taym, many CD player manufactuers (and radio) "enhance" the audio by bumping up the bass and treble to make it sound fuller. For a portable player like the Karma, I would suspect this would be very common. Since the 3.0alphas are from the Karma code, I would suspect this the reason. I bet the "better" audio is "less pure" from a flat frequency response stand point, but like people say "flat isn't always better to the ear". Personally, I'd probably welcome this because the empeg has sometimes seemed a little "dull" sounding to me, but that's likely because I've been conditioned to like audio that has been modified a bit.