Steve Jobs was an audiophile

I was in Best Buy the other day, and they want $20 for those ear plug phones. They're absolutely the worst. I have 4 of them and they're still wrapped.

 

Still though all these pictures with Jobs looking solitary and hippie/cool with nice audio gear, is it real or just a photo shoot? I say photo shoot.

 

Hi-Fi may have been "just a hobby". Like Apple TV is to Apple.

 

Read the link in post #23 where Tyll Hertsens investigates and explains the why's of the Apple earbud. There are rational and practical reasons why Apple does not include better earbuds.

I would prefer that Apple not bundle in $100+ earbuds that I'll never use. Doesn't matter how they sound. They're not going to be what I want. So bundling in better earbuds is a waste of money. The included earbuds are good enough for those who don't care. And that's all that matters.

The Apple earbuds are reasonably good for an earbud. And they've been improved over the years.

The fact that the iPod does gapless playback is enough to demonstrate to me that Steve was an audiophile and enjoyed listening to good music where gapless playback is necessary. I don't know if it was Steve or someone else at Apple that championed gapless playback. I'm assuming Steve because a feature like that doesn't come cheap or easy. Significant development and engineering is necessary to get that feature to work.

 

If he really were an audiophile he would have cyroed the iPod. This to me proves that he wasn't.



Chad

 

Case closed!

 

Well played.

 

What everyone loses sight of is the concept of "good enough." While many like to wax poetic on the glory days of analog, etc etc, they forget that back in the 60's and 70's most people were listening to beat up 45's on a crappy $70 portable record player.

When you put music in that context, listening to MP3's on an iPod (which still has the ability to utilize uncompressed files) with a $75 pair of Grados still sounds way better than that.

So, what the average, non audiophile listener is using is MUCH better thanks to Jobs.

 

Also the Ipod can also connect to a high end DAC using the Wadia itransport.

 

This.

Steve Jobs was around to create things, and make money. Not to turn everyone into a budding audiophile, even if he was one.

 

Steve never bought furniture for his house because he hated the design of almost all furniture he saw. What you see in that photo is how he lived before he got married.

Some may think I'm crazy but I thought the early iPods had better sound (it was the DAC or something). I had a chance to play my 10g iPod next to a 160g model using the same track and the older device sounded better. Of course the 160g was about a third the size/weight of the older model. My iPhone 3g sounds identical to the 160g iPod as near as I can tell.

The latest story I've heard is that Mylo Xyloto sounds as bad as it does so that it will sound "normal" when shoved through Apple's earbuds.

 

Does anyone know if that is a Tiffany lamp that he's using in the picture? looks real nice.

 

I would love to see SJ set up. Anyone have any pics of his gear?

 

Yeah, I bet he has a secret man cave full of McIntosh gear.

 

They do sound better. I had a 160 GB and compared it to my 80 GB 5.5 generation and the 80 sounded better. The 5th generation and the 5.5 generation are the ones that people upgrade.

Chad

 

A question from Santa Fe

Could you point me to the passage that says SJ never owned a quality hi-fi? I'm left hanging between that assertion and the evidence in the photograph from his bachelor days, along with stuff early in this thread about the high-end gear that he bought from David Wilson, etc.

I’ve only read parts of Isaacson’s book, but I’m convinced by various critics that Isaacson has a shaky grip on technical details, and I wonder if that might extend to the specifics of Jobs’ audiophile credentials. It also might make a big difference if you’re talking about Steve Jobs in his younger days or his later years as a family guy with a house full of kids. In any case it’s hard (okay, impossible) to imagine a music fanatic and quality-control freak like Jobs listening to Dylan and the Beatles and U2 and other heroes on some piece of c**p system.

This thread contains two mutually contradictory versions of factual reality, and I’d like to zero in on the truth if I can.

 

do you believe the photograph or the assertion?

 

Ya good points!!

I agree with the bolded part. Its like in here so many use the terms..."High end", "audiophile", "high res" "highly resolving" etc.


"High resolution" term being applied to records that the source material is for sure not fantastic sounding also drives me bonkers.
Its all RELATIVE

Ive heard plenty of "Normal resolution media" that was sourced from fantastic sounding original recordings that blow away a lot of "High Res" stuff.
They for the most part are very vague and mostly meaningless. Again its all relative.

I keep asking who owns a "Resolution Meter"??

So far no one has claimed to measure how high their "Highly resolving" system really is.

Its just someones subjective description.

 

Find me any guy in Silicon Valley or a Tech head who is making over 500K a year and show him a decent system and they wil buy it.

 

Certainly. You don't think millionaires who bottle and selll cheap wine actually drink it themselves, do you? His computers and phones may have been top notch but other than the advantage of portability the Ipod is a stop down...lower audio quality from what most of us were listening to before it's production.

 

Even my first iPod sounded miles better than the cassette/Walkmans I had through the 80s and 90s, and just as good those bulky CD Walkmans I carried around in the early 2000s.

I laugh aloud at every bold proclamation that claims iPods ruined sound quality. As if the average person waiting on a bus used to wear a $1K pair of Sennheisers and listen via a Sony D-Z555 Discman before the iPod came along.

 

most of us humans or most of the people on this forum?

 

Exactly ! They could not believe that most people were totlly happy with those white ear-phones - that was a hype recognizable item for years, when the second generation iPods suddenly were hip.
Apple expected them to be exchanged like those cheap IC's you find with most hiFi gear.

Steve Jobs had several Wilson speakers in his house according to David Wilson. The first was a X-1 Grand Slamm in the 90ies.
He always upgraded when there was a better model.
He phoned right back and gave his reviews at least with Spectral electronic gear..
Afaik he sticked with Spectral & Wilson.
Maybe one of his kids had a modest Stereo or Steve wanted to hear, how the iPod sounds on a typical consumer stereo...

He even was into sound of cables and could not understand why digital cables have such an enormous importance in sound quality. But he accepted that and used the best he could find.
He wanted to understand the technical aspects and he discussed these matters with the people from the industry.

BTW I remember one of the apple shows with the iPod when he talked about Stereo performance and explained pretty well what good stereo means and that he owns an expensive set-up..
Just a quick interlude, but I remember it well.
It was on point for everyone to understand.

 

Same her - I bought my first 5 GB iPod for 599 Euro in germany in 2001 and it lasted nearly 10 years and the sound quality back then was better than that of the one I bought last year - by far and now think about how much better DAC's are now than in 2001. He did choose pretty well at the price point of course..

BTW
If anyone really doubts the credential of this thread just email Richard Fryer at Spectral or David Wilson..

 

So true! I think it's obvious that the iPod actually raised the sound quality for the vast majority of people. And it's not like audiophiles were forced by buy one (though, this audiophile did and loves it).