SingTel Group and Samsung cooperate to accelerate mobile data growth in the region

On the sidelines of the Galaxy S5 launch in Singapore today, the SingTel Group - comprising SingTel (Singapore), Optus (Australia), AIS (Thailand), Airtel (India, Africa), Globe Telecom (Philippines) and Telkomsel (Indonesia) - and Samsung today announced 4 joint initiatives to encourage the growth of mobile data in the region, benefiting over 500 million customers in all.

Retail Collaboration Programme
This allows select Samsung Stores to provide the respective local carrier's sign-up services, providing a simpler retail experience for customers. Currently available in Philippines and soon to be available for India and Indonesia.

Those who visited the Samsung pop-up store (well, sort of) outside Ngee Ann City some time ago may remember this in action. It certainly does drive sign-ups of customers who are already considering getting a Samsung smartphone with SingTel, but for walk-ins, at least in Singapore, I think this won't be so effective, since we're so used to getting everything done at a telco outlet anyway.

Direct Carrier Billing with Samsung Apps
Singapore already offers this and it will be rolled out to Thailand, Philippines and Indonesia. Customers can buy Samsung apps and content by either charging to their mobile bills or deducting from their prepaid balances.

This was most interesting to me. Alistair Johnston, CMO of Telkomsel (above left), revealed in the Q&A of the press conference that Direct Carrier Billing is an attractive alternative to payment by credit cards, which do not enjoy as high a penetration rate in emerging markets. Pratthana Leelapanang, SVP for Digital Service of AIS (above right), noted that NFC technology is being used in Thailand as a direct means of payment for public transport (ie, using your smartphone as an EZ-Link card) as well as cashless contactless payment for about 300 major establishments such as fast-food chains, and this can be linked to Direct Carrier Billing.

Mobile App Development Programme
This is just basically calling on start-ups around the region to bring their development ideas to the SingTel Group and Samsung, and if they like it they will accelerate their development and open access to the half a billion mobile customers around the region. Selected developers will have their apps marketing in Singapore, Australia, Thailand, Philippines and Indonesia.

Nothing new, and I'm no expert on this, but dang those figures look real good to me.

Direct Access to Applications
Gonna have to be honest here - this is a fancy term for pre-loaded apps by the telco, albeit "carefully customised to reflect local requirements and content", starting with the Galaxy S5. Will be available to Thailand, Philippines and Indonesia.

Take what you will of it.

All in all, this sounds like a promising push, with SingTel flexing its international muscles by bringing so many telcos in on it. Perhaps there'll be a progress update on the morning of the Galaxy S6 launch.

If you aren't already thinking about that SingTel... time to start planning? :)


After the press conference the media were invited down to witness the commencement of sales for the Galaxy S5. First 10 customers in the queue were rewarded with an extra (quite good) goodie bag.

Movie Review: Need for Speed (2014)

 I've always loved driving, and I always tell people that while I enjoy gaming, the only form of gaming I think I stand any chance in is the racing genre. And to most console racers, the Need for Speed series of games represent an important part of gaming history. Thanks to Walt Disney Studios and Bates&CHI I had the privilege of catching the media preview of the movie based on the game franchise. 

As Justin rightly pointed out, it mustn't be easy to create a story out of a game franchise that hardly ever has a proper story to any of its titles. Not that that's a problem for the games, since just about everyone who'd buy it just want to hit the gas pedal and preferably knock some cars off the road. But given the franchise's 20 year history, there has to still be quite alot to live up to.

Without spoiling the plot for you, what struck me about the movie was that it quite nicely embodied the theme that its games were centred around - the concept of a perhaps not-always-apparent, but nevertheless deep-seated rivalry, whether between cops or between racers. The cops in the movie did get in the way of the illegal races, but they are pretty normal cars that "top out at 130", as mentioned by one of the film's characters. That's pretty crap considering that they were up against 6 supercars, from Koenigsegg, Lamborghini, Spano, Saleen, Bugatti and McLaren. The chief rivalry that drove (hurhur) the plot was one between two racers, and if you watch the movie, you will see that there's a pretty solid reason for it.

The movie was great in building up the adrenalin of races, beginning with a race amongst muscle cars and ending with a flat-out supercar showdown. With quite a number of surprises thrown in, it was an enjoyable 2 hours relishing the sights and sounds of the best of automotive technology today, capturing with some exhilarating camera work.

Need for Speed opens March 13th in Singapore's theatres.

Tech Review: Creative Sound Blaster Roar Portable Bluetooth Wireless Speaker

TL;DR: it's good, go get it, mai tu liao.

Given that audio reproduction revolves chiefly around the induced movement of air, when audio products come in small sizes, they have a great tendency to leave much to be desired of its quality. Smaller drivers are only able to move so much air, and that usually makes for a weak, unbalanced or worse, forced output. From time to time, however, certain products find the means to go against the odds of physics to create highly admirable sound within a compact package. I consider myself immensely fortunate to be able to own a number of such products, and the latest addition to the family is the freshly released Creative Sound Blaster Roar.

When this portable Bluetooth speaker was first announced at CES 2014, I noticed news of it but never bothered to read any article that featured it. All of that came back to me when I received Creative's eDM on the then upcoming IT Show, announcing they would be debuting their latest star product, one that has won international recognition, with a 41% introductory discount. A quick search revealed a fresh article on Hardware Zone reporting on their closed-door preview of the device, which I have perused extensively in the lead-up to my purchase. The writers at Hardware Zone take after my heart in their standards for aural excellence, so if they've waxed lyrical about it, that's theoretical reason enough for me to go for it. Check the article out for more technical and feature-centric points on the product.

By the way, having seen the mad sell-outs on the first two days of the IT Show, I went down at noon when the show opened on Saturday and literally brisk-walked to the Creative booth to listen to the device for a grand 15 seconds before zipping to the payment counter to pick up a unit. I thought that kiasuism had gotten the best of me, and was just starting to feel foolish when I found out later that units for the day sold out at 2pm.

BAZINGA. More pre-order information below.

Ok, review. With the product lying down, Creative logo facing towards you, there are two mid/high speakers projecting stereo sound towards you, bass projecting upwards because obviously that's where the least obstruction of air should be, and radiating panels on either side to push the sound outwards evenly. This is something that's really apparent with the device - it's of course easy to tell where the sound is coming from or projecting towards, but wherever you place the Roar, you get a great sense that its sound reaches outwards to fill the space, which I think is well beyond the expectations of many smaller sounds systems, to say nothing of portable wireless speakers.

  

Will you get tight and defined 10Hz bass beats? No. Is the bass tangible? Heck yes, and I think it's something that will continue to impress me for a long while. As for the main pair of speakers, it's got the good ol' signature warmth of Creative speakers, without getting muddy and in fact being impressively crisp, that I so love. I have yet to hear it crackle, and I don't want to make that happen because 1) I would like to retain my precious hearing please and 2) I don't want the police paying me a visit.

Having put everything together in such a compact case, I think the choice for hard metal grills are highly sensible, if not pure genius (which sensibility seems to be as rare as these days). Metal grills will provide due protection to the many speakers and driving elements inside, while ensuring that air is able to move freely.

Here's the thing about the Roar button though. It was made to amplify, enhance and spatially widen the sound so that it still cuts through in larger gatherings and spaces, and that will of course contribute to an accelerated loss in battery life. But there is a marked difference in quality between Roar and normal modes, so great that I would much rather turn the Roar on and reduce the volume, rather than go with the normal mode at a higher volume. Even better audio quality, enhanced for longer reach, which can be enjoyed at lower volume - why would you not take that? I certainly would. Every time. In other words, I would have been happy without an option to un-Roar the speaker.

Quick note: it is mentioned in the manual that plugging the power supply in would further enhance the quality of the Roar mode, and that it is recommended to keep the power supply plugged and running while on Roar mode. While I would gladly endorse the latter statement, I noticed no significant difference between battery-powered Roar, and DC-powered Roar.

Another difference I was pleased to find a lack of is the audio quality between direct playback and Bluetooth playback. I've loaded 320kbps MP3s as well as WAV files into the card, and playing the same music from my phone through Bluetooth, I found only the same sparkling audio quality from it. Be warned: Your mileage may vary on this point.

The sheer multitude of features were also a huge factor in influencing my purchase. Offering not only playback from a MicroSD card but read/write via USB, audio output via USB in which your sound experience can be further tweaked with downloadable software, the ability to answer calls and record either currently streaming music or voice via in-built microphone into the card, and good Lord why has no one thought of this, a USB DC-Out to supply extra juice to your mobile device streaming music to the speaker, this portable speaker has all you need and more, with fantastic audio quality to top it all off.

While I definitely do find the Alarm mode useful (calling-for-attention alarm, not wake-up-at-7 alarm) I don't think I'll be using it anytime soon. Ditto for Life-Saver modes, which play loud noises randomly to keep you awake, although I'm way more appreciative of this feature, since it can help with midnight oil burners who don't want to wake up the next day to find that their report consists of 6 words and a pool of saliva on the table, and more importantly long drives in other countries.

An unfortunate problem of the speaker, even though it technically has stereo output, is the lack of effective separation between Left and Right audio channels. This is due to the fact that the speakers are so close to each other, but I gather you don't really need such details when you are groovin' away at the party. This will be more of a pain point to the discerning audiophiles who just want to bring their music along with them to enjoy. I would have thought that it would be a simple matter of angling the speakers away from each other to pull the audio channels apart, but perhaps that would be detrimental to the effective projection of the sound, which is obviously key in this product and while I well won't argue with.

The speaker is also rather hefty, at more than 1kg. It's kinda like the Alienware of the portable speaker world - while it can definitely be moved around and transported quite freely, you will find the bulk and weight to be the cause of slight annoyances if you're hand-carrying the speaker, even with the carrying case that they're currently giving away free with purchases of the product.

The Recommended Retail Price of the Sound Blaster Roar is S$338. At time of writing, you may still pre-order your unit at S$199, to be delivered from 8 April 2014 onwards, though this extended IT Show promotion will end 10 March 2014. As echoed by many others, it offers tremendous value for money even at its standard price, and at $199 you are getting practically glorious quality and features for pretty much a third of the market price for such products. If you are in the market for a portable audio solution of any kind, you need to have this product in your consideration list.

Tech Review: Sony XBA-H3 Hybrid Balanced Armature Headphones

 One of the natural drawbacks of using earphones is that with 8mm circular drivers or balanced armature drivers, however many, the sound that is piped through, regardless of accuracy, remains rather lateral and flat. You don't enjoy the same experience you get with headphones of larger driver sizes, which get much closer to reproducing the natural sound-stage of the recording - in other words, the placement of instruments within an ensemble, as well as the unique reverberations of the individual locations where the recording took place, whether a stadium with a live audience, a concert hall, a high-ceilinged cathedral or a small studio.

After the boom, and to a certain extent consumerization (lookin' at you Sony, you market spoiler you) of Balanced Armature products in the market, manufacturers of personal audio products have recently turned to exploring hybrid earphones, in which the two dominant technologies of personal audio, dynamic drivers and balanced armature drivers, are combined within a single product to provide the best of both worlds. To this end, Sony has produced the XBA-H series of products.

The XBA-H3 is the highest grade of the series, with one large 16mm dynamic driver to provide the bass, and two balanced armature drivers: a full-range driver, and a tweeter to further drive higher frequencies. Other products in the series include the XBA-H2, with a 13.5mm dynamic driver and a full range BA driver, and the XBA-H1, with a 9mm dynamic driver and a full range BA driver.

In short, the H3s (I'm just gonna call them that cos it's really quite tiring to keep typing XBA-H3s) completely caught me by surprise with its huge soundstage. It scored impressively on clarity, but having tested the XBAs before I already expected it to. To so tangibly feel the breadth and depth of the recording though, is this product's greatest success.



The dynamic driver is tuned to handle the bass, and it does so tightly and impactfully, cutting through the music most delightfully. I've learnt early on that if you were to press dynamic drivers in to your ears such that a seal is created by the diameter of the earbuds, you actually can get very good fidelity from most earphones, including Apple's iBuds. Given that doing so all the time is not at all a comfortable experience, plus the fact that you look like you are trying to block out your own music and therefore quite mad, that is an impractical solution. I would theorize with admittedly no knowledge of this particular field that a lack of free-flowing air and an overly muffled sound prevented manufacturers from simply sealing the sound in and channeling it through silicon earbuds, much like what the H3 does, but with the addition of balanced armature drivers to cover the higher frequencies, plus the innovative addition of an air vent at the back of the housing, this has been all but smartly eliminated.

Continuing their aforementioned legacy of balanced armature drivers, highs are cleanly delivered, and rarely sound sharp to the ear. It took some mad crashing of cymbals in a drum solo to make me start to wince, but it was generally tolerable and should be extra good news to most other users because 1) I am extra sensitive to higher frequencies, and 2) I listen to my music at generally louder volumes.

Now the catch. Yes. Yes there is, much as it pains me to say it.

There is a disappointing lack of mids in the tuning. Funnily enough, the two pieces of music I found completely acceptable were by the Chick Corea Super Trio and Diana Krall, where mids came through in full glorious force, so I suppose if you are a jazz person, mai tu liao, as they say. I did however, consistently notice hints of crackling at mids-intensive portions of the songs, which again may not happen if you listen to your songs at a lower volume. I was doing about 70-75% on the iPhone audio scale. I know I know. But with the other songs I sampled, spanning across Pink Floyd, Asian Kung-Fu Generation, Disney, Immortal, Les Miserables and more, there was a resounding absence of mids, which contribute to the soul of the music - the oomph, excitement, richness and warmth. Many a times this made the music sound like cold and clinical renditions.

Driving the earphones are no problem - there wasn't a significant difference between listening from my audio amp, and listening from the iPhone directly, except for the source amplitude.

Here are a list of artistes and songs that I tried out, and my impression of the output from the H3s:

• Chick Corea Super Trio: sparkling, lively rendering, crackling at piano solos, nearly peaking at drum solo cymbal crashes.
• Diana Krall: near-perfect rendition. Both ensemble and solo parts clear as day.
• Asian Kung-Fu Generation (Japanese rock): great Rock-like EQ, but lack of mids = lack of excitement.
• Disney classics: every individual instrumental and vocal part in Disney orchestras and ensembles, which are HUGE (think Under the Sea and Be Our Guest), can be clearly heard. You can quite clearly imagine where each section would be sitting if you were in the conductor's spot.
• Pink Floyd: The stereo bounce in Us and Them was aurgasmic, to say the least. The high reverb in Money's emotive, soaring solo is generously reproduced, although the solo itself felt thin with the lack of mids. Similarly for the scatting in The Great Gig in the Sky, one of the most emotional lengths of senseless yelling anyone's ever done, there was little impact in the output.
• Immortal (black metal): no mids, but extreme metal relies a fair bit on the high mids, so the tweeter sort of saved it by reproducing the gritty crunch of the highly distorted electric guitars.
• Muse (live rock recording in a stadium): no sense of excitement, and this from a mids-heavy live recording.
• Les Miserables: Nicely reproduced, almost captivating. I do play this quite high on the volume.
• Casiopeia (Japanese fusion jazz): anti-climax at electric guitar solo.
• Daft Punk - Random Access Memories: Great tight bass, immersive environment.

Quick note about ergonomics before I conclude: it is quite cumbersome handling. The audio unit itself is already so blocky, you definitely aren't gonna be sleeping on your side with them on. The wires are rather disobedient, especially the top loop around your ear, although I will say it does a mostly good job of keeping itself out of tangles. ... when it doesn't get caught up with the rubber portion of the top loop.



The success of the H3s, therefore, are highly dependent on how sound engineers tune their final mix to be burnt on to the disc, which should not be the case. Even as someone who understands that I have a highly personal taste in musical output, I can't really imagine alot of people appreciating the lack of mids, unless perhaps clarity is a personal preference for you. For audio engineers and other professionals whose jobs require on audio monitoring, the earphones don't have the flattest tuning, but depending on your personal audio consumption tastes and needs at work, this pair of earphones can serve a good balance between both. They retail for a recommended price of S$438, and can be found at Sony stores and retailers around the island. Go to Sony's Singapore flagship store at Wisma Atria to try them out.

Skullcandy Crusher

A couple of months ago I was offered the opportunity to try out the Skullcandy Crusher, then the freshest release. The Crusher promised a new way to experience bass with its - in a sense it's true - dual drivers. The Sensation55 driver is an actively driven bass extension driver that amps up the bass to give more thump, controlled by the slider you see in the picture above. An AA battery is required, but there wasn't a noticeable difference in weight between both ears.

I've never been a big fan of Skullcandy. I have reasonable respect for them as a personal audio brand, in that their churn out alright audio quality. It's something that I'd give a nod to if my friends asked what I thought about it, but I wouldn't use it myself. In recent years, I felt that they got a little over-focused on the fashion aspect of their products and did the minimum to keep their audio quality and technologies above the water.

The overall sound quality from the Crusher is still not what I'd call desirable. It's crispy, but sounds tinny - a little far away, in other words. There's a whole lot of intimacy lacking in the delivered audio, as if the insides were just being very business-like about getting the goods to you and coldly ignoring emotion in the process. In my case I had a vacuum tube audio amp to salvage the result a little with its signature warmth, but since this is meant to be brought out on the streets (and is portable enough to be by the way), one should assume that that is how it normally is used, not hooked up to a signal-enhancing circuit.

The thing about the Crusher though, is that the powered bass is not so much an aural experience as a physically tangible one. The bass driver generates more vibration than it does actual bass signals, which sort of breathes a new dimension of life to the music you are listening to. Suddenly you are moving, progressing and transitioning along with your tunes. I've heard a whole lot of stuff on it - Jamiroquai, Tchaikovsky, Aerosmith, Bon Jovi, Zero Sequence (mad props if you know who they are), Verdi, Puccini - and though the bass doesn't always work in favor of enhancing the audio per se, it does sweep you along with the piece.

The obvious downside to all of this is that this otherwise brilliant bass can quite easily cause you a massive headache, because it's essentially a very rapid series of air waves knocked in to you. Repeatedly. At it's highest power, with songs like trance, funk or rock where strong bass beats feature, the Crusher quite literally rattles with each beat, and I'm pretty sure my neighbors can hear some of it, in addition to seeing the headphones occasionally flinch. There is plenty of air within the circuits and plenty of routes for escape, giving a very free flow of air. In fact, whenever I put the headphones on, I have this little habit of pressing the cups against my ears, causing in this case for the headphones to quite audibly sigh, and breathe again when I let go.

If you are a fan of Skullcandy and its sound signature works for you and your music, you can definitely consider the Crusher if you think it's time for an upgrade. The bass level controller is smooth, and the best thing about it is that it caters to the days you've just had enough of the the low-frequency ear-slamming, days you want some serious thumping to get you going, and everything else in between. You suffer from neither excess nor lack, because that is in your hands to control.

The Skullcandy Crusher is available at all leading lifestyle electronics stores at an SRP of S$165.90.

Sennheiser HD 598

I've been eyeing this pair of headphones for the longest time. It's luscious creme-colored leather skinning and brown earpads were the first thing to catch my eye (yes yes shallow like that), and when I picked it up to listen to it, I was astounded by the clarity of what I heard.

That was, however, in a Sennheiser store, with properly-amped, high-quality music, and just plugging it to my phone and playing music from the in-built audio circuit does this pair of headphones no justice at all. I was very pleased to be linked up by SG Story to the Sennheiser Asia folks, who very readily sent a pair my way for review.

The Set Up
If I were to actually buy this for myself, it would be sitting in office, where I have placed my trusty little tube amp and 30-pin iPhone dock, which in turn holds my iPhone 4 and pipes its music out via Line Out to my amp when connected.

The Music
Pretty much everything I have. I've been taking a more orchestral slant so I've been listening to alot of operas, musicals, concertos and symphonies. But I've also tried out rock, hard rock, metal, jazz, blues, funk, post-rock, vocals and some pop, wherever my fancy takes me. I try to have my music source in as high a sample rate as possible, so most of them are in 320kbps, but some of my more complex music like concertos and jazz are in lossless WAV, running at 1411kbps.

The Verdict
The defining factor about the HD 598 is that it is open-canned, meaning that air is free to pass through the earcups, allowing for wider sound reproduction as opposed to closed cans, where the air available to transmit sound is limited from what's within the earcup, up to your ear drum. That is, unfortunately, also it's only pain point. Air moves so freely that people around you can pretty much hear whatever you are listening to, and you can still hear everything that goes around you, even a suppressed cough. Some argue that if people can hear what you are listening to, you're listening to it too loud. And with proper amping, the HD 598 can produce all frequencies evenly at low volumes. But for lack of a better phrase, it's quite simply tak shiok when the music isn't completely washing over you. Even feels like a bit of a waste at times, listening to music so softly when you have such powerful hardware. But to each his own. In fact, even with air flowing so freely, your ears start to feel tired, not from the prolonged cupping of the cushions, but if the volume is too loud.

The thing about the HD 598 is that its transducers deliver music so smoothly that it quite often feels flat. That is not to say the music feels lifeless - rather, it's helped me pay more attention to the details of my music, and rewarded that attention by faithfully reproducing every last bit of audio information that the little bits you never knew were there - a cough, a musician shifting in his chair, a slide on the fret, the sigh of a piano's sustain pedal - presents itself to you and delights the heck out of you.

Along with the open-cans, Sennheiser's Eargonomic Acoustic Refinement technology claims to give you the experience of sitting in front of a hi-fi system. Not sure how effective that has been for me. For sure the soundstage can be matched by few within its class, and stereo separation is well-defined, but it can feel very lateral, instead of the more forward placement you would expect from a hi-fi system.

Bass instruments that are often glossed over by lesser audio products - softly rumbling kettle drums, double basses, the lower harmonics of trombones, even some frequencies of bass guitars, are clearly heard with these headphones without getting too overwhelming.

The same can be said for the high frequencies. I have yet to hear something that could push the headphones' high frequency output into "ear-piercing" territory. Cymbal clashes, crashes and bashes, high notes of female singers, piccolos, trumpets and usually painful guitar squeals are all pumped out clearly yet tolerably, allowing you to enjoy musical climaxes without destroying your eardrums.

Mids have an unfortunate chance of getting overshadowed by the higher frequencies, but I've only heard that happen when everything is playing together, for example when chorus and orchestra are both going at full volume. If there is a tenor or baritone singing however, you can be damn sure that they'll cut through and be the centre of your attention. Even if they've been mixed to be in the background.

The recommended price of S$399 is a hefty one to pay if it's your first or second time making the jump to higher quality audio. And it's seldom worth it unless you already have an amping system in place that can provide proper output support. Music forced at loud volume from inferior audio circuits merely sound like wind through a tunnel. Try plugging any high quality headphone to your iPhone and maxing out the volume to see what I mean. Not a pleasant experience, and certainly not an experience worth draining your player's battery for. But if you want to jump into the world of audio goodness, and are willing to pay for an amp, the HD 598 offers amazing value for what you are paying, and should last you a very long time in your journey towards better music.

Sony 2nd-generation XBA Balanced Armature Earphones

When Sony first launched the XBA series in late 2011 (and in Singapore early 2012), its suggested retail prices took many by surprise. Single driver in-ear monitors (IEMs) from well-known high grade audio brands such as Ultimate Ears, Westone and Shure were priced at approximately S$199, often breaking the $200 point. Sony's XBA-1 was priced at S$109. Did they spoil the market? Absolutely. Did they minimize the risks associated with entering the market?

I doubt. Being a corporation of their size they could definitely lower production costs by mass manufacturing, but that would have made for a major loss if it didn't sell. In fact, the 2011 Japanese tsunamis nearly wrecked the manufacturing process, and threw Sony into a delay.

I only have a fleeting impression of the first generation XBAs, since they were mostly tested at the event, save for the XBA-1 that we had each received. This time however, I have been sent all 4 earphones (XBA-10, 20, 30 and 40) to try out, so I can take my time to make my humble judgments on each one.


The Set Up
I decided to test the earphones in 2 different settings - powered by my iPhone (5, if it matters to you) on the go, and powered by my trusty little desktop headphone amp, with my old iPhone 4 as my music source via Line Out. The amp did not make as much of a difference as it usually does because the XBAs have relatively low resistance, but it did help me confirm certain points that I couldn't judge with my iPhone. All models' silicon earbuds were swapped out with the noise isolation earbuds, which includes an extra layer of sponge within the inner flange of the bud to absorb ambient noise. I always start my tests with tracks from Muse's HAARP live concert (hard rock, sharp bass, keyboards, stereo effects, live audience) and slowly branch out after that to jazz, metal, opera, classical and classic rock tracks.

General Good
If I had to describe the series in a single word, it's obvious that clarity is the XBA's main focus. How that clarity manifests itself though... that comes up a little differently. The XBA's extensive range of silicon earbuds, both normal and noise isolating, also ensure that you have the best fit possible. Little things like lapel clips and cord managers also let you customize the way you use your earphones.

General Bad
The wires aren't so much anti-tangle as tangle-resistant. A fair bit of acoustic noise from the cable can be heard, but that can be solved by looping the cable over your ear. The problem with the higher models though, especially the XBA-40, is that the light wires keep popping up when looped around the ear, making you look weird. And slightly loony.

XBA-10 (Full Range, S$98, iPhone version S$118)
The XBA-10's clarity take the number 1 spot out of the four models. Mids were rich and full-bodied, and to my treble-sensitive ears, highs were delivered with sparkling precision, without shredding my ear canals. This actually allows your music to cut through and overpower a fair bit of ambient noise.

However, as brilliantly as Sony's full-range driver handled mids and highs within a single armature, bass, the number one problem with single armature earphones, was still conspicuously missing. This gets slightly better while the earphones are driven by the amp, along with slightly more pronounced mids, but the higher frequencies can get overwhelming before the bass reaches an amplitude of your liking.

Use for: traveling on public transport, plugging in at work or in cafes

XBA-20 (Full Range + Woofer, S$238, iPhone version S$268)
The simple addition of a woofer driver pretty much compensates for what the Full Range driver is missing, and adds bass to your experience, with both drivers operating at full amplitude (if you don't quite get what this means read on to 30 and 40). This can make the earphones too bassy for some ears, but for me and my favourite music, this is an almost ideal output that comes close to matching my triple-driver custom earphones in richness and clarity. For this reason, the XBA-20 wins my vote as the best model of the lot.

Use for: needs specified in XBA-10, your bass-hungry ears, and probably if you listen to hard rock with heavy distortion and overdrive.

XBA-30 (Full Range + Woofer + Tweeter, S$318, iPhone version S$338)
The triple-driver offering adds booster drivers to either end of the audio spectrum, but instead of accentuating the high frequencies, some tuning and volume leveling of the drivers completely flattened the sound signature of the XBA-30. Especially after having listened to the richness of the XBA-20, the XBA-30 seems to withhold the life from my music, pumping it out in a very matter-of-fact way. What it does give you, however, is an incredible soundstage, so wide and distinct that I could clearly map out the placements of sections of a 50-piece orchestra, along with a similarly sized chorus and the main singers. I could tell when singers shifted position on the stage, or when two similarly voiced sections of the chorus were singing different lines side by side (for example, Tenor 1 and Tenor 2). That, to me, is the XBA-30's principal selling point. That said, I hate my music flat (delivered as-is without aural influence of the output device), but if there is some insight that most audiophiles who would consider the XBA-30s like their music flat, then hey, go for gold I say.

Use for: a portable solution to serious music study, listening to how orchestras or bands work and how they place themselves. Or if you are a stickler for flat output.

XBA-40 (Full Range + Woofer + Tweeter + Super Woofer, S$388, iPhone version S$408)
From a manufacturing point of view, the XBA-40 could be said to be Sony's bud-sized trophy. Where similarly-speced earphones cost close to or over S$1000, the XBA-40 retails for just over 40% of that price.

Aurally though, it feels like the XBA-40 falls short of the success it very well should be. Little more can be said about it that hasn't already been articulated for the XBA-30, save for the fact that with the addition of the last driver, the Super Woofer, music with very deep and subtle bass parts, such as that elusive bass drum in classical orchestras, are done justice with a satisfying rumble. That said, it isn't a 100% hit rate, and for bass heavy music like techno and rock, it doesn't really matter as much because the Woofer can more than deliver on the output.

Use for: ultimate music enjoyment if you enjoy your music delivered flat

The packaging. Really love the design and efficient use of space!

Conclusion
Sony's definitely gone in the right direction, and for the brilliant work they have done in commercializing balanced armature drivers for the mass market, I'm willing to shrug off their misses with the 30 and 40. Personally, I think they can make the 30 and 40 even friendlier to a larger crowd of prospective buyers, and I think these buyers wouldn't even mind forking out more than the current price for future iterations, if it can hit their sweet spot.

Sony introduces PHA-1 portable headphones amp

Rather dated news but took me a long time to get my blog going as I like it.

So right on the heels of its second generation of balanced armature driver earphones, Sony announced their entry into the portable amplifier market with the PHA-1 portable headphone amplifier. This news has been out in Japan as early as September 2012, but Singapore will find this product in stores from March 2013 for a recommended price of S$599.

Ideal for the "mobile audiophile" (sounds rather ridiculous when you type it out but goodness knows our numbers aren't scarce), the PHA-1 supports audio signals as high as 96KHz, with 24-bit resolution. Are those specs cool? Yes. Are those capabilities maximised? Not easily, these days.

The amp can also be hooked up to your computer to serve as a Digital to Analog Converter (DAC) (in English, better quality music). It has an in-built, USB-charged battery that runs for up to 10 hours when music is piped in through Audio In, and 5 hours through Digital In.

You can hook your player or smartphone up to the amp by the Audio In jack in front, which I along with most other aurally-inclined technophiles tend to discourage, if there are better alternatives.

1. It causes the audio to be double amped. Think of the audio circuit in the amp as a large shiny water pipe with treatments to make the water better, and think of your audio player's audio circuit as a thin, old rusting pipe whose impurities the water carries along with it as it travels through (it's probably not all that bad your player's audio quality but just as a comparison...). Running your water through the old pipe and into the large shiny pipe is merely throwing impurities into the latter - remember it has enhancement features, not decontamination treatments.
2. As a source your player will need to push a strong audio signal, which almost certainly means that you need to pump your player's volume to maximum. Remember that this is usually meant to go straight to your earphones and so uses the full audio circuitry in your player. Nothing like full-powered audio output to burn your player's battery life.

But here's the cool thing about the PHA-1, you can hook your device directly to it via USB. Apple's 30-pin connector, Walkman's connector and a standard 3.5mm jack are included in the package. Sony says that Lightning devices are supported by the amp but that the cable will not be included. With this method your audio source gets piped in via Digital In, and the amp acts as a DAC to pump the music out to your earphones.This is a far better way to process music than Audio In, and maintains alot more audio fidelity, especially if your sources files are lossless types like AIFF, WAV or FLAC. However, it utilizes pretty much all of the PHA-1's circuitry, which explains the higher battery usage.

And Sony says the amp doesn't require burn-in. I haven't had a chance to test this so I cannot verify this at the moment. Take it how you like.

Most of us know Sony to be the company responsible for Playstations, Bravias and Xperias, but my friend pointed out that they started as an audio company after all. This is a cool step for Sony to take, to return to their roots perhaps? But unlike the balanced armature earphones this amp isn't priced below the market rate. S$599 is what a mobile audiophile in these parts would have to cough up, at the very least, for a decent portable amp. Is this a sign of Sony's confidence in what this tiny giant can deliver?

I'll let you know when I've tested this out. Meanwhile, XBA reviews coming soon.

Back in the game

Hi. I'm back.

I think it's about time I started writing again. I miss dishing out my opinions, and I'll never be able to do so as freely as I could 4 years ago. But I should at least try.

I may come to regret this seeing as I probably will have some writing coming my way at work. Till then, please look forward to my posts.

Au revoir, et salut

Another day, another month, another year. 2011 left as soon as it swooped down, and I have to say, it left quite a trail of destruction in its wake. Tsunamis, floods (talking about Thailand, we only pond here in Singapore), uprisings, revolutions. I wonder if humankind has been any unhappier, discounting the wars.

I suppose I've had a good enough break. All I have done is spend money, more money in a week than I usually spend in 3. That should be a good enough sign that I had fun. It's back to full speed immediately on the first day of work, and I hope I can pace myself and stay another year in OPR while helping with Tech65 and developing my own photographic and videographic skill sets.

It's purported that the world is due to end in 2012. Kinda hoping it wouldn't. I do have quite the checklist of things to do before I run along to heaven.


I've fallen asleep two times writing this.


I suppose that's another sign.