[Nobody]

I just bought a Shuffle recently (it's the first mp3 player I've ever owned), and I'm kind of dissappointed in the sound quality. The music sounds kind of muffled, whereas music on my 10 year old Discman sounds noticeably "crisper".
Is my opinion in the minority? Or do flash music players generally have slightly inferior sound quality compared to portable cd players?

[BigFatDuck]

are you listening to the same files or are you listening to original cd's on the discman and compressed files of that cd on the shuffle?

[moose_n_squirrel]

Are you listening with the bundled earbuds? I don't like those. I use some cheap Sonys I already had and I like the sound better with those. Plugged into a stereo or into real headphones, it sounds great.
As for whether you are in the minority, here are some reviews.
CNet: "solid sound quality"
iPodlounge: "sounds great"
PC Magazine: "We did our usual critical listening through the supplied earbuds, our Sennheiser HD280 Pro headphones, and studio monitors. The shuffle had no sonic flaws that we could detect."
And BigFatDuck has a very good point. CD sound is full quality uncompressed. Flash player/iPod sound depends on what settings you had when you imported the songs. Low bit rate = low quality. High bit rate = better quality but needs more space per track. CD audio is 650MB per full CD, or only a few tracks on a shuffle, so compression and some quality loss is expected if you want to store many. But that's about the files, not the hardware. Give the hardware good quality files and good headphones and it should be stellar.

[Nobody]

Thanks for your responses. I'll give your suggestions a try.

[pdrayton]

Yeah, you might have your iTunes "Import" preferences set to something low-quality.
Make sure you're doing at least AAC at 128Kbps. That should sound great on your shuffle.

[Nobody]

You were right moose. I tried using my Discman earbuds and they sound alot better than the Apple earbuds.
Too bad apple doesn't sell higher quality headphones that "match" the shuffle (ie color, cord length). I noticed that apple, as well as sony, sell white headphones, but they are both the "in ear" style, which I do not want. Also, most earphones these days seem to have the "L-shaped" plug, rather than the straight plug, which is more ideal for the shuffle if you're using the lanyard.

[ej7865]

Greetings Everyone.
Have a new shuffle and the sound quality is more then adequete, but I found that the shuffle is not as loud as I would like it to be, I tried increasing the songs volume but that did not seem to work. Plus I've noticed that some song are louder then others, and also that some songs are not effected by adjusting the song's volume? Anyhow, noticed that increasing the bitrate on each song will help sound quality....how does one do this? Can it be done through itunes? And any one have suggestions for increasing the sound on the mp3s that I put on my shuffle..i.e. How do I make my shuffle louder.....
Thanks Your Help Would Be Greatly Appriciated.
EJurado

[Doug_G.]

I'm using Apple's In-Ear Headphones with my 512mb Shuffle. The sound is very good - these 'phones are much better than the standard earbuds that ship with iPods. Overall, I'm quite pleased. And the Shuffle's battery life is excellent...