Τρίτη 21 Αυγούστου 2012

Sansa E130 (refurbished report )

ReviewReviewReviewReviewReviewJan 16, '09 3:35 PM
for everyone
Category:Computers & Electronics
Product Type: Other
Manufacturer:  Sandisk
THis is is the html version of the file found on the blog version ;tHis is just a short refurbishing in oreder to be read more easily You know that I am a music fan  having a very big interest to Asian music, and more particularly to Malaysian and Indonesian kinds. If you don't know you can ?  See my reports on the start of my revierws part http://zlgr.multiply.com/reviews/item/2      (malay persoal hits ) http://zlgr.multiply.com/reviews/item/4   (dangdut personal hits ) http://zlgr.multiply.com/reviews/item/36 , 37 , 38, 39, 40
My small Degen 808A  with a memory just 512 MB which today seems to be quite short , has a maximum  number of ca 250 songs  compressed in WMA on 48kbps. This mode this the highest in order to ensure good quality audio at the shortest possible ?  le size.  Considering that my personal music col- lection from casetes and  albums goes more than 5000  songs , all of them converted from casetes and LPs manually into MP3s as well form  Sw direct to computer, it is sure that this collection is still  too big to ?  t into this player.
And I  finally I managed to ?find a good solution  for this.Looking at the local market  I found the Sansa E130. The SANSA E130 the smallest mdel of the 100  series with 512 MB  bought from Multirama (major hardware seller chain ) at a price  of Eu70 (for 2006)which was possibly the right price for me.  Surely  this short memory does not impress you ,  but Sansa as equipment manu- facturer can offer better products than its rivals with the same price: the model is expandable to 2.5 GB using an external SD memory. I alerady  had a 2 GB momery   that i used for my Nikon  70  camera  and  is now dedicated  for the player The model  seemed to me as a rival to Ipod, and  was my entry to the  new  tehnollogy of Ipod likes.
The model seems  quite more sophisticated than  my previous Degen 808A  , 512  MB and my intermediate Crypto of 512 MB.
The Degen 808A  has a LED screen and series of  icons  navigated by a thumbbutton rightwsards  adn leftwards and selected by pusihng  the button
The Crypto (this is the name of the intermediatery  Greek compamy who imports and sells them, not  the OEMs whose  name is not evaialble anywhere!)  works nearly the same as the degen model , with a  USB  direct  connexion , however  has been given  immedaitely to my  parents after  very  short for a  special project and has not been  tested.  It's main    purpose is to play 24hrs a day in a remote place  The e13o instead  shows a menu of operations  from  standard playback of MP3s (and WMAs  and other formats which will be noticed below )

As you may see the model is very simple. A LCD screen of ca 1 x 0.7 sq inch where everything is shown four directivity/ touch-up buttons and a small button on the middle. On the top side there is a headphone- plug socket 1.9 mm and a USB connector. The connector is preserved with a detach- able plastic that i have lost it a few houss after i bought it... At the right of it there is a digital adjusted volume control . At the left side is just key lock switch and at the right side the socket for the memory and the on/off button. After i bought it i returned to the of? ce, as it was morning. Trying to open its very strong plastic packing the player dropped from the table , but did not happed anything to it. Or just is what i supposed
From below you will see several pictures of the model . (please notice that  the following  pictures come from diferent photo sessions ths  is the reason  the lighting differs ) Once  switched on this picture is shown  , showing the  model and  the standard  memory:
and immediately after  it shows  this mes-age , in ca se a external memory card is  inserted:
As i always use the external card  this  message is  always shown to the player,    during its  startup   for about 5-10   sec- onds   so that  it is quite ennoying to me,   But this time  varies  according to the changes  made  in the external memory. AS far as  i can understand , the player checks the    ? les and their ID3 tags and renews its data- base. The least  timeis abot 5 seconds and  in case of totally new collection can pass  the minute!!I mean surely for a new collec- tion of about 1000  songs as i do usually !!
Playbak capabilities:  The model pays  : MP3 , WMA and protected  WMA . IN  a later  version of this article i will in- clude  more info on these capabilities Here is a picture of the   main menu.
Chinese letters (possibly new writ- ing ) are corectly shown. I think that  the same happens to my  808A For anyone knowing  the  song shown below, one  of my most favourite  chinese pop songs and has  excellent  excellent melody ! (zaihui shou )I knw  this song since 89 from Singapore  having re- corded  it from the  local FM  station City Sounds.
Also once again pressing the middle button    some information is  shown in the display. The  display is here  illuminated. as you can seee  the mode is quite high for Windows Media ,and  info is for the same song as reffered above
Also  greek letters  are correctly shown
Radio: There are  two modes for FM region European  and International . I did not found any signi? - cant diference between both except that  the    memories  have been deleted!!!   another  intresting point is the on/off frm FM stereo. Power mode is universal determining  the  sleep time (when the apparat  will be shut off )  and the autio shut off , ie after how much time  the player  will shut off ,in case of non usage
The radio is very simple  display . A pointer  shows the freq on a bar
And here is the listing of  the stations you  store: Pressing  the up down , you move into  presets , with the right  or the middle you set  the station. Up to 20 stations can be stored
Audio effects: SRS wow SRS  is noticed as an audio enhance- ment , due to losses from the  conversion  into MP3 or WMA . I never use it as audio  is severely  `destroyed . Insetad of this i  could really use the 10 band equalizer
IInformation: The information of the model and its ver- sion ! Now there is a new version but i  have not installed it so far. But there was    no information on what are the updates ... ..
Stopwatch And there is a stopwatch , I really  do not unser- stand in what it can be  used except that is just  a  chronometer with 100s of seconf of accuracy
Earphones The earphones  are insulated type and go into  the ear  . they offer some less nose then the  standard ear buds, If you push them more in- side the ear  they become more bassy . They  offer good audio but still prefer the 929 from  Degen. These are the earphones from 1103    and offer better bass and higher  trebles
Favorites The player has ca 30 favorites  .For the stand- ard mode of  500 MB or 140  songs on 128/44    (a total of 505 secs), 30 MP3 as favorites are  OK . However as far as I use it with 48kb  WMA and with  external memory of 2 GB ,    or a total of ca 1200 songs , the unchanged  number of 30 favourites  is very short v

Two observations i did  not like: Power usage: the company says : 17 hours  using MP3 on 128 kb. However using it always on WMA and with external memory of 2 GB  an alkaline battery drains  in about 6 hours!! For this   reason i have bought a mains to USB adaptor , together with mains cable extension
Volume: still in its maximum  the volume is just strong.I found abt 32 steps  be- tweeen minimum and maximum   Using the 808A  volume is nearly the same on 16-17. Startup : the time requied to chack up the external memory  in order to update the database. Comments:
Now this model is my most favourite among all the MP3 s i have used so far  even that the  model has sevrel very impoertant ? was as for example the very slow starttup and and the high batery drain


PART  2

MEASUREMENTS
And here are several measurements made with it and a audio processing program: First step : Making a noise ? le: It is a white noise of duration of 1 minute
 A) This is  the original WAV ? le in spectral view , mean levels just the  linear view
The ? le has been converted into MP3 and  WMA  giving the curve as  below
This is the 128 MP3 From the above picture it is clear that the MP3 format in the 128kb compression goes maximum to  18kHZ , that  surely lossy but for most  ears it is OK. As far as I tested so far my ears can listen to  tones up to 14 kHz
Just look at the  bandwidth ! It has a bandstop on 20 kHz .......
.........then transfered to Sansa and played
This is the resulted curves !
As is shown , this is no linear curve . Signals drop to 16 db  after the 18.5 kHz  . However it is still  a linear response for all of us
MP3 128 kb
Hmm from the above  here you see that  it is not a linear curve. All freqs  above the 18000 Hz drop by several db.. Is as like someone is turning down the  treble
WMA 64
Instad here the response it  quite  linear . Just above 19kHz. the linearity drops somehow. and it ends on the 20,2 khz WMA  has the same linearity as 64 . In contrast , when listened there is some `arti?  ciality' in  audio. If  you thinkt that  this is too theoretical , i am including here a more  real example  with   only the  results of a  song conversion. But the song  was quite bassy and came from a cassete
This is  the resulted   wav MUSIC ?  le.Here is the  resulted MP3 ?  le:
Here is the  resulted MP3 ?  le: Uncommonly  there is a bandwidth stop on 15.5 Hz !!!
This is the result  of the  WMA 48 v ?  le Look at the differences  between the  WAV and the WMA 48
and here is for the WMA 64 As you  see the curve is nearlay the same  with the 48's !!
Here is the pix- mix between all modes: WAV  , MP3 and WMA as you may see  being the WAV as `linear'
and here is a comparative between WMA and  MP3
THis is  the results between the original and the playbacked  MP3 ?le . Both ?  les have been at ?  rst normalized for having the same audio level. This here can mean that above the 2000 kHZ  the response drops up to 10 db
My conclusions : As it is clear the MP3 format lacks the ?  delity WMA offers , and thogh i am generally contrary to this  format , I always use it  for its very good capability have very good results with the highest posible compres- sion. For me the 48 kb  WMA is  the best compromizse for portability and quanitty
Nowadays my Sansa together with a 2 GB SD memory can keep about 1200  songs , ie more an 100 albums!

Δεν υπάρχουν σχόλια:

Δημοσίευση σχολίου