Why is the mobile phone camera getting better and better, but HIFI is gradually giving up?

HiFi players are all minorities, HiFi audio, HiFi headphones. A city, such as Dalian where I live, is now called a second-tier city. Hehe, not many people play HiFi. There are hundreds of people you know and hear about, and the equipment ranges from tens of thousands to millions, but it is a small circle after all.

HiFi devices are also shrinking now. Old brands are all relying on their old roots and have not developed. New brands often appear, but fewer and fewer people still play. Young people listen to Bluetooth, or a tens of thousands of high-end Bluetooth speakers. Few people play vinyl records and CDs anymore. Of course, older people still like to play with vinyl, and those with strong hands-on ability are ok, but those with weak hands-on ability are not.

It doesn't matter what you play, do what you can, and remember that "photography is poor for three generations, and sound is destroyed for life." Ha ha ha, laugh at yourself!

Mobile phones are like radish and cabbage, and 95% people need them. A fever stereo is like Napoleon XIII, and 95% people don't like it. Mobile phones are daily necessities and can be used by individuals. They are widely used for making phone calls, playing games and shopping online. HIFI is a luxury with only one purpose. Only a few people can taste it. Besides hardware, it depends more on hearing, feeling and imagination. Therefore, it is doomed to miss most people.

From 500 yuan to 1 10,000 mobile phones, everyone can afford it; At least four or five thousand stereos, but hundreds of thousands or millions, not everyone can afford them.

The compact mobile phone is easy to carry, and it is convenient and fast to play anywhere. You can also play when you go to the toilet and sit in the toilet. There are many audio equipment, so we should have a fixed listening environment, a certain amount of time and leisure time.

Now everyone is busy, everyone is busy making money and making a living. How can I have time and mood to sit on the throne and enjoy fever music?

In fact, the fever stereo has not been abandoned, just like a symphony, it is always appreciated by a few people, especially the fever stereo. Therefore, in the past, present and future, HIFI will always be a hobby of a few people.

There is a saying that "high and low" is also a normal phenomenon.

At present, there are many people playing HlF on mobile phones. First, listen to lossless music with headphones, and the sound effect is equivalent to that of CD. In addition, you can connect an external decoder. Nowadays, many mobile phones can realize asynchronous usb external decoding and play high-quality digital master tapes such as DSD, and the sound quality has surpassed that of ordinary CD and vinyl. Playing HiF should also keep pace with the times. A 60-year-old friend has been playing with ore machines since childhood. Technology is improving. You must also keep pace with the times. You can't stand still. If you don't study and update your knowledge, you will get narrower and narrower, and the circle will become smaller and smaller. How good the technology is now! A small mobile phone B or notebook connected to a decoder can copy and kill the previous 10,000 yuan equipment, and a network disk can collect all the software in the world and dating software thousands of miles away. It can be said that fever has actually entered a broader new world.

Tell me my opinion:

No industry is static, and so is the audio industry.

What drives the industry change is the change of customer groups. Those enthusiasts who used to be the main body of the industry have entered middle age or even old age, and their consumption tends to be rational or even reduced or even stopped, which is not enough to support the continued development of an industry. The time when you can get a good return by selling only a few sets of sky-high-priced stereos a year has gradually drifted away.

Young people's demand for audio equipment has changed, and they no longer like products with calm appearance, huge volume and single function. Due to the accelerated pace of life and the pursuit of fashion, portable players, headphones, Bluetooth speakers, small computer speakers, multifunctional living room speakers and other products have gradually become the growth point of the industry. In fact, many innovative brands have already begun to explore in these areas.

The word hifi has gradually become a description of quality, and the meaning of representing a certain group has gradually faded. More people will use high-quality audio products and don't think they are enthusiasts, because in their minds, enthusiasts are their fathers and even grandfathers, which has become a memory and gradually becomes a part of history.

We will gradually accept the changes in the industry, and the technological progress will make the products we used slowly withdraw from the historical stage, such as bulky electron tubes or transistor power amplifiers, and replace them with digital power amplifiers with higher reduction, higher efficiency, lighter weight and energy saving. For example, optical media players (cd players) will be replaced by digital players with higher bit rates and so on. This does not mean that the unknown audio industry is declining, but there are many new things waiting for us to learn. If you have no mind to study any more, you can keep your happiness with antique equipment.

In the new year, I wish fans and young friends who like listening to songs have fun!

Family words are for reference only.

Text/talk about technology

Maybe many people still don't know what HIFI is. HIFI is the abbreviation of "High Fidelity" in English, which translates into high fidelity in Chinese, and it may still sound a little difficult to understand. Simply put, high fidelity means that a piece of music can be more truly restored when it is recorded. This is called HIFI. To put it bluntly, it is what it looks like when it is recorded and what it looks like when it is played.

In the mobile phone industry in previous years, HIFI, like taking photos now, is a very sought-after function. In the early years, almost all mainstream mobile phone manufacturers made HIFI mobile phones, such as VIVO, Meizu, Xiaomi, HTC and so on.

The most extreme and persistent brand on the HIFI track is VIVO.

VIVO Xplay 6, a mobile phone released by VIVO 2065 438+06, still stands at the top of the food chain of HIFI mobile phones after many years (a top-level ES9038 PRO decoding chip doesn't know how many friends who play HIFI are hooked).

Moreover, VIVO is still insisting on HIFI. For example, the latest iQOO 5 series and VIVO X50Pro+ are also equipped with independent decoding chips CS43 13 1. Even iQoneo 3, a cost-effective mobile phone, is equipped with an independent decoding chip with model AK4377A, which is really unique in today's mobile phone industry. It can be seen that VIVO is quite enthusiastic about HIFI.

Here I also briefly explain the functions of the independent decoding chip (also called HIFI chip).

Generally speaking, the processor of mobile phone will integrate DAC decoding chip, but due to the limitation of chip size and power consumption, the performance will not be particularly good, which is basically a sound level.

Independent decoding chip can bring more powerful signal-to-noise ratio, total harmonic distortion and decoding ability to some professional audio file formats. For example, the decoding chip CS43/KOOC-0/3/KOOC-0/carried by iQOO 5 can directly play the music in hardware-decoded DSD lossless format on the mobile phone (Flac and WAV are pediatrics in front of DSD, and DSD format is recognized as the most high-fidelity music format in the industry at present), while other mobile phones without independent decoding chips can't decode the music in this format, that is, they can't play it normally.

To sum up briefly, the independent HIFI chip can make your mobile phone output restore more real, more detailed music and better sound.

Speaking of this, some people will ask, since HIFI chips are so useful, why don't people from mobile phone manufacturers play this concept now? Let me briefly summarize:

The price of top DAC decoding chip is not much cheaper than that of mobile phone processor. Let's take the ES9038 Pro on the VIVO XPlay6 mentioned above as an example. Its cost price is as high as 300-400 yuan RMB, and the cost of a mid-range mobile phone processor is just this price.

Some people may still find it incredible. Let's give another example. Meizu released a decoding amplifier made of CS43/KOOC-0/3/KOOC-0/decoding chip this year (this type of decoding chip is used in two flagship chips of VIVO this year), and the price is/KOOC-0/69 yuan.

To tell the truth, the cost of this amplifier is basically concentrated on the DAC decoding chip CS43 13 1. According to the information of the supply chain, the cost price of this DAC decoding chip is about RMB in 70 yuan.

In contrast, the cost price of an excellent X-axis linear motor is only about 10 RMB, and the price of NFC chip is only about 1-2 RMB. And don't forget that DAC decoding chips need to be integrated on the motherboard, which will also put forward higher requirements for the stacking process of the motherboard.

According to the above, it can be seen that an excellent HIFI mobile phone can produce music with better sound quality, but the music played on the mobile phone can not be directly sent to people's ears, but needs headphones as a bridge of transmission (as for the speakers on the mobile phone, ignore them directly), and the quality of headphones can directly determine the effect of music playing.

Simply put, a good horse needs a good saddle. Only a good HIFI phone without a good headset can't give full play to the full strength of this phone. But good headphones can cost hundreds of thousands at a time. Many people are willing to spend money on mobile phones, but not many people are willing to work hard on headphones.

There is also the problem of sound source. In order to come up with good sound, lossless music is essential. The lowest sound source is Flac format, and the more professional one is DSD format, which is difficult to find, especially the latter. If you are not a music enthusiast, you can't find it at all.

On the other hand, the camera function of the mobile phone does not need so many conditions. For ordinary consumers, they just need to take out their mobile phones. Compared with HIFI, the difficulty of entry is n-level lower.

Because Bluetooth headset is wireless transmission, it is a loss of transmission protocol, so the decoding performance of the mobile phone itself is no matter how good, and the music format after Bluetooth transmission is basically worthless. Therefore, after the rise of Bluetooth headset, HIFI has become more and more lonely.

But then again, with the rise of Bluetooth technology and the improvement of transmission protocols, the sound quality of Bluetooth headsets is constantly improving, and consumers are willing to invest more money in Bluetooth headsets, so the future HIFI industry is expected to usher in a wave of recovery.

Generally speaking, the decline of HIFI has its historical inevitability, but with the continuous upgrading of Bluetooth technology, the future HIFI mobile phone is expected to usher in a wave of new life.

I am also a light hifi player myself. I mainly play some players and headphones, mainly portable, and have never played high-end speakers. Simply talking about the problem of mobile phone hifi is just my humble opinion.

First, the public demand for high sound quality. Mobile phones are popular products, unlike professional hifi players, which are only aimed at enthusiasts and customers who specialize in listening to songs. For most people, the cost of mobile phone hifi is unnecessary, and the sound quality of most mobile phones can meet the needs of most users.

Second, the collocation of headphones. Anyone who has played hifi knows that headphones are as important as the front-end playback equipment. Even in terms of sound quality improvement, headphones are more meaningful than the front end, and the investment in headphones will not be less than that in the front end. This seems a bit unacceptable to people who don't play hifi. Therefore, if a mobile phone is equipped with high-end hifi configuration such as decoding and power amplifier chips, the reasonable collocation of users must be to buy headphones with higher prices to enjoy the corresponding high-quality sound quality, otherwise ordinary headphones will become the bottleneck of sound quality, and most ordinary users will not be able to spend thousands of dollars on headphones.

Third, the prevalence of Bluetooth headsets. Now more and more mobile phone models cancel the 3.5 interface, allowing users to use Bluetooth headsets as listening devices. Bluetooth headset is convenient, but its disadvantage in sound quality is more obvious than wired headset. There is a great difference in sound quality between Bluetooth headsets and wired headsets at the same price, which makes it unlikely that users who are used to using Bluetooth headsets have too much demand for high sound quality.

I think the effect of the camera is too obvious. The goal of mobile photography is at least a digital camera, and the initial gap is really clear at a glance. Therefore, mobile phone photography has to be upgraded intensively, and the photography level of each family is mostly clear at a glance. The direct result of this is that the direction of our efforts is clear, and the progress of the effect is obvious, which is very easy to feedback and improve. With the improvement of mobile phone photography, SLR cameras have gradually become the target of catching up. But SLR cameras often have to go home for post-production to see the final film effect, while mobile phones are not so lucky. If you shoot, you have to see the result ... If it is not ideal, you can shoot again ... All photos are "shot and sold now", which makes the mobile phone camera have to evolve and iterate as soon as possible, otherwise it will be eliminated. In addition, compared with the insensitivity of sound quality differences, people's standards for measuring photo effects are the same. Good photos can basically be seen at a glance, there is no need to scrutinize them too carefully, and there is basically no big controversy.

On the other hand, the demand for HiFi phones is not so exaggerated. I remember that the level of playing mp3 music on the mobile phone is not equal to the mp3 when the camera of the mobile phone has 300,000 pixels. Compared with the difference of mobile phone playback effect, the influence of headphones seems to be greater. In addition, most people who listen to songs on their mobile phones basically listen to them on buses, subways and roads. The environment is noisy, and the requirements for sound quality are not so high. Few people use mobile phones as special equipment for listening to songs. Therefore, the improvement of the sound quality of music played by mobile phones is more like icing on the cake, which can be better improved and maintain the general level. This makes the original development momentum of HiFi mobile phone insufficient. However, if the improvement of the sound quality of mobile phones leads to the decline of other experiences, such as large size, heavy weight and short battery life, it is a very important indicator compared with mobile phones. It is easier for people to choose a mobile phone with adequate sound quality but better other indicators. After all, the mobile phone is not the main tool for listening to songs. If you want to listen to hi-fi sound effects, you still need to find a sound solution.

Compared with the fact that the mobile phone is not the main equipment of HiFi, the role of the mobile phone camera is increasingly irreplaceable. After all, it has gradually become a habit to go out and take photos with your mobile phone, so it is much more troublesome to bring a digital camera or a SLR camera. Therefore, the camera function of mobile phone is becoming more and more important, and it has even been upgraded to one of the main functions of mobile phone. Therefore, the research and development of mobile phones also have to take improving the camera level as the key point of performance competition. Over time, the level of mobile phone photography is getting better and better.

To sum up, the level of mobile phone cameras has advanced by leaps and bounds, mainly because the cameras are useful, and everyone is sensitive to the level of cameras and has high requirements. Listening to songs is an auxiliary function. Listening to songs with headphones is mostly noisy and insensitive to sound quality. Therefore, there will be no greater investment in mobile phone research and development. It is good that the sound quality of listening to songs on mobile phones is enough. People who pursue higher sound quality can achieve better sound effects with special sound in a better listening environment.

The strength of various functions on the mobile phone is not determined by the manufacturer's own intention, but is definitely determined according to the needs of users and market trends.

The camera function of mobile phones is constantly strengthening, but the performance of audio HiFi is getting less and less attention, which is obviously an objective reflection of the needs of mobile phone users. Users' demand for cameras is obviously higher than that of audio HiFi.

Why?

Where there is demand, there is a market. Why does everyone need the performance of mobile phone cameras? Today, with the widespread popularity of social networks, taking photos and videos are exactly what users need. Whether you are a photographer or not, it is a very popular way for ordinary mobile phone users to send pictures and short videos to other users while using social tools. It can be said that pictures and videos have become important social languages besides words. Shooting clearly and better has become a strong demand of almost all mobile phone users. This social demand has led to the continuous evolution and improvement of the camera function of mobile phones.

On the other hand, audio HiFi enhances the high-fidelity effect of mobile phone music playback, which seems to be a performance that many users strongly demand, but this demand group is very small. How many music lovers are there around you? How many deep fans are there? The mobile phone itself integrates the music playing function. For most users, a good earphone on the mobile phone can fully meet the needs of listening to music. What high frequency is clear as water, is the low frequency deep and elastic, and is the middle frequency solid? For most users, this will not be considered at all. Sounds good, it's the demand of the public. Only a small number of music enthusiasts will pay attention to such indicators.

In terms of camera performance, although mobile phones are constantly improving camera performance, the driving force of this development is social demand, not the pursuit of the ultimate image quality. Users who have professional requirements for image quality and control will still use professional cameras instead of mobile phones. It is precisely because audio HiFi does not have a huge number of just-needed users, and the sound quality of online audio is generally low, which makes mobile phone HiFi very tasteless.

Photography is a creative act. Even though taking photos on mobile phones looks unprofessional, users who are used to using mobile phones will still record their life fragments and some beautiful things with their mobile phone cameras. This is also a kind of light creative behavior. Creation can bring great satisfaction and self-motivation. Taking photos or videos can just bring such an experience, which makes mobile phone users more willing to shoot with their mobile phones, greatly improving their dependence on mobile phone photography performance.

However, listening to music is a completely passive appreciation behavior. Whether the music is good or not, whether the effect is what you want, is completely passive acceptance, and your will will will not have much influence on listening to the music itself, so this also makes the mobile phone HiFi not valued by most users.

Times have changed and technology has developed.

It's normal to have WIFI and abandon HIFI. For example, with a smart phone, the mobile phone of that year was eliminated.

Listening to digital music is too convenient, too cheap and rich in sound effects, which is absolutely incomparable to HIFI.

As for the mobile phone camera getting better and better, it is a technological development, which has nothing to do with HIFI. One is photoelectric technology, the other is electroacoustic technology.

Of course, if you are nostalgic, it is ok to play with HIFI, just like people are still playing with movie machines.

Why is the mobile phone camera getting better and better, while HiFi is drifting away?

I found something very strange. Nowadays, mobile phone manufacturers seem to be constantly improving the capabilities of mobile phone cameras. While improving the ability of mobile phone to take pictures, the HiFi we once knew is not valued by mobile phone manufacturers as before, which really makes us feel a little surprised!

Let's first analyze why people pay more attention to the camera ability of mobile phones now. In fact, in my opinion, a key factor is that consumers' pursuit of images is constantly improving, which makes many mobile phone manufacturers begin to pay attention to mobile phone photography.

Moreover, taking photos on mobile phones is a very obvious sign that can best reflect the performance of mobile phones. The strength of mobile phone photography? The ability to take pictures with a mobile phone? They will be very clear about us. Therefore, mobile phone manufacturers can really let us know more about the efforts of mobile phone manufacturers by taking photos with their mobile phones.

Of course, in fact, some mobile phone manufacturers are still insisting on HiFi sound quality. What I want to mention here is vivo. I believe that everyone should be familiar with vivo. Vivo is the earliest manufacturer of HiFi chips in China. The earliest mobile phone I used in vivo was vivo xPlay 6, which combined HiFi chip with mobile phone.

Vivo Xplay6 inherits the classic sound quality configuration of vivo. ESS new generation DAC decoder chip ES9038 (theoretical dynamic range reaches 129dB, distortion is-120dB) is used in the mobile phone, and this mobile phone is also equipped with three operational amplifiers OPA 1622. More importantly, this mobile phone realizes hardware decoding DSD format.

It can be said that after years of continuous development, vivo mobile phones have truly achieved the complementarity of HiFi chips, HiFi music and mobile phones, and indeed achieved a consumer's pursuit of mobile phone sound quality.

And it has not given up the requirement of HiFi sound quality. We see that many mobile phones are using this brand of HiFi sound quality.

For example, the mobile phone vivo X50 Pro that we know now uses the high-performance HiFi chip CS43/KOOC-0/3/KOOC-0/which can be decoded by an independent DAC, which makes the sampling rate of this mobile phone as high as 384kHz, the 32-bit accuracy as high as/KOOC-0/30 dB, and the total harmonic distortion+noise as low as-/KOOC-0/.

Of course, in addition to vivo's insistence on HiFi sound quality, I always think that domestic mobile phones are actually constantly improving their sound quality characteristics. For example, Xiaomi, Huawei, oppo, etc. They can take different forms. For example, Xiaomi 10 Extreme Edition, which is characterized by 12 16 superlinear dual speakers, makes the sound cavity as high as 1.2cc, thus improving the sound quality of the mobile phone.

So we can see that different mobile phones may improve their sound quality performance through different sound quality optimization. However, here we really want to express our admiration for vivo mobile phones. You can always use HiFi chips. This kind of experience, this kind of courage, is really rare in mobile phones.