Audiobus: Use your music apps together.
What is Audiobus? — Audiobus is an award-winning music app for iPhone and iPad which lets you use your other music apps together. Chain effects on your favourite synth, run the output of apps or Audio Units into an app like GarageBand or Loopy, or select a different audio interface output for each app. Route MIDI between apps — drive a synth from a MIDI sequencer, or add an arpeggiator to your MIDI keyboard — or sync with your external MIDI gear. And control your entire setup from a MIDI controller.
Download on the App StoreAudiobus is the app that makes the rest of your setup better.
Will a DAC help?
Am I in the minority who thinks that the sound from the ipad's headphone port sounds somewhat 'dull'?
My iPad is an ipad pro 2017 and my ears will be 52 years old next month, if that has any relevance, and I don't have any hearing loss to my knowledge.
Why do DACs exist if not to make stuff sound better? Will it make ipad music apps sound better? Will it make my Black Hole reverb app sound like the hardware pedal!?
I'm sure the last statement is moot, as that's probably impossible, but the other questions remain.
Thanks
Davey
Comments
The headphone out is a consumer grade audio connection and on top of that iOS limits the volume through algorithms as far as I know to protect your hearing, maybe this can make it sound ”dull”. If you connect digitally through Lightning or USB-C and use an audio interface with its own headphone out, you will most likely get better sound quality.
I can tell a clear difference between the two in my setup.
/DMfan🇸🇪
I recently did some tests myself, I have a 2020 Ipad.
On my desk, I have a USB hub, and I used Audioquest Dragonfly v2, Qudelix 5K, Fiio BTR3K, Chord Mojo DAC, and headphone out. I am a bit an audiophile, I like to thinker about a signal chain that is not compromised, to an extend. In the end the music counts and not the equipment.
They all work with low latency on Ipad and AUM. With my headphone the external DAC´s all sound more or less the same. And when I compare the headphone out to these DAC´s, it is not worse, it only sounds a bit different, I think the mid frequency is a bit recessed. But it doesn't sound flat or dull.
So my headphones could be a limiting factor, or my ears (too much concerts and clubbing....). I also have small active speakers, M-audio AV-40, and with these speakers I really don´t hear a difference.
On my PC I have a M-audio Delta 44, that is an older one, and the result is the same.
My conclusion is the headphone output is not bad for casual listening and working with audio apps.
I think when you need a proper audio input, an audio interface (ADC) is definitely needed, and then a nice DAC is a bonus.
This is likely more a function of your headphones than the DAC. Also, being 52 years old, you are guaranteed to have high frequency hearing loss -- assuming that you are a human being. High frequency hearing degrades for all people as they get older -- it happens so gradually that you would only be aware of it if you do a hearing test that demonstrates the highest frequency you can hear.
For some people it degrades faster than the norm, but even 18 year-olds can't hear some sounds (over about 17.5k) that 14 year-olds can. By 40, most people can't hear frequencies over about 15k. At 50, it's down to about 12 k.
As it happens, our brains adjust so that we never even notice that we are missing those.
I became super aware of it when my son was 3 (and I was 50). We were listening to a CD and he kept talking about a tambourine part that was "too loud" and I could barely hear it. I checked on a spectrometer and sure enough there was a lot of high frequency content over 14k when the tamborine was playing.
It was humbling.
Different headphones/ear buds can sound very different from each other. You might find that switching to another type might make things sound less dull.
Get one of the $9 Apple lighting (or USB-C) headphone adapters, those are actually some of the best portable DACs you can buy without spending A LOT more.
The hardware pedal goes into a dedicated amp/recording stage, which will alter the sound in it‘s own way. The sound of the pedal remains the same, it has the exact same code as the IOS app version.
If you compare sound it‘s important to match levels exactly. Even 0.5 dB more will be perceived as „better“, though your ears (usually) ignore such small difference in loudness.
But there is also some range in output stages (beyond DACs) to significantly alter sound.
I used to monitor on an Audient ID22, which does a great job in what‘s considered „analytical“ playback (to handle mixes), but the tone is (at least to a degree) still pleasing.
Now I‘ve modded some former broadcast modules for that purpose, and the sound is frankly flattering... plain joy.
It‘s the same sound, yet the difference is not subtle at all... of course no eq/compression involved. There‘s a tiny loss of loudness in the high range, but bass and low mids are exceptionally clear... and that‘s where most of the music plays.
Hi All, thanks for your comments. All very informative and have put some perspective on my situation.
I definitely accept age-related frequency loss, regarding my hearing. That is a given, according to medical science, but I'm not so sure it plays a part in why I think the sound from the ipad pro port is sort of flat. And here's why - using the same not-so-amazing headphones plugged into my Roland 707 the sound I was getting was big and well-rounded. Maybe an unfair comparison, as the Roland will have dedicated this and that to boost the sound, but then I connected my Bluetooth Aftershocks to the ipad and they sounded a lot better, even though, by rights, they really shouldn't, given the nature of their physical design.
Let me also state that I'm not an audiophile, or even pretend to know anything about the science of sound and audio. I'm only expressing my feelings on the audio port's perceived inability to deliver 'good' sound, to my ears. Even when I plug in my Beyer Dynamic DT150 studio headphones I don't think there's any improvement when compared to the sound I get from the 707. It's possible though, with the case of these phones, being that they're 2x250 ohms, that the ipad has too hard a time driving them? So I'm muddying the waters here, perhaps. A DAC in this case would probably do a job, but before I take the plunge I will do more tests using the audio coming from the lightning port.
I value and appreciate everyone's input, thank you.
Davey
Hearing loss isn‘t just the common „nothing above a certain frequency“ phenomenon.
There may be individual attenuations anywhere in the spectrum as well as a lower overall sensitivity.
In that case a mobile output stage may simply not deliver enough juice to drive certain cans.
Amplifier design is a challenging task. Optimizing for loudness may have side effects in the time domain (phase angle) and vice versa.
Btw an amp needs a lot of juice to follow transients properly.
When comparing to your 707, were you comparing identical signals at an identical volume?
Very good point. Probably definitely not. What I meant was that on the whole the sound was more pleasing from the 707 using the same headphones than the sound I get from the ipad through the headphone socket.
You need to compare identical signals at identical volume. Both are important.
If you do that test then you can move on to whether a DAC/amplifier will drive those phones better. (Or if you want to pick up phones that can be comfortably driven by your iPad).
There are various website’s that have a large number of test tones that could be used to test audio equipment, iPad and certainly equipment able to playback the .wav files, these could be used to test hearing also.
On a side note, I have a few Zishan audio players (flac, DSD). These things are cheap but the DAC chip is of high quality (proper implementation is more important).
The Z3 model has a single ESS 9038Q2M DAC, and the DSDs model has this DAC chip in a dual setup. I have changed the opamp to the same type (Burson V5i) in both players.
Long story short, when I play the same song, and I hotswap my headphone, I can hear that the dual DAC version has a bit more space or depth in the sound character compared to the single DAC version. The dual DAC has more weight. I stop here, no audiophile mumbo jumbo about black background etc....
But my point is, because your ears don't have a memory, this difference is gone in a few seconds.
Back to the topic, buying a proper DAC, if you have money to spend, why not. But check if you need a USB hub to power this device, or the Ipad can run it by itself.
My Fiio and Qudelix DAC's have a rechargable battery inside.
I too have a 2nd Gen Ipad Pro and I am 53 years old. I run headphone out into my Focusrite 3rd Gen Scarlett 18i8 then into Samson monitors which are at least 10 years old. I also have a Eventide Space and I can say that I have A/B the hardware against the IOS Blackhole app and I cannot hear any difference.
With this kind of topic it’s always a bit annoying when people start to break down the same old technical explanation on why it shouldn’t sound different. While in fact people who make a lot of music on various platforms and have an ear for it just notice there is a difference in sound. So it’s not a question of explaining the difference away, but rather explore what might be causing the difference.
The comment about transients needing a lot of juice in an amp is something that sounds like it might be going in the right direction. There is of course a pretty big difference in terms of power consumption of an ipad and an MPC 60 for instance. Of course this doesn’t account for all of the other differences, but it actually hints at why it’s very difficult to emulate this kind of sound fully.
It’s kind of interesting that a lot of hardware that gets loved by producers for its sound doesn’t run on usb power.
Might there be something to this?
PS. Besides the hardware differences, I also believe the coding can have a lot to do with the sound. I noticed there is one app I use on ios in particular that just seems to sound ‘better’ (a little bit more like hardware) than most other apps. I remember in the 2000’s software programs would sound pretty different from eachother. Propellorheads Reason always had this specific sound that just couldn’t match a lot of other software. Other software just had more oomph. You could again explain this difference away if you would use a lot of synth sounds, but I always used a lot of samples. So that’s where you can really notice the difference.