Is the return of wired headphones driven by a simple desire for better sound quality or is it part of a backlash against modern tech? Thomas Germain tries to find out.
I have the Innioasis Y1 which is regarded as a starter DAP. The Fiio Snow Sky Echo Mini is the go to DAP for new people. The HiBy R1 is high rated as well.
A lot of people will tell you “just use an old Android phone”, but am in the party that thinks having an app store takes away what a DAP delivers and that’s freedom FROM connectivity. No ads. No algorithms.
You don’t need to even have an appstore installed to make an old phone be a decent DAP. The real issue IMO is that while some of the older Android phones had some decent DACs, but they couldn’t power anything much more demanding than ear buds which any decent DAP can do just fine. Also a DAP battery will last many times longer.
Yeah, sometimes songs that I’ve labeled in MP3 tagger don’t show up with an artist. It’s just <UNKNOWN> but that’s only occasionally. I can fix it too. Turning it off can be a pain, you have to go through the menu to do it. Other than that it’s pretty easy. I put a theme on it that makes it looks like the iPod OS.
I grabbed an Echo Mini as others have mentioned. For the ~$50 or whatever it costs it does what I want. It’s small and weighs next to nothing. If your music library is gigantic you might need more than one micro sd card as it has a limit of 8,191 songs. If you’re one to constantly change your music the interface might not be the best. I mostly use it as background music while working on stuff. So shuffle suits me fine.
Any advice on what’s good?
I have the Innioasis Y1 which is regarded as a starter DAP. The Fiio Snow Sky Echo Mini is the go to DAP for new people. The HiBy R1 is high rated as well.
A lot of people will tell you “just use an old Android phone”, but am in the party that thinks having an app store takes away what a DAP delivers and that’s freedom FROM connectivity. No ads. No algorithms.
You don’t need to even have an appstore installed to make an old phone be a decent DAP. The real issue IMO is that while some of the older Android phones had some decent DACs, but they couldn’t power anything much more demanding than ear buds which any decent DAP can do just fine. Also a DAP battery will last many times longer.
Thanks! Both Snowsky Echo/Echo Mini and Innioasis Y1 are on my list of potential buys. Do you find any minor annoyances with it?
Yeah I want something dedicated to music, without anything else.
Yeah, sometimes songs that I’ve labeled in MP3 tagger don’t show up with an artist. It’s just <UNKNOWN> but that’s only occasionally. I can fix it too. Turning it off can be a pain, you have to go through the menu to do it. Other than that it’s pretty easy. I put a theme on it that makes it looks like the iPod OS.
I can attest to the Echo Mini. Most people will never need a better player in terms of sound quality.
How’s the music management? I heard it got some updates making it better to scroll bigger libraries lately
I grabbed an Echo Mini as others have mentioned. For the ~$50 or whatever it costs it does what I want. It’s small and weighs next to nothing. If your music library is gigantic you might need more than one micro sd card as it has a limit of 8,191 songs. If you’re one to constantly change your music the interface might not be the best. I mostly use it as background music while working on stuff. So shuffle suits me fine.