that lossy compression loses is the information deemed least important to the file. In music, this tends to be the very high and very low frequencies that are not considered to add as much to the music as the range of frequencies in between.

Many audio formats use lossless compression. This means that they retain every bit of information that is found in the original, so nothing is lost at all. Because of this, lossless compression cannot make the compressed file as small as it would be using lossy compression. However, lossless compression means that you get a smaller file without losing any information, and so is the only method that can be used when absolute 

i have compared these things im not just saying this stuff cause its the way i think computers work and to give you a bit of my background our shop has built the best sounding car in western Canada and 3rd place in expert pro in 2006 at the Usaci worlds where we actually had the highest sq part of the score in the class . I have taken many tracks that you can hear fine detail in the background of tracks that you loose if you rip it to mp3s and burn it to a cd or put it on an ipod

Hey i would love to have my mp3s replicate everything i hear on original cds but i have yet to hear it


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## akelu (Feb 1, 2010)

Stearnzy said:


> i dont care what you do any time you do anything on a computer expecialy taking music file and compressing it to a mp3 you are going to loose someting thats why its called compressing you are taking a large file and removing parts of data to make it a smaller file and using programs to reinterpret what you ripped of the original, try and tell me that in that proccess you will not loose someting. and show me one computer that dosent have something running in the background that could cause a problem, have you ever riped a song went and listened to it and had a little bilip of sound in a wierd area im sure everyone has and its usualy cause your doing someting else on your computer at the same time, well think about it, even if your not touching your computer it is procesing things all the time even just to show you an immage on your screen or if your screensaver pops up. i have use multiple types of ripping software and i have always had small issues so i would love for you to tell me that the average person without an amazing proccessing speed computer is going to make a completley perfect rip




Hate to bump up an old thread but i got to this via google.

The above is completely wrong 

a 15 year old computer with 50 seperate programs running can rip a cd to a music file without losing ANYTHING from the original. Computers have things setup in place so that crossover talk doesnt happen between programs.. What you are saying makes no sense.

Also, compressing data making it smaller doesnt have to mean losing sound data. For example, think of compression like this. If you have a single tone that goes at 20hz for 10 seconds. Original size of file say 500kb, (totally made up figures), a compression can make that file 10kb without losing any data instead of going "20khz play, 20khz play, 20khz play, 20khz plz" the file has "20khz play 10seconds".. see that? thats a very rough guide on how compression works. Losless compression music files are identical to their CD.


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## bginvestor (Jan 13, 2008)

Has anyone figured out the clipping level (volume position) for the Ida-305s? It appears to be pretty much on the top end from listening tests.. 

Anyone have any opinions/measurements? thx.


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## tnbubba (Mar 1, 2008)

with an uncompressed wav file a 0dbfs mine clips right a -6 on the alpine scale..
that's plumb ****ty

esp considereing that stoopid bar graph your cant tell when you are reaching that point
alpine needs to fix the firmware and upgrage so you can choose and see the number readout not that dam bar graph or fix the ****ty preout so it dont clip on full scale signal..

anybody got the schems of this unit so I cna go in and start hacking n fix this stoopid thing or sell it and buy that $1000 pioneer


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## Stück (Jul 3, 2011)

I had one of these in a daily driver almost 2 years ago. I hated it with a passion and got rid of it as quick as I could. It was SLOW as hell to search through a USB drive full of songs, random was the only way to listen. The bar graph volume thing also drove me nuts.


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

tnbubba said:


> with an uncompressed wav file a 0dbfs mine clips right a -6 on the alpine scale..
> that's plumb ****ty
> 
> esp considereing that stoopid bar graph your cant tell when you are reaching that point
> ...


DO IT!

P99 in manual iDevice mode + an iPhone 4S with Siri.

Bestest single din head unit out there ever, by far. Hell, best head unit period if you don't need the big screen.


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## bginvestor (Jan 13, 2008)

t3sn4f2 said:


> DO IT!
> 
> P99 in manual iDevice mode + an iPhone 4S with Siri.
> 
> Bestest single din head unit out there ever, by far. Hell, best head unit period if you don't need the big screen.



I am seriously considering switching to a ipad 2 w/ a Bitone. Maybe this alpine will be installed in the wife's car!?


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## tnbubba (Mar 1, 2008)

the alpine is wayyyyyyyyyyyy faster thatn anything on the market for thumbing thru a flash drive than maybe a kenwood.. I've tested em all and man the pioneers suck ass..

the alpine has it quircks but its quick the kenwood interface for falsh or hdd is better thatn the alpine but the alpine wins hands down with ipod.. pioneer is not even close..
I have not tested the p99 yet but they all have the same interface folder sturcture according to the manual.. the alpine is not bad but it's out put sections could be wayyyyyyyy better.. i just want the pioneer for the x/o to simplify things,,, why add outboard processors to do another a/d/a conversion >??


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## gnesterenko (Mar 17, 2011)

Not sure if this was mentioned or not in the thread, don't feel like reading it all, but just a point.

THe Alpines, despite their marketing, do NOT maintain a direct digital signal between your iDevice and the preamp section. While they DO bypass your iPods electronics, the head units will convert the signal to analog internally, then convert it BACK to digital for the DSP section (limited though it may be) and then once again to analog for the pre-amp section. In other words (and why they would design their HUs like this, I don't know) there is an internal D2A conversion, then a A2D conversion and then again a D2A conversion. The P99 however, is, to my knowlege, the ONLY HU on the market today that will in fact keep your signal in 1s and 0s all the way from the iDevice hard drive to the decoder to the DSP to the DAC and only then, at the pre-amp stage, will the signal be converted to analog.

That said, the Alpines do sound good, and the better the source file (320Kb or Lossless) the better the reproduction will be. But, and this has been tested, discussed and proven on these forums, when the resulting signal is compared against the source untouched signal, there are very obvious changes and artifacts introduced by the HU processing back and forth. The digital signal in the HU is not the same as what was leaving the iDevice. Where as the P99, the digital bits at the HU matched the source bit-for-bit.

I use an Alpine IDA-X100 and while I do love it, I recently tried to use it with an almost filled-to-capacity 160GB iPod classic. All of a sudden what I thought was efficient and intuitive browsing became just about useless. VERY slow to scroll through the list, and seeing only 4 lines a time... I quickly gave up on finding anything specific and set up some playlists to use instead. It will probably be better if the iDevice was based on an SSD and not HDD, in terms of speed anyway, but again, the limited screen size becomes very very apparent. My next device is probably going to be the P99 because it allows you to maintain control via the iDevice itself rather then forcing you to use the HU controls (and of course, the aforementioned sound quality difference).

Posting from work, so need this disclaimer:
"The views expressed here are mine and do not reflect the official opinion of my employer or the organization through which the Internet was accessed."


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## tnbubba (Mar 1, 2008)

where did you get the info on the alpine ad conversion?? you can bypass all the dsp in the alpine an just use it straight thru..
I'm looking at schematics of the 305s and I don't see that conversion taking place unless it's done in the one dac chip.. but according to the BB spec that chip is just D-A

yea the 305S has some improvement over the x100 but not sure what

and why use a CRAPPOD on the pioneer when it supports windows file structure and HD or SSD device???


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

tnbubba said:


> *where did you get the info on the alpine ad conversion?? you can bypass all the dsp in the alpine an just use it straight thru..*
> I'm looking at schematics of the 305s and I don't see that conversion taking place unless it's done in the one dac chip.. but according to the BB spec that chip is just D-A
> 
> yea the 305S has some improvement over the x100 but not sure what
> ...


it's an educated assumption based on test that bikinpunk ran on the Ina w910 plus other tidbits floating around. The difference between the measured results of the USB and the internal cd are so big that there is something strange going on. I could not get 4 different digital sources to measure different in even the slightest way on the same dac when I tested them. They were all affordable home sources. So why would it happen in the alpine. And it also does not happen on the p99. It measures the same as expected. 

Our conclusions we later updated to simply say that the two internal digital siources in the headunit don't measure the same and as a result there is no garantee that the "digital USB input" will be any cleaner than a quality portable players lineout into the same headunits aux in.

Here's a post summing it all up.....

http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/1466239-post8.html


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## tnbubba (Mar 1, 2008)

but have u tested the x305S?
the IDA is totally different architecture?

still going with the pioneer just so I don't have to build a custom 4 way active crossover


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

tnbubba said:


> but have u tested the x305S?
> the IDA is totally different architecture?
> 
> still going with the pioneer just so I don't have to build a custom 4 way active crossover


Nope, have not.


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