Sony A845 Right Mark Audio Analyzer RMAA scores

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One test failed and I will have to redo it, but Sony's new badboy is now mine for a week. It is a player I really want to love, but cannot fully. Not only does it fail to drive earphones as well as my iPod touch and sacrifice low and high detail for mids, it has artefacts such as hiss and clicking in the background.

It looks sexy though and has a decent EQ. Still, for music, I have slowly but surely been going back to one player only: the iPod touch.

Anyway, here are the RMAA scores for the A845. They are both loaded and unloaded and when I am able to right the crashed test, I will show the differences between an amped headphone output and an amped line out via ALO's Line Out Dock. Unfortunately, it seems that Sony's LO isn't as well implemented as Apples, but I hadn't expected much better to be sure: Sony have opted for marketing SQ rather than real SQ for many years.

The headphones I used for testing the Sony are my favourite and reference customs:
1. FitEar Private 333 16Ω triple BA custom earphone

2. And the satisfactory Kenwood C711 single driver dynamic driver earphone

For reference, the iPod touch drives both a bit better than the Sony.

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Right Mark Audio Analyzer (RMAA) graphs to follow

These are all UNLOADED meaning no headphones in parallel to the headphone output. As you can see, the Sony isn't really reproducing the sound wave that well, but it could be worse. And since this is UNLOADED, wait till you see how well (not) it drives earphones.

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And RMAA succinctly summarises the A845's performance which is in both hardware and listening tests, subpar for a device which advertises SQ and its 'S-Master' amp. I am not impressed, but that doesn't mean the device isn't fun to listen to. A lot of people drone on about SQ as it is 'clear' etc.; what they are hearing is the recessed bass and treble in comparison to the midrange, making instruments and vocals stand out whilst sacrificing resolution in both areas which are part of the original wave.

That and noise is terrific (in a bad way). I want to like this player, but alas, I cannot.

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The following had to be re-calculated as the iBasso T3D wasn't about to output a strong enough signal for RMAA to pick up without crashing, so I substituted it for the iBasso T3, the same amp, but with an analogue volume pot rather than digital. Both are very good amps for the money, representing excellent performance.

However, keep in mind that the Sony HPO unloaded test is used without an amp and so shouldn't be directly compared to the amped scores simply because the amped scores have a different final output stage. Compare rather, the 3,5 mm cable to iBasso T3 and ALO Line Out scores. As you can see, Sony haven't implemented a very good line out; it rolls its treble off. It is also very quiet in comparison to the A828 using the same cable. All in all, I am quite sure Sony cheaped out on this release which is far from reference quality.

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Here is the final score and then run-downs of performance from RMAA. The reason this test is important is that it is unloaded, showing very little the performance of the amp, but merely of Sony's line out versus its HPO for driving external amps. A better amp like the ALO Rx would do a better job of driving the final signal, but I chose the iBasso T3 for very practical reasons. Anyway, LOD use is good: there are fewer artefacts in the signal; however, Sony's implementation of the line out in the A845 is less than idea: roll off (not present from the same amp from an iPod touch) and distortion top the charts. The A828 and the same LOD are much better, but for reference quality to external sources, both are trumped by the iPod touch, absolutely trumped.

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