{"id":3490,"date":"2014-09-09T12:55:49","date_gmt":"2014-09-09T19:55:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/?p=3490"},"modified":"2014-09-09T12:55:49","modified_gmt":"2014-09-09T19:55:49","slug":"pono-2-0-in-preliminary-design-stage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/?p=3490","title":{"rendered":"Pono 2.0 In Preliminary Design Stage"},"content":{"rendered":"

We’re only weeks away from the first delivery of the Pono 1.0 players and the folks behind the effort are already talking about its successor. That might seem a little premature but planning for the next version of the device will begin shortly according to the developers and Charles Hansen of Ayre, the genius behind the existing hardware. The Pono 2.0 models are expected sometime late in 2015 or early 2016. What would prompt Pono to start thinking about their next design when they haven’t even delivered their first model?<\/p>\n

Because every one of the roughly 15,000 Pono players that supporters of the Kickstarter campaign have pre-ordered will be obsolete when they receive them. The question was asked, “what benefits will the Pono players offer over Smartphones that have tremendous audio capabilities AND all of the capabilities of a handheld media device?” <\/p>\n

Did you see the new Apple iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus this morning? No, they didn’t announce that the new phones will be “high-resolution” capable nor do they sport stereo speakers like the HTC M8 Harman Kardon Edition phone offered by Sprint, but the inclusion of WiFi, better battery power and the anticipation of Beats headphones resolving HD-Audio locally means that the world of HD-Audio is just over the hill for Apple. And Pono knows it.<\/p>\n

I listened as Charles Hansen of Ayre described the ecosystem that is beginning to emerge in the world of portable high fidelity playback devices. He and the head of technology considered making the first generation phone communicate via Bluetooth or WiFi with an iOS or Android phone. The Pono hardware would play the role of “high fidelity external DAC and storage device”, a small music server under the control of a remote touch screen of some type. The strategy would require you to carry two devices around with you instead of just one. I don’t really see that working as a long-term strategy.<\/p>\n

While the screens of the next generation of Smartphones are getting bigger by the day (the new iPhone 6 and 6 Plus screens are 4.7 and 5.5 inches from corner to corner), what matters to me is increased audio fidelity, wireless communication improvements, longer battery life, and the extra on board memory…all things that will open up the devices to compete directly with Astell & Kern, Pono, and the rest of the “do one thing devices” being offered to audiophiles.<\/p>\n

That’s why the question was asked. What are the people at Pono going to do about the fact that their device doesn’t offer anything substantially better than a good Smartphone. The Apple iPhone 6, their top of the line revolutionary new phone, with 128 GB of storage will cost $499. Who would spend $1200 or $400 on a one trick pono…pony? I certainly won’t.<\/p>\n

Pono would be smarter to focus on the other end of the music pipeline. The Ayre-designed Pono player is not going to be capable of delivering “the soul of music” as promised in the materials provided by the company, if the sources for the digital files offered at 192 kHz\/24-bit FLAC files come from ripped CDs…as seems to be the case with Omnifone on board. Neil says that the “soul” is only available at 192 kHz\/24-bits, remember. The fidelity of CDs is likened to being submerged 200 feet below the surface among the dolphins. Here’s the diagram the Pono used to help make its case for the KS campaign.<\/p>\n

\"underwater_pono_gfx\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Figure 1 – One of the graphics used to sell the Pono player during their KS campaign. Notice where CDs are ranked. [Click to enlarge]<\/p>\n

With Omnifone readying their 35 million “High-Resolution” CD rips for the Ponomusic store, I’m not sure I’m ready to buy into the Pono equity campaign that has been extended to the end of the month. There is no way to make a Redbook CD into a 192 kHz\/24-bit FLAC file and improve its fidelity. The file will be a whole lot bigger but the fidelity will still be CD quality.<\/p>\n

I think Neil Young and his Pono initiative should focus on getting his artist friends and the labels to issue better versions of the music in the first place\u2026or design Pono 2.0 as a high-end streaming service like Tidal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We’re only weeks away from the first delivery of the Pono 1.0 players and the folks behind the effort are<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3492,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[657,50,40,757,172,57,242,725,1032,70,640,26,639,651,42,298,251,645,1035,638,637,227,643,169,276,336,335,759,758,1037,347,659,673,658,660],"class_list":["post-3490","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dr_aixs_posts","tag-advanced-resolution","tag-aix-records","tag-analog-vs-digital","tag-audio-quality-guarantee","tag-audio-resolution","tag-audio-specifications","tag-audiophile-mastering","tag-blu-ray-discs","tag-dvd_audio","tag-hd-downloads","tag-hd-music","tag-hd-audio","tag-hi-res-audio","tag-hi-res-audio-logo","tag-high-resolution-audio","tag-high-res-music","tag-high-resolution","tag-high-resolution-audio-experience","tag-highresaudio","tag-hires-audio","tag-hires-music","tag-hra","tag-hra-listening-experience","tag-mark-waldrep","tag-mastering","tag-neil-young","tag-pono","tag-pono-2-0","tag-pono-equity","tag-ponomusic","tag-spectragram","tag-uhd-audio","tag-ultra-hd","tag-ultra-hd-audio","tag-ultra-high-definition-audio"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3490"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3490\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3493,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3490\/revisions\/3493"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3492"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.realhd-audio.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}