Ipod distortion?????

Yes and its one of the reasons I won't be buying another Ipod.
It's impossible for me to listen to Californication because the Ipod makes it sound ****.
Bah.

 

The headphones might be crap. I mean, look how small they are. I get it too sometimes, but it comes and goes. And it's like you say, distorted bass. I wish I had a solution.

 

+1

I think you need to try some different/better headphones before you chalk this up to an iPod issue.

Are you using the stock earbuds?

 

If I use my $60 Sony headphones, then I don't get any distortion, by the way. It sounds just like it does coming from my computer.

 

Yeah, Id try new headphones. Suprisingly, the 13 dollar Sony earbuds sound great, and I dont get any distortion.

 

In an MP3 player, there are three factors affecting sound quality, in this order:

- Headphones
- Built-in sound card specs
- EQ settings

Most of the time, it's the headphones. Those little stock headphones don't handle high levels of bass well, just like regular speakers. A nice set of headphones usually does the trick. My $20 Sony headphones work nicely for the job, although I'm sure anything above $20 would do even better. The stock Creative headphones weren't bad, either. The only reason why I don't use them is because I'm not too fond of earphones.

As for the sound card specs... I don't know much about Apple's sound card design. I bought a Creative Labs Zen Micro instead of an iPod mainly because of my history with Creative Labs sound cards - they're the best on the market, IMO, especially if you're a gamer. That technology carried over into their MP3 players, and it shows in my Zen.

Honestly, I find it hard to compete (in terms of quality sound reproduction) with the world leader in PC gaming audio.

Lastly, there's EQ settings. EDIT: Based on your post (which I didn't read completely before, sorry ), I'm discounting this one as a possibility. Sure, it'd be nice to have a graphic EQ, but even the preset ones shouldn't cause distortion that easily.

My diagnosis: It's your headphones.

 

Thats the one thing about iPods that bugs the living crap out of me. You can only choose presets for the eq, no customizing. I will give them this though, the acoustic preset works really well, but I could make it better.

 

It's the headphones. The stock earbuds really suck... But try hooking the 'pod up to better ones, everything will sound fine.

-Dash

 

Remember that CD sounds trash anyway. I have trouble listening to it on any system these days.
Go google for it :/

 

In iTunes on one of the menus you should find a selection to enable error correction on importing CDs (I don't remember where it is). It'll slow down the ripping of a CD, but it'll eliminate many distortion problems that some of your discs may have.

 

I found that I still get distortion when not running through headphones, runnning into PA (changing cables to make sure it wasn't those either) and even at low volumes still distorts. I also tried 320kbps and still came out with distorted bass drums and bass where there shouldn't have been.

interesting, I googled that and got an interesting wikipedia article.

 

I think this all reinforces the fact that while Apple has some nice (but unorthodox) computers, they have an unjustified monopoly in the MP3 player business.

I refuse to be chained to iTunes for my music, as well as be subject to mediocre sound quality.

 

yer i had a ipod and had the same problem with bass.I bought some fancy £30 sony in ear earphones still sucked.Got a 6gb sony walkman problem solved

 

I've used apple's forums several times to solve my ipod problems (mostly problems with the user).

 

You're right, I missed that.

Have you plugged the headphone output into a high-impedance input, like aux inputs on a mixer or stereo receiver? If so, is the distortion still there?

 

Your iPod might be defective then. I believe the headphone amp in it is a single chip device. There's probably an Apple store near you that you can take it to and get it checked, isn't there?