Apple’s iDevices have a lot going for them, not least convenience but when it comes to sound quality it’s a different matter thanks to Apple’s use of DACs - Digital to Analogue Converters - that at best can only be described as adequate. A cheap and nasty DAC can result in a shallow, brittle and generally tiresome sound. A good DAC can have the opposite effect, making even a grotty 128k lossless audio file sound almost CD-like.