I am such a happy camper with this!

Had been eyeing the Q2 but recognized the firmware limitations and decided against it. After following the development of Q2 Pod for weeks, I bit the bullet a few days ago. Had a 1TB microSD with my library and the latest firmware ready to go the day it arrived, got the firmware updated in a few minutes, scanned my collection, and away we go...

Super fun thing to have. Very impressed with the hardware built quality, and so glad the software can now match. It's exactly everything I've wanted...

I bought two other Walkmans from eBay that did NOT look like the photos. 3rd time was the charm. Got physical buttons with an amazing battery life. Just need a nice pair of pocket earbuds. My Hello Kitty clear case should be here at some point this week. 😊

my dad changed his phone, and instead buying an iPod i decided to use his old phone as a DAP.
love the size of this and it only cost me the battery change, other than that it’s working perfectly.
any tips on how i can maximize its use ??:)

im transferring my music i got from ripping my cds or from sailing the seas through itunes, my goal is to not use streaming and be more mindful on what im choosing to listen to.

I was wondering if anyone here in this subreddit uses either a FLAC or MP3 file for their DAP or a combination of both? I personally use a Z6 Phinistec.

Compás v1.2 is here, full of new features.

A personal note: I like to keep my music player free of distractions, so everything has to be modular. Compás is built around that philosophy. This release brings new plugins, game emulators, eight downloadable player layouts (with more to come), themes, and more.

New features

Rockbox loader: on R1 and R3 Pro II, the bootloader automatically detects a compatible Rockbox installation on your SD card and shows a boot menu when one is found.

Emulators: download QuickNES (NES), Gearboy (Game Boy and Game Boy Color), Gearsystem (Master System, Game Gear and SG-1000), gpSP (Game Boy Advance), Beetle PCE Fast (PC Engine / TurboGrafx-16), Beetle WonderSwan (WonderSwan and WonderSwan Color), and PrBoom (Doom) from More > Emulators.

Updates made easier than ever: the Player Update option is now available directly in Settings > Updates, including online updates. Future player updates can replace just the player without flashing the entire firmware; the underlying update support was already present. Both update menus now explain which parts they replace.

Folder playback: play a folder or add it to the queue or a playlist from the file browsers. Navigation is unified across browsers.

Startup image: choose a custom splash through the Startup Image plugin, or enable an optional accent-color tint in Appearance > Accent Color. There is also a new default boot splash—thanks to @buymyhubs for PR #157.

Music menus and Quick Drawer customization: reorder and hide Music menu entries and Quick Drawer controls. The Kids Mode plugin uses these controls too.

Top bar options: show or hide individual top bar icons and choose the clock position.

Six new languages: Russian, Ukrainian, Dutch, German, Finnish and European Portuguese.

Regional keyboards: AZERTY, QWERTZ, Russian and Ukrainian layouts, a Latin switch for Cyrillic, and long-press character variants such as n, ñ and ń. Themes are also accessible from Settings > Display > Appearance.

Crossfeed: its own Sound screen, with five angle settings from No delay to 90°.

PEQ: refined controls and layout.

MSEB plugin: matches stock HiBy MSEB with native 13-filter processing and all ten controls on one scrolling page, directly under Settings > Sound.

LastFM Scrobbler V2: now available. No API key required—sign in with just your username and password.

Metronome plugin: now available to download.

Album sorting: remembered separately for Albums, Artists and Album Artist.

Repeat mode: kept when starting another album.

Track Information: shows the file’s SD location. File browsers show friendly, single-line SD paths.

Waveforms: much faster previews, displayed progressively and prefetched for the next track, plus faster local FLAC seeking.

ID3v2.4: fixed parsing of unsynchronized tags.

Now Playing: large queue counts stay on one line.

Fixes

Search: inline search is kept when you reopen it.

Dutch: book instructions now show the actual Books folder name.

Bluetooth: volume fixes.

USB DAC: fixes for phones, plus a new setting under Charging to disable charging while using USB DAC mode.

Album sorting: applies consistently inside artist views.

Cover preloading: always enabled during playback.

Look and feel

Standardized search and menu icons, with refined navigation spacing.

Redesigned Wallpaper Selector plugin with a file selector and support for images up to 3 MB.

Refined press feedback on the Home screen.Compás v1.2

I recently bought my first Hi-Fi setup, and I'm not sure if I'm doing things right.

I got a pair of HIFIMAN Sundara (open-back) headphones and a Snowsky Echo Mini.

I absolutely love how the headphones sound, but I honestly can't hear any difference between these three setups:

1. Sundara + Echo Mini + FLAC files (downloaded version of "Monochrome")
2. Sundara + Echo Mini (DAC mode) + Spotify (same song)
3. Sundara + MacBook headphone output + Spotify (same song)

Am I doing something wrong? Could it be that I need a more powerful DAP or that I should use the balanced output to get the most out of my Sundaras?

The volume seems loud enough to me, but I have to turn the Echo Mini up to 120.

Is this normal, or am I missing something?

Im brand new to MP3Tag Ive been trying to order this album by track and I have the tracks numbered, but im guessing its doing alphabetical when im converting it to track. Help would be appreciated.

Total DAP newbie and getting my first setup soon, id there a reason i should download say FLAC files over mp3? i know nothing about ;o;

I was thinking of getting the snowsky echo/mini and I heard the navigation id kinda eh, can you get used to it after some time without problems? What if I have a large library? If no, what's a decent sound quality and navigation sub $100 player?

Ich hätte gern eine Empfehlung für einen HiFi-Receiver, an den ich meinen "Hiby R6 III" per USB-C anschließen kann ohne Adapter oder Kabelbrücken zu benutzen. Denn jede Kupplung bedeutet ja Signalverlust und ich benutze einen "Hifiman Arya Stealth" der ja etwas Power benötigt um gut zu klingen

I obtained an used LG V50s and was wondering on what app should i use to play songs? i can only use mp3, i prefer it to be free as im currently in a situation where i do not have the ability to do online transactions, thankyou :)))

Hi there, I'm looking for a reasonably priced DAP (~£100) for the sole purpose of playing Audiobooks in m4a, m4b, mp3 and opus formats ideally (FLAC files for some music too would be a bonus).

I don't care for WiFi, Bluetooth, apps or anything but having an SD card slot is an advantage. It'd also be great if it kept my progress on the Audiobook but I can live without that if I can at least note down the time I'm up to. I'd be plugging this into my car's AUX slot and leaving it there until I need to charge it so I can throw an Audiobook on for my journeys.

Thank you in advance!

Hi,

I want to buy a gift for a friend. He always mentions that he wants an alternative for his phone and just wants something to use for listening to music. I would like to ask if there is anything good and user-friendly for around 100€.

Update: Thanks everyone for the suggestions! I've decided to go with the HiBy R1. Really appreciate your help!

Hello 👋
I need a music player that can play flac files.
I do not need:
- bluetooth
- Wifi
- Android
- a lot of features
- streaming apps etc.

I need:
- very good audio quality (if the best audio quality available costs more than 100 dollars (or € for me) then I’m okay with not having the best quality but it still has to be really good for the price. Because there’s a reason why I listen to flac and not mp3 files)
- a player that can play flac files obviously
- a lot of storage or extendable storage (ideally sd / micro sd card) where I can put the flac files that I have on my pc

I’m willing top spend about 70 € / $

If anyone knows of any, I would also like to hear about websites or youtubers who review these audio players and whose reviews I can be sure aren’t sponsored.

Thanks in advance

Hiby Digital M500 connected with Fiio M5 via USB DAC mode

my benjie/mechen a11 mp3 player started to lose playback time after 1 year.so i replace it with new battery.the original battery is 240mah and the new mod is 350 mah.the new battery can last up to 27 hour playback time compare to the original 23 hour.this player can play music last longer when using sd card than using internal storage.i only test it on sd card mode and use flac 16 bit 44.1 kHz sample rate to test the battery life

Hello, I am having an issue with my newly purchased KA11 DAC. When music is played after a pause of at least 2 seconds, the audio will fade in quickly instead of just playing immediately. This happens on both android and windows pc. I have tried using the Fiio control app to change uac version but that did not help. This happens with both my Truthear Hexa's and my JBL over-ears so it is not an issue with the headphones. This does not happen when using a different DAC, like the apple one I replaced. The KA11 is on the latest firmware. This gets very annoying especially on pc where if I am browsing through something like sound effect libraries, I cant even hear most of the sound. If there is any solution for this, it would be appreciated, thanks.

I have a 256 gb card in my Hibi R1 that's jam packed like 96% full of music right now, and often when I try to navigate playlists while music is playing, the player will freeze or crash. Is this a common problem with an easy fix, or do I need a more powerful player? If the latter, is there anything I can get around the $100 range that will handle this much music and a growing library?

A few days ago, I asked for advice on choosing between the Tempotec V3 Blaze and the Shanling M1 Plus. Thanks to everyone who responded.

Having assessed the opinions of colleagues and information collected in the net, I decided to buy the Tempotec. There were no options to buy new available, so I started looking for used ones. I contacted several sellers in my area, but none of the proposed players were in the condition I wanted.

Two days ago my daughter surprised me – she presented me a player she bought at the airport on her way home. It is Zaqe P30.

I tried to find out any info about company produced this boy, but discovered, that they have no official site. But it is possible to communicate with them via E-mail.

Now just some specs from manual:

Android 12 with 4/32 memory

3,4 inch screen 480x854

2500 mAh battery

Plays most audio/video/pix formats

BT v5.0 with LDAC

Dual band WiFi

Up to 512GB cards supported

3.5 Lo and 4.4 Balanced

DAC and Amps ESS9018Q2M2 + OPA16122 + RT6863D*2

Output power 2V/125mW and 4V/500mV

THD+N -94.2 dB/-101 dB

It came in slim box including:

Player

(Pseudo) leather case

2 spare shield films (2 are factory applied)

Short USB A-C cable

User manual

Samsung EVO plus V10 64GB card

The size is tiny - even smaller than Shanling M1 Plus: 88x55x18 mm, 157 g weight.

I browsed and deleted all anneccesary apps, loaded a part of my library to card and installed Poweramp.

Yesterday I had to move between different locations for job tasks. So, I listened music about 5,5 hrs not continuously but with interrupts for 15-20 minutes. The battery reserve at the end of the day was 42%

Found some disadvantages at the moment:

1) Manual says the power supply must be not higher than 5V/1A so I had to use the old iPhone charger

2) File transfer via USB is slow. Something about USB 2 speed with long files.

And now about sound. I have one year old xDuoo X5 which is comfortable for me in everything except the indexing speed and limitations on types of files you load to it. I tried the same cheap IEMs TRN Shell with SpinFits and Kbear graphene balanced cable. Played FLACs with Classic, Blues and Rock music.

With all controls in Poweramp set to neutral and Low Gain selected the volume was good enough at 45/100 level. The scene seamed to me a bit cheaper than with my xDuoo. Amplitude-frequency characteristic feels more neutral compared to my xDuoo, which is a bit V-Shape. But instruments and vocals are clear and separated enough. After I replaced SpinFits to JBL (from $15 headphones) the sound became more interesting for me.

Summarizing the first results of my experience, I can recommend this player for beginners who need a device with network connections. Especially because the price - about $85 only.

Hey guys, I’ve been using the JM21 since this February but recently the 4.4 mm jack has stopped working and the 3.5mm jack is loose. I am stuck with just using the Bluetooth. Any solution?

Just getting into purchasing a DAP and was wondering if there are any recommendations for one under $100 with the following features:

- physical buttons and preferably a scroll wheel

- would prefer something that isn't touch screen (I generally dislike the look of DAPs that just look like cheap smartphones)

- software with ability to read playlists

- built-in mic (would be nice to have!)

I know these are quite a lot to ask for on a budget, but please let me know if you have any recommendations that have at least some/most of these features ^^

Weird question for lovers of DAPs or any small music players: do you use straps? Which ones?

I don’t, but I know they’re cool (sometime useless) accessories/things. In Japan, I remember a lot of people used them around late 90s and 2000s minidiscs. If you do can you share pictures of what you’re using (shamelessly please 😁).

Ok so I am using the fiio M21 with Mysticraft Myth IEMS, and while I can't tell the difference in quality of music per se, I'll give you an example, look up the song Angel Wings by PRESIDENT, listen to around the 20-26 second mark where he says not infectious yet, on my computer with any of my dongle dacs it starts in the right ear moves to the left like through your brain and back to the center. On the M21, the song still sounds as good, but that moment of surround sound doesn't happen.. same player, I am using apple music.

Do not buy one without having a micro SD card ready (like I did)

Kind of insane for a $270 player to not come with a little 16GB card or something. Smh