what is the ipod's SNR ???

[i_wolf]

One thing that apple doesn't publish on its website is the SNR of the ipod.
Has anyone done any tests or is anyone in the know as to what the SNR of the ipod actually is? (A weighted I presume is what we are looking for!)
I know creative are 98 , and iriver and edigital are 90 on their players. Just interested.

[ZoidbergD]

What is an SNR?

[dmt1]

Signal to noise ratio. I believe the ipod's is 90, but I'm not 100% sure.

[rkabir]

i though it was 95dB, i am pretty sure its more then 90.

[i_wolf]

it sounds to me better than some of the 90db players out there. Has anyone done any tests on this???
How do the Dacs etc... compare with creatives on the zen??

[i_wolf]

ok so we have someone who thinks its 90 and another who thinks its 95. Has anyone done any tests to find out what it actually is???

[rkabir]

noone knows..

[Drewpy]

The third Generation iPods, which use the WM8731-L chip have a 100dB (A) SNR on the DAC (output). On the ADC (input) it's 90dB. The chip website: http://www.wolfsonmicro.com/products/WM8731/

The 1st and 2nd generation iPods which use the WM872
1 chip also have a 100dB SNR. You can see this here: http://www.wolfsonmicro.com/products/WM8721/

[dmt1]

Drewpy,

Ok, edumecate me here--what's the difference the output and input SNR? Which is the one that is traditionally compared--ie when the Nomad Zen has a 98 SNR, traditionally would that be the input or output SNR?

[i_wolf]

good question.! Which Snr correlates to the advertised 98 SNR of the zen???

[Phil]

I think someone did test the SNR of the old gen ipods with some professional equipment. They posted their results in the old forums a while back. From what I remember, it was above 90dB, and I think above that is good enough.

[i_wolf]

so it doesnt' make the 100 SNR as seen in the link above???
just interested. It definately sounds clearer than my mates 90snr archos jukebos playing the exact same file. In fact it sound much better... through same headphones etc.... then again better is subjective, but to me it sounded much clearer and more like a creative unit
.. but not quite creative audio quality....

[Phil]

I think it has to do with more than SNR. They're almost the same for practical purposes. I'm under the impression that Creative's decoder is better than the decoder Apple uses.

[Drewpy]

It means that the iPod has a SNR of 100dB in all theory. It may well measure a little less than that, since the audio has to go through some more components before it gets to the headphones, and with each component a little more distortion is added.

Basically, the difference between the iPod's and the Zen's SNR is so small it would be very very hard to tell the difference.

[sorka]

Actually, the headphone outputs comes straight out of the WM8731L chip as does the line out.