wav

Sure, iPods and Zunes can sound perfectly fine, but no one ever claimed they were bona fide portable high-end audio devices. Their "good enough" sound isn't entirely their fault: they're too small to house a battery potent enough to power a high-quality headphone amplifier and a high-resolution 24-bit/96kHz digital-to-analog converter.

The Hifiman High Fidelity Music Player HM-801 is the Hummer of portables; it's big enough to get the job done. It's 3 inches wide, 4.5 inches high, and 1 inch thick; that's about the size of an old Walkman cassette player from the 1980s. Hifiman doesn't say how much the HM-801 weighs, but it feels substantial.

If Apple wanted to build something as good or better, it could, but the potential market for something that sounds better than an iPod is probably insignificant, and certainly too small for Apple or Microsoft to bother with. They're too busy jamming more features into their players, and sound quality never makes the cut. Besides, the market demands ever cheaper products, and real quality is never cheap. so the HM-801 is downright pricey.

That's another way of saying it's aimed at the sort of music lover who's already invested in a set of top-of-the-line Etymotic, Grado, Klipsch, Monster, Shure, or Ultimate Ears headphones. If you have and you're using an iPod or Zune, you're not hearing all the sound quality you paid for with those headphones.

The HM-801 was conceived as an audiophile player, so non-sound-oriented features are pretty scarce. The HM-801 has a user removable headphone amplifier circuitboard/module that makes future upgrades easy as pie. Hifiman already has one such upgrade in the works, a $170 board specifically designed to maximize detail and resolution of high-end in-ear headphones. Looking inside the HM-801--it has removable panels--so you can see it features top quality components, like a Burr-Brown PCM1704U digital-to-analog converter and Burr-Brown OPA627 Op-Amp. This is a level of technology normally found in audiophile home componentry, and never before used in a portable music player. … Read more

DJ software like AdionSoft's DjDecks can put pro-level audio programming and playback capabilities at your fingertips. You can mix and sequence many different file types and play them back in programmed sequences, like most DJ-oriented software. It has a raft of beats, loops, echoes, and other special effects you can apply during playback or save in your chosen file type, as well as plug-in expandability, like some of its competitors. But what sets it apart from and above most similar software is its flexibility and compatibility with external devices, such as multiple sound cards, including ASIO driver support, and … Read more

We like the idea of QWave in theory; it's an extremely lightweight media player that lets users instantly play audio files instead of waiting for a program like Windows Media Player or iTunes to load. Unfortunately, the program's lack of documentation and virtually nonexistent interface make it confusing to use.

We installed the program and then attempted to launch it. This produced a dialogue that asked if we wanted to "Add QPlay to menu." We weren't sure exactly what menu it meant, but we clicked yes. Because the publisher's description mentions an icon in … Read more

We see a lot of audio converters, and there's really only so much that they can do to differentiate themselves from one another; we rarely see any that are particularly impressive. Switch Sound File Converter didn't do anything that blew us away in terms of design or features, yet this lightweight, uncluttered program won us over with its simplicity and ease of use.

The program's interface is quite basic and intuitive, with its features organized with well-labeled graphical buttons. Using the program couldn't be easier; users simply select the files they want to convert, choose the … Read more

Audio Record Expert is an audio recording program that, at first glance, seems like it has potential. It has several features that are useful and not always included with this kind of software, but unfortunately, the quality of the recordings that the program produces negates any potentially useful features.

The program's interface is basic and fairly intuitive, with its features arranged in tabs and buttons. Making recordings is quite easy, a matter of simply starting and stopping the program at the desired times. We liked that the program supports a variety of inputs, including microphones and sounds playing from … Read more

AIFF MP3 Converter provides an exciting number of file conversion options for such a simple program. It can convert practically any audio or video file type in a hurry.

The program's interface was sparse but surprisingly perfect for its functions. We were able to quickly master its few commands and options in order to convert files. After reading the product description, we assumed this program only converted AIFF files, but we were pleased to discover we could convert just about any audio or video file. We simply added files to our queue and chose a file type to convert … Read more

WAV MP3 Converter offers many more possibilities than its simple descriptive name implies. With an incredibly easy-to-use layout and impressive list of conversion options, this is a great program that does more than expected.

The program's interface is impressively easy to navigate. Its commands are thinned down to the essentials and are intuitive to manage. The program's name implies this is simply a program for converting WAV files to MP3s, but fortunately it does more. Instead of a simple file converter, it turned out to be a highly flexible program that provides a slew of unexpected video and … Read more

WMA MP3 Converter is a great tool for converting audio files to different types. By offering much more than the name implies, this turned out to be a surprising and helpful program.

Its interface was a relief, thanks to command icons that are scaled back to the absolute simplest form. We were never confused or in need of instructions since the entire layout is so intuitive. We were surprised to discover that WMA MP3 Converter isn't just a converter for WMA files. In fact, you can take any audio and video file and convert it to a sound file … Read more

OJOsoft WAV Converter is a simple program that allows users to convert WAV files to a variety of other formats. The program doesn't really offer anything that we haven't already seen, but it is easy to use and it works well.

The program's interface is plain and intuitive, with large buttons across the top that represent the file conversions that OJOsoft WAV Converter can perform--WAV to MP3, WAV to WMA, etc. Users click the appropriate button and then simply select the file or files that they want to convert, choose an output destination, and pick the audio … Read more