PONO - Where Music Lives

"And by 2040, most individual visual-interface applications (home entertainment, business, mobile, etc.) will be headworn."

http://www.stereophile.com/content/audio-engineering-next-40-years

I bought this unit 3 months ago and finally discovered the setup guide last week on Audioquest's website. Understand on my iMac it simply works when you plug it in, and it does improve your sound quite a bit. When I purchased it I thought well thats it and it was noticeably better so I enjoyed it for about 3 months as a nice but not elite DAC. However, after walking through audioquest's setup guide and adjusting a few settings in sound preferences and itunes the sound really opened up to a new level. The sound stage sounds wider with a more vinyl like warmth. Today I tried the recommended itunes companion program called pure audio (it's pricey at $129) and now it is actually very close to my main high-fi system running a NAD 51 DAC to monitor audio gx speakers/ Denon amp. After installing the application the highs are better separated and the lows are more controlled. As I write this I am listening to "lights" by Journey

As I write this I am listening to "lights" by Journey

I just knew there was a punchline waiting for me at the other end of that paragraph.

that's, like, the best punchline

since this has now become the default budding audiophile thread, how does Dragonfly compare say with nuforce uDAC (which also acts as a phone amp)?

― licorice oratorio (baaderonixx), Monday, March 17, 2014 2:18 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i have the nuforce and, like i said upthread, i've been very happy...BUT...it does have a tendency to overheat and i googled around and this appears to be sort of known design flaw in it. it's not terrible, you just have to unplug it for awhile and let it cool down, but still that's kind of crappy.

so for that reason, and because it's been improved and price cut by $50 since i bought the nuforce, i'd do the dragonfly now if i had it to do over....

I am on vacation but I plan on buying a Dragonfly as soon as I get home, I have been looking at an M-Audio FireWire output but they seem expensive and obsolete and I don' really need inputs since I don't do recording. So thanks thread!

From my reading about this Dragonfly thing, it will make any file sound better, correct? Like you don't need to be using FLAC or anything for it to be noticeable? Because I ceased having an mp3 collection about two computers ago and use Spotify a lot. It sounds awesome though.

works w.spotify

yeah I'm listening to mp3s right now and I just a/b'd this little minor arpeggio in King Diamond's "Haunted" from Fatal Portrait - to get a true A/B I'd have to turn up the volume on the pre-Dragonfly signal but the "3D" aspect of the preamp is just so audible even with the pre-boost's volume lower

imo listen to stuff with guitar solos and a/b those, it's a place where you can really focus and notice a vast improvement. also just listen to more stuff with solos generally

ugh another awesome cool thing i have to buy

well, PONO seems to be fantastically successful so far in increasing consumer interest in simple-to-use, affordable digital audiophile products...that aren't PONO

maybe that was... the point

next week, neil's electric car, with built in Dragonfly audio, is announced!

when you get an external dac or w/e and you hear an improvement i v much doubt it's cuz of the dac but a better amp/impedence match for your headphones/speakers/amp

somebody posted this upthread, which is a v good introduction to digital audio and sampling

https://people.xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-young.html

also ethan wiener knows what's up, skip to about halfway through and iirc he does some blind AB testing + phase cancellation testing with a "shit" dac/adc and a good one

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYTlN6wjcvQ

Iirc, all PONO is right now is a picture and a name. No one has heard anything from/on it yet, right? Like, Neil's whole SXSW keynote shill was nothing but talk. So there's not much to talk about, which seems a strategic roll-out error. Or strategic LOL-out.

no one will buy this

I mean I'm baffled at the whole thing.

out of touch rich guy in assuming everyone agrees with him shocker

thanks for the fiio e17 recommendation guys. I see B&H has it in stock for 130 bucks. I want it. Thinking I can lash it to my 160 GB ipod back-to-back with the UI sides facing out, lol

> no one will buy this

they already have, about 10,000 of them via the kickstarter thing.

anyone try using a dragonfly on linux? googling seems to suggest folks have had success and others have had issues...

out of touch rich guy in assuming everyone agrees with him shocker

― anonanon, Tuesday, March 18, 2014 12:22 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

In his book Neil seems to imply he's not rich. Which may just be modesty or something, but i cant imagine he's not pretty wealthy.

believing you are not rich seems to be a key aspect of being rich

he says in the book that anytime he's had a lot of money he ends up throwing it all into some not-very-profitable project

model train money will one day dwarf real train money just you wait

either way his ranch he bought way back in the day has to be worth a gazillion dollars now given northern cali real estate so he's rich in assets at least

Don't forget the car collection!

with the ticket prices he charges and what he prices his LPs at I can only assume that he really needs the cash.

Don't forget, he has three kids, at least two of whom require major, 24/7 medical care (both his sons have cerebral palsy and his daughter has epilepsy).

In his book Neil seems to imply he's not rich. Which may just be modesty or something, but i cant imagine he's not pretty wealthy.

he doesn't license his music and record sales are moribund. Obv if he tours he rakes in a fair bit of money and as upper miss points out he owns a big piece of property he bought on the cheap in NoCal, but his publishing is limited to airplay & covers at this point - does he even sell his stuff to movies? I would guess his receipts are pretty lean, though I also think he probably negotiated a big advance for the book

does he even sell his stuff to movies?

Yep, "Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere" was in Almost Famous (the director's cut; not sure if it was in the theatrical release), and "Rockin' In The Free World" was in Fahrenheit 9/11. Those are just off the top of my head; there might be more.

But I don't recall any stories about him getting screwed by bad investments or shady tax shelters or anything like that, and I can't think of a single thing he's done that even remotely smacked of a cash-grab.

xp According to Shakey, "Safeway Cart" was in Beau travail, and "Time Fades Away" was in Scorsese's American Boy. Also: "Out On The Weekend" was in the festival version of The Wackness (replaced by "All The Young Dudes" for general release iirc).

Checking imdb, he had songs in Due Date, Eat, Pray, Love, and Shallow Hal wtf?

Dead Man-esque score for Shallow Hal iirc

The guy clearly has money, but he's not rich like some of his peers, no doubt. I always bring up Ringo. Is Ringo rich? Sure, by most standards. Near as rich as Paul or Lennon's estate? Not even close. Rock star/celebrity finances are so weird. Frankly I don't get how any of them go bankrupt, but it happens all the time. Stuff must be tied up in investments and holdings and trains and instantly pointless high-end digital music players.

I would think Ringo is fucking loaded.

ok yeah Neil is making some money on placements then. Not "I'm rich" money but probably doing all right. Movies don't pay like commercials do.

He and John and George nearly went bankrupt at various points post-breakup. Paul was fine, largely due to his music publishing holdings (of other artists, that is).

xp

just checked celebrity net worth, which suggests ringo is worth about 300 million. neil young is about 65 million.

Forbes puts Paul at $650 million, in part due to his divorce payout:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/zackomalleygreenburg/2013/04/12/why-paul-mccartney-isnt-on-the-forbes-billionaires-list/

But according to this his current wife is so wealthy she put him over the billion mark.

in one of the laurel canyon books someone (one of the Flo and Eddie guys I think?) says that simply due to never having had monster coke habits, Neil and G Nash are presently the least struggling of their coterie.

financially

65 mil

Jesus Neil

Put 20 of that in an interest-bearing account and chill on the PONO

smokin' blunts in Savannah
blow 65 mil like I'm PONO

Supposedly, converting his old-timey cars to electrics costs $40,000. Per car.

He and John and George nearly went bankrupt at various points post-breakup

being bankrupt, legally speaking, is v v different from not having a lot of money. it's not as if george was living on the streets. (did john have bankruptcy issues too, though? that's news to me.)

Supposedly, converting his old-timey cars to electrics costs $40,000. Per car.

and buying a taco, for me, costs $4. which is, relatively speaking, about the same deal.

(did john have bankruptcy issues too, though? that's news to me.)

Yeah, pretty sure it was when he tried to emigrate to the US; most of his money was tied up with Allen Klein.

And granted, it's not like George would come home to his mansion to suddenly find his furniture and guitars out by the curb. But if it wasn't for the Anthology, he would've gone bankrupt (due to a combination of factors including, but not limited to, his film company tanking, and his longtime business manager screwing him over).