LG Unveils V20 Android Nougat Phone With 3.5mm Jack, Audiophile Smarts

[symphara]

No phone can make studio quality recordings by itself. But with iOS you have the option of doing so using external gear since the support for such hardware is built into iOS. Not so on Android, where today's flagships still have issues with things like audio latency.

So basically we're talking about apples (no pun intended) and oranges.

If I look at the V20, I see a phone where particular care was taken to provide it with an out-of-the-box sound recording experience. Is it "studio quality"? I highly doubt it, this sounds like a dubious, typically marketing-overblown sensationalism. However, the real question is what does it do? And here, we have a reasonable expectation that it will provide a much better out-of-the-box sound recording experience. So people using their phone for mundane tasks, such as making small video recordings of their family & friends, or perhaps using the wealth of voice/video communication apps, will benefit from.

In contrast, you smugly dismiss it and tell me that an iPhone, if you plug special hardware into it, can - theoretically - be used for actual studio recordings. Yes I'd certainly call that a hypothetical. You have it at best at "enthusiast" level, i.e. usable by someone who really, really thinks it's cool and fashionable to use their iPad to do a recording with their school band.

Your claim that an iPhone is used at a professional level, by actual recording studios, is far more dubious than LG's.

So wait, now you're changing your tune? First you claimed iOS was single-threaded and now you're talking about multitasking? Do you retract your original post where you said iOS was single-threaded?

Your brand loyalty has seriously impaired your reading comprehension. I never claimed that iOS is technically single-threaded (i.e. it runs a single execution loop on one core), in fact, what I literally wrote was "basically the single-thread experience of iOS". By which of course I stand, as I previously explained.

 

[kilcher]

Not commenting on the V20 specifically, I know nothing about it, but I find it kind of sad these companies could come out with a phone that's the best in every way and no one would really care. It's all Samsung and Apple. At least one more strong competitor would be nice to up everyone's game.

 

[Zirel]

Clunky, due to OS <-> app and app <-> app interaction. Basically iOS has been from the very beginning built around the idea that you click on an icon, start an app, do stuff, click the home button, rinse and repeat. Apps are very self-contained and generally don't interact much with the OS or other apps. The lack of file system access seriously compounds this problem.

Total bull

No, I can send an email and attach files from Dropbox, I cannot do the same with Gmail app.

No, I can use Stacks.app right on Safari to convert other currencies to €.

No, I can use Microsoft Translator right on Safari.

No, I can use external ad blocking on Safari.

No, iMessage can now use third party Apps.

No, Photos.app can use other apps to edit photos.

No, on Apple Maps, I can hail an Uber right there.

No, on Siri, I can book a table at a restaurante right there.

You don't know what you're talking about, and you're completely wrong.
[doublepost=1473262812][/doublepost]

I see a phone where particular care was taken to provide it with an out-of-the-box sound recording experience. Is it "studio quality"? I highly doubt it, this sounds like a dubious, typically marketing-overblown sensationalism. However, the real question is what does it do? And here, we have a reasonable expectation that it will provide a much better out-of-the-box sound recording experience.

No, it's unreasonable, there's no point besides marketing bs to belive in that.

It's stupid even comparing a mobile phone, to anything close to professional recording equipment with controlled oven crystals, balanced inputs, etc.

Can you even hook a professional mic to it? No! So there's nothing "professional" about it.

 

[Sefstah]

I didn't mention anything about instability, malware, or viruses. That was you.

I just pointed out the fact that if reliability is paramount in your job, people use iOS. I'm not sure you can disagree with that, as the proof is in the pudding. It's odd how people say Android does more, yet people who actually do more tend to use iOS. Probably because they don't care about dicking around with custom ROMs and installing moving backgrounds. They just want stuff to work.

Just as an example I've personally witnessed; Logic Remote is infinitely smoother and more reliable on iOS than TouchDAW is on Android.

You're not allowed to speak on the subject because you've never owned an Android. Plus, you repeated everything that I already agreed on.
"People tend to do more on iOS"?? Really? Who are these people you speak of? Give me some examples.

 

[AllieNeko]

For all those about to be hurt by the lack of a 3.5mm headphone jack. 10 years. 2005 vs 2015.

Headphone jack is just on the other side of that 12" Macbook. I'm typing on mine now. Definitely still present.

 

[Mactendo]

This is how you update phones.

V20 boasts a 32-bit Hi-Fi Quad DAC (digital-to-analog converter) and a 72-stage volume control fine-tuned by Bang & Olufsen, with support for most lossless music formats including FLAC and Apple Lossless. It also includes a HD audio recorder able to capture "studio quality audio" from three ultra-sensitive built-in microphones.

 

[symphara]

Total bull
No, I can send an email and attach files from Dropbox, I cannot do the same with Gmail app.

I don't have/use Dropbox, but I can attach any file I have on my Android phone to an email.

What I cannot do on my iPad (or couldn't, last I tried) is get an email from someone with a Word attachment, edit the document to make changes, and reply to the person with the new document as attachment. I could only send the new document as a new email, and to do reply, I had to reply, manually copy/paste the subject line and text field, discard the reply, and copy the subject/text into the new email. An incredibly clunky way of doing the most simple task.

No, I can use Stacks.app right on Safari to convert other currencies to €.

Good for you. I don't need Stacks.app. I type "140 USD to EUR" in the search box on the home screen and get the conversion.

No, I can use Microsoft Translator right on Safari.

Good for you. I don't need Microsoft Translator. Chrome does it by itself. On top of it, in any app, if I select text, I get a "translate" option.

No, I can use external ad blocking on Safari.

As you can on Android, with Ghostery and other options.

No, iMessage can now use third party Apps.

Ok, to do what exactly?

No, Photos.app can use other apps to edit photos.

This has always been the case on Android. You can install any app you want, and on my phone for example, Google Photos can edit stuff itself, or I can use the Huawei photo editor.

No, on Apple Maps, I can hail an Uber right there.

Shame that Apple Maps is rubbish. Otherwise, Google Maps does the same thing (http://mashable.com/2016/03/15/google-maps-uber/#j68Nkk4LBPqn), although probably better.

No, on Siri, I can book a table at a restaurante right there.

The only thing I found Siri good for is understanding to set an alarm. Otherwise the voice processing done by Google is a generation ahead.

No, it's unreasonable, there's no point besides marketing bs to belive in that.

It's stupid even comparing a mobile phone, to anything close to professional recording equipment with controlled oven crystals, balanced inputs, etc.

Can you even hook a professional mic to it? No! So there's nothing "professional" about it.

Utter nonsense that has nothing to do with what I wrote. There's nothing "professional" about iOS sound support either, i.e. it cannot be realistically be used in a professional sound recording environment.

 

[1041958]

So basically we're talking about apples (no pun intended) and oranges.

If I look at the V20, I see a phone where particular care was taken to provide it with an out-of-the-box sound recording experience. Is it "studio quality"? I highly doubt it, this sounds like a dubious, typically marketing-overblown sensationalism. However, the real question is what does it do? And here, we have a reasonable expectation that it will provide a much better out-of-the-box sound recording experience. So people using their phone for mundane tasks, such as making small video recordings of their family & friends, or perhaps using the wealth of voice/video communication apps, will benefit from.

In contrast, you smugly dismiss it and tell me that an iPhone, if you plug special hardware into it, can - theoretically - be used for actual studio recordings. Yes I'd certainly call that a hypothetical. You have it at best at "enthusiast" level, i.e. usable by someone who really, really thinks it's cool and fashionable to use their iPad to do a recording with their school band.

Your claim that an iPhone is used at a professional level, by actual recording studios, is far more dubious than LG's.

The poster I replied to wasn't making mention of microphones or out-of-the-box. They made a generic comment about studio quality which I replied to.

And I'm sorry, but iOS devices are widely used by many people in the recording industry, despite your attempts to trivialize it with snark about using it to record your school band. Do enthusiasts use them? Absolutely. As do professionals. Right tool for the right job at the right time. Having audio processing capabilities that can match studio gear in something as small as an iPhone or iPad is useful in a wide variety of situati

Your brand loyalty has seriously impaired your reading comprehension. I never claimed that iOS is technically single-threaded (i.e. it runs a single execution loop on one core), in fact, what I literally wrote was "basically the single-thread experience of iOS". By which of course I stand, as I previously explained.

I'm sorry, are we talking about iOS and multi-tasking/multi-threading? Why are you trying to diminish what I say by playing the "brand loyalty" card? Are you not able to discuss facts without bringing your pre-conceived biases into a discussion?

I'm a developer on embedded systems. Which makes me a stickler for terminology. Tasks and threads are two very distinct things. Your entire statement (minus the part you conveniently left out) was:

"Since Android is an actual multi-threading OS, vs basically the single-thread experience of iOS,"

Any person reading this would think you're implying Android is multi-threaded and iOS is not. Especially when you qualified Android as "an actual multi-threading OS". There's no reading comprehension issue on my part. Your original statement is misleading.

 

[symphara]

The poster I replied to wasn't making mention of microphones or out-of-the-box. They made a generic comment about studio quality which I replied to.

Then, no offence, you were talking beside the point. As I said before, I don't believe that the V20 will offer literally "studio quality", but it looks like it will offer a better out-of-the box recording experience than most (all?) phones out there. Otherwise, what are we talking about? Are you seriously comparing the built-in microphones of any phone with dedicated equipment that you plug in? What's the point?

And I'm sorry, but iOS devices are widely used by many people in the recording industry, despite your attempts to trivialize it with snark about using it to record your school band. Do enthusiasts use them? Absolutely. As do professionals. Right tool for the right job at the right time. Having audio processing capabilities that can match studio gear in something as small as an iPhone or iPad is useful in a wide variety of situati

This strikes me as being as delusional as claiming that because an iPhone can be used to fly a tiny drone, it is used by commercial aviation.

No, I don't believe that in the context of professional audio recording, an iOS device is anything more than a toy. If I were a sound engineer and you'd suggest to perform concert or studio recordings on a device that - at best - has 100Gb of storage and a 10" screen, I'd think you're pulling my leg.

I'm sorry, are we talking about iOS and multi-tasking/multi-threading? Why are you trying to diminish what I say by playing the "brand loyalty" card? Are you not able to discuss facts without bringing your pre-conceived biases into a discussion?

Because I believe your brand loyalty has prevented you from reading what I actually wrote, and you continue to misinterpret it in a very narrow way. Don't feel singled out - it's very common. One of the previous posters thinks it's an unreasonable expectation to think the V20 will have better (note: not professional, merely better) audio recording compared to other phones, just because LG included 3 high acoustic overload point built-in microphones. I find this bizarre. If Apple had included such hardware, many people would think it would boost its audio recording capabilities, and particularly on this forum, it would be the best thing since sliced bread.

Back to the other point, I believe that iOS started from an extremely simple task/thread scheduling paradigm, and this is because on one hand they wanted to provide a lot of animation and quick interactivity (perceived smoothness is essential if you want to sell fashion tech) and on the other hand they had to aggressively limit resource utilisation (memory, CPU, battery) to achieve this. It hasn't moved much beyond that. Yes, there's a bit of support for running multiple things at the same time. It's extremely limited and convoluted by modern OS standards. I remember the first time I looked into iOS programming, I was shocked to discover that you needed a special handler to run whenever the process was not in foreground, and that it didn't seem possible to simply have a process that ran the same way in foreground or background, as it is on a modern OS, because as soon as your process would not be in foreground, iOS would suspend it and then kill it.

So my entire statement is correct, and if you want me to expand on it again, iOS still provides basically a single-thread experience, peppered by a little support for threads (i.e. multiple in-process threads of execution), and a little support for tasks (i.e. running multiple processes, simultaneously). It's not literally single-thread, I never said that. I said the experience is single-thread, i.e. using it feels to me like using an OS with a basic event loop prioritised on UI. It's like that, with a bit of stuff on top.

In contrast, Android started from a modern OS that offered state-of-the-art support for multi-tasking and multi-threading, and they had to trim it down so that it's workable on such limited hardware as a smartphone. Still, it remained that Android is far superior from this point of view. This is immediately apparent if you have any apps that require lingering connections, for example.