When I got a Cambridge Audio DacMagic about two years ago (see my Macworld article about it) I was immediately impressed by how it improved the quality of the music I listened to from iTunes. Even with compressed music, it gives better detail and spaciousness. While I am not an audiophile, the DacMagic is certainly a worthy addition to my stereo.
I just noticed that Cambridge Audio has released a new version of the device, the DacMagic Plus. (Apparently this was released a couple of months ago; I just saw a mention of it in a classical music magazine.) This improves on the original by adding a headphone jack and volume control, allowing it to be used on its own as a headphone amp, which is very practical. In addition, it has a digital pre-amp, so it can be used with active speakers, and it has a Bluetooth receiver so you can stream music from Bluetooth devices.
I would have liked to see AirPlay compatibility, for streaming from iTunes, but you can always stream to, say, an Apple TV connected to the DacMagic Plus via a Toslink cable. However, with only two digital inputs, this may be limiting for some.
For me, though, the big advantage would be using it as a headphone amp, when I want to listen to headphones. The device is compact enough that I could put it on my desk, rather than next to my amp which is on a shelf a few feet from my desk chair, making headphone cable paths a bit easier to use. (I use my DacMagic for my office stereo.)
Unfortunately, it is more expensive than the original DacMagic: it lists at $679, but is available from Amazon.com for $599; the original DacMagic sold for around $429. But the addition of the headphone amp and jack make it a very useful product.
If you’ve never tried a DAC – digital-audio converter – you might be surprised to hear how much of a difference it can make, especially if you play music from your computer. (If you have, say, a high-end CD player, the difference will be much less obvious.) If you want a device to add detail and clarity to your sound, do check out the DacMagic Plus.
As regular readers of Kirkville probably know, I’m a fan of Marcel Proust. I recently started re-reading A la recherche du temps perdu, but was sidetracked by moving house. Some time ago, I listened to the entire work, on a French audio recording. But not all Proustians are French speakers. Proust actually has quite a following in the US and England, and his popularity is such that Naxos Audiobooks has recently released the first part of a complete, unabridged recording of Remembrance of Things Past (also know as In Search of Lost Time).
The narrator, Neville Jason, has one of those smooth, soft English accents that lulls and entrances you. His reading is leisurely and relaxed. He takes his time, allowing you to absorb the work comfortably, without speaking too slowly, as is sometimes the case on older audiobook readings. Jason’s reading is a performance, but it also sounds like he’s sitting by your side, reading from the book, like a friend. In addition, his French accent is quite good, and when he speaks the names of French people or towns, it sounds as it should.
Swann’s Way is more than 21 hours long, and is only the first of seven volumes of Remembrance of Things Past. Naxos will be releasing each volume individually, and will most likely offer a box set with the entire text – which will be more than 120 hours – when all the titles have been released.
If you want to listen to Proust, and don’t speak French, Neville Jason’s recordings are excellent. For now, this is the only complete recording in the works. Simon Vance, who is also another wonderful narrator, has recorded Swann’s Way, but it doesn’t look like this will be a complete recording of all seven volumes of Remembrance of Things Past, as this recording was released in September, 2010, and no follow-up has yet been released.
I recently wrote about the first iPhone case I tried, the Speck Candyshell. Today I’m going to discuss another, similar case, the Otterbox Reflex Series. Like the Candyshell, this is a light case that protects the iPhone’s body, and which is designed essentially for shock protection.
According to Otterbox:
Surrounding each device with a cushion of air, the Reflex Series flexes upon impact and rebounds to its original form. Focused on protecting the occupant, just like the crumple zone of a car, this case not only takes a hit but recoils and springs back, ready to protect again and again.
This case doesn’t have rubber inside its hard plastic shell, but protects the iPhone by having extra space. It is as light as the Candyshell – only 27 g – but has an interesting particularity: it is in two equal parts. You slide the phone into one part, then slide the other part on the phone, and they snap together.
In the first place, this makes the case a lot easier to put on and off the iPhone, if you want to do so. But the main reason for this is so you can take the bottom part off of the iPhone to place it into a dock. While there is a space sufficient to connect Apple’s dock connector cable, if you want to put the phone in a dock, you need the bottom to be naked.
I don’t put my iPhone in a dock, and this is probably less common now with over-the-air Wi-Fi syncing, but many people still use docks to connect to audio playback devices. If that’s the case, this is an extra reason to buy the Otterbox Reflex Series case.
Aside from that, the protection is similar to the Candyshell. I was initially worried that the two parts of the case would come apart easily, but that hasn’t happened. In fact, the ability to take the case off so easily has me preferring this case; for now.
Check out this and other Otterbox cases on the company’s website. They sent me another model that I’ll review soon.
If you’re a vendor who makes iPhone cases, feel free to contact me (there’s an e-mail link in the sidebar to the right). I’d be happy to mention any cases I receive that I like.
Dropbox is testing a new photo and video upload feature, and as looking for people to help. In exchange, they’ll give you some extra free space: 500 MB just for trying, and up to 5 GB in free space depending on how much you upload. Go to the forum post linked above and download the new beta, then connect your iPhone or camera. The free space is credited to your account immediately.
If you don’t have a Dropbox account, you can get a free account with 2 GB storage that you can sync across computers and access from mobile devices. To get an account, click this link. In addition, if you sign up through my link, I’ll get some additional free space as well: 250 MB per user.
As I mentioned recently, I’m new to the iPhone party. And I’m not going to take a €629 device and just stick it in my pocket without any protection, nor especially take it out of my pocket without something to cushion any shocks if it slips from my fingers. So I’ve been exploring iPhone cases, based on recommendations from friends and readers, and this is the first of a handful of reviews that I’ll be posting.
The first case I got was a Speck Candyshell in black and gray. It was cheap, and seemed to meet my needs: a simple case, that would protect the iPhone from falls. I don’t believe that I need a screen protector, but I wanted something solid and unobtrusive.
The Speck Candyshell is just that. After you struggle a bit to get it on the iPhone, it fits like a glove, and the rubberized interior makes sure the iPhone doesn’t move a millimeter. The back of the case is smooth, glossy plastic, which gets scratched pretty quickly (though not seriously), and the front has a raised rubberized edge to protect the screen if you drop the iPhone screen side down.
One thing I don’t want is a case that is very heavy. The iPhone weighs 138g, and the Speck Candycase only adds another 27g (though that’s still 20% of the weight of the iPhone). For this type of protection, you probably can’t get much lighter, unless you go with a flexible silicon case.
There’s enough room on the bottom to connect a dock cable, and access to the buttons is simple on the sides. There’s a hole for the camera and flash, and a decent sized hole for access to the headphone jack. All in all, this is a fine case, and is close to what I was looking for. While I think I found something a bit better (see an upcoming review), for what it cost (a mere €8; you can get it from Amazon.com for around $12), this is certainly a good deal.
Speck Products has a wide range of cases for iPhones, as well as plenty of other devices. While I don’t live in an area where I can see many of them first-hand, their website shows the variety of protection they offer for different needs.
If you’re a vendor who makes iPhone cases, feel free to contact me (there’s an e-mail link in the sidebar to the right). I’d be happy to mention any cases I receive that I like.
Neil Young was interviewed by Walt Mossberg about digital music, and made a number of statements where he expressed a desire to see more high-resolution audio files. He claims that only “5 percent of the data present in the original recording” is present in MP3 files – though he doesn’t specify what bit rate. He also suggests that vinyl LPs or cassette tapes reproduce nearly all of the 24-bit, 192 kHz files used to master recordings.
Well, I take exception to these claims, which are a bit off the cuff. First, comparing 24/192 files to anything is ludicrous. In order to get all of the “data” from those files, you need very high-end stereo equipment. Even if you do have a standalone DAC (digital audio converter) between your source and amplifier, the majority of these devices only go up to 96 kHz. Next, recording artists listen to their recordings in studios on equipment that is even better than what most obsessive audiophiles have in their homes. I’m sure there is a difference in sound in a recording studio: not only do you have the best studio monitors, but you also have acoustically perfect rooms in which to listen.
But suggesting that LPs, with their clicks and scratches, or tapes, which are notably known for problems at high frequencies (remember Dolby noise reduction on cassettes?) is just disingenuous.
It’s interesting that Neil Young became famous during the time of AM radios. Even those with stereos had equipment that was light years behind the average stereo today. He got famous because of his music: his songs, his lyrics and his voice, not the quality of the sound. Yet he says “we have 5% of what we had in 1978,” which is just a lie. Analog recordings did not approach the 24/192 benchmark that he cites, and the sound quality of the average stereo then was crappy compared to today’s iPods. (It’s worth noting that Neil Young suffers from tinnitus, or at least he did in 1995 – it generally never goes away – so how much of that 24/192 does he actually hear?)
He wants people to be able to buy high-resolution files more easily. There are many vendors who sell these files, and he seems to not realize that this is possible. He calls for a “device” that can play high-resolution files, but says that it takes 30 minutes per song to download these files. (I don’t know what he means by this; with my Internet connection, I can download a high-resolution “song” – a file just a few minutes long – in just a few minutes.)
Young claims that he and Steve Jobs were “working on” such a solution, but I think this is not true; if they were discussing it, it was most likely just an idea in the air. There were rumors of Apple offering 24-bit files via iTunes last year, but the source of this was never clear. My sources have told me that this is very unlikely, at least in the near term, for a number of reasons: bandwidth, price, playback, etc. The audiophile market is too small for Apple to provide high-resolution files for all the music they sell. It is entirely possible that, in the future, they offer high-resolution files for a limited selection of music, but even that seems unlikely, as it would confuse average users.
Neil Young does say that he looks at the Internet, and piracy, “as the new radio.” “That’s how music gets around.” It doesn’t bother him that people download his music, saying “it’s acceptable.” It allows people to discover music, and for him this is a good thing. Of course, he makes enough money on royalties and back catalog that he doesn’t need to worry about income…
While I understand Mr. Young’s desire to have better quality music files, you must remember that this idea comes from someone who can afford the hardware to listen to them. The 99% of music listeners who don’t have that hardware simply don’t care. They buy music for music, not for audio quality.
My friend Doug Adams, who runs Doug’s AppleScripts for iTunes sent me an e-mail yesterday asking if there’s any way to have an iPod sync with iTunes automatically. He has one old device connected to a dock that he uses as a clock radio. It made me realize just how useful auto-syncing would be.
Not everyone needs this. Doug wants his podcasts to update, and it’s true that unless you listen to podcasts, or download content frequently (such as, for example, an iTunes season pass to the Daily Show), you won’t need daily syncing. But for some of us, it would save a step. Instead of having to go to iTunes to sync a device, there should be a setting whereby you choose periodic auto-syncing. You should be able to choose days and times; for example, you might want to sync every day at, say, 7 am, before you head off to work, but on the weekends, you might not want to sync at all, or, perhaps, later in the day.
This would be easy to implement: it would happen on the iTunes side, not on the iOS device. iTunes would simply have a daemon that checks for the next scheduled sync and runs it when that time comes, if the computer is on (or the next time the computer is on). If the iOS device is not found, then it stops and waits for the next time.
Note: Doug is looking into whether he can script this. So I hope to be able to update this article soon with a solution to this problem. This wouldn’t work directly with iTunes, but would probably use an AppleScript to set up and activate.
I just got my first iPhone. Yes, I know I’m late to the party, but I didn’t need one, and it was too expensive. I was living in a village in the mountains, and as I work at home, I rarely had use for a cell phone. But I’ve moved to a larger town, and changed my personal situation, as it were, and it would be practical for me to have a good phone. Also, since the French ISP Free introduced an unlimited iPhone plan for €20 (only €16 for Internet customers, which I am), I decided to go for it.
While I’m not worried about scratching the screen, I am worried about dropping the phone, and I think I need either a simple case or silicon protector. I’ll be checking some local stores to see what they have, but in the meantime, I’d welcome any recommendations. Given where I live – a smallish city in the French Alps – there aren’t a lot of options. There are phone stores that have some cases, but the selection is very limited.
And, if you’re a vendor who makes iPhone cases, feel free to contact me (there’s an e-mail link in the sidebar to the right). I’d be happy to mention any cases I receive that I like.
Follow-up: So I ended up getting a Speck Candyshell, which I got cheap on Amazon.fr (€8). It is exactly what I wanted. It fits well, isn’t bulky, and looks like it offers excellent protection. I would have bought the Otterbox Commuter, but it is quite expensive here in France, and the company’s shipping prices from the US are outrageous.
As regular readers of Kirkville probably know, I’m a fan of Marcel Proust. I recently 
The first case I got was a 
