[Ross]

I notice no hiss, noise or pops, although I rarely notice hiss generally.
 
I have done a little bit more listening to the Calyx M, and comparing it against the Hugo as well as the AK120, using my JH13 Pros. The Hugo is a little smoother, particularly with high frequencies and transients. But the Calyx M has a bolder sound, with more saturated tonal colours. The Hugo sounds tonally light by comparison. The slight grain I noticed earlier has already disappeared after a few hours of playing, and the sound is noticeably filling out and deepening. This player is already sounding great. Although it's rather larger than I would have liked, with 448gb capacity and excellent sound quality this could finally be the one single box player that does it all.

 

[Sauntere]

  I notice no hiss, noise or pops, although I rarely notice hiss generally.
 
I have done a little bit more listening to the Calyx M, and comparing it against the Hugo as well as the AK120, using my JH13 Pros. The Hugo is a little smoother, particularly with high frequencies and transients. But the Calyx M has a bolder sound, with more saturated tonal colours. The Hugo sounds tonally light by comparison. The slight grain I noticed earlier has already disappeared after a few hours of playing, and the sound is noticeably filling out and deepening. This player is already sounding great. Although it's rather larger than I would have liked, with 448gb capacity and excellent sound quality this could finally be the one single box player that does it all.

 
Hi Ross,
 
Have you heard the AK240 ? The guys at Addicted to Audio tell me it is the reference for portable players. When i asked them for advice on which player to buy if i wanted THE best performance with IEMs they were unequivocal in stating it was the AK240. They carry Hifiman players as well. What do you think ? Have you heard the Hifiman 901 or the AK 240 ? 
 
Cheers

 

[SilverEars]

Without. Didn't thought about testing it at max volume at silent track.

I don't get why that hissing problems with listed iems were brought into attention, I don't recall reading about hissing from people's impressions.

 

[Ross]

I haven't heard the AK240, and frankly it is more than I would ever pay for a purely portable device. I really like the A2A guys but they are of course interested in selling products, and the more expensive the better. So I would take what they say with a grain of salt. They may be right, I don't know, but we will need to wait for someone who has heard both players to comment.

 

[Ross]

Hmm, battery just died after maybe 2 or 3 hours of continuous use. This requires further testing
 
But just before it died, I was able to use it to run my Sennheiser HD600s to very satisfying levels. That is good news.

 

[AmberOzL]

3 hours of battery life? Pff..

 

[warrior1975]

3 hours... That's horrendous. Did you have display on full brightness? Also, did you use the display a lot? I'm praying you say yes otherwise 3 hours makes this device fairly useless.

 

[Solude]

  Hmm, battery just died after maybe 2 or 3 hours of continuous use.

 
Screen off the whole time?

 

[SilverEars]

  3 hours of battery life? Pff..

LOL, it has the same battery life as my old laptop.  Not sure even loading it with HD600 it should be that short.  Does it even have a high power output?  I guess if does HD600 justice, I probably does.

 

[cooperpwc]

Three hours is a massive concern but he just got it. It will be charged and used again - apparently care must be taken to ensure that it is actually fully charged - and we will see where we are. If it really is and remains three hours, the SQ had better be damn good. 

 

[pekingduck]

I think one of the Korean head-fi'ers mentioned that Calyx would fix the battery problem in the next firmware update.

 

[CraftyClown]

Ross could you try turning it on again next time the battery drains so quickly and see if it really is empty after all? I believe a previous poster mentioned the problem being with the battery indicator incorrectly reporting battery life much lower than it should be and switching off the device. Switching the device back on, showed it was not empty after all. Hopefully this is the case as it should be a simple bug to fix, as compared to genuinely bad battery life. 

 

[gracky]

  Hmm, battery just died after maybe 2 or 3 hours of continuous use. This requires further testing
 

 
If its firmware is 0.5, try turning it on again after auto turn off, it is possible about 30% of battery is remaining yet. -_-;;; Even with 0.6 getting the battery charged fully is tricky. Battery management is a problem yet.

 

[monkeygod]

  Hmm, battery just died after maybe 2 or 3 hours of continuous use. This requires further testing
 
But just before it died, I was able to use it to run my Sennheiser HD600s to very satisfying levels. That is good news.

Huh. that's odd - i haven't done a full stress test but with 80% 16/44 and 20% high res, I had enough juice for most of a days use. I would guesstimate somewhere between 5-7+ hours, as I still had juice after a short plane ride. This was with the 0.6 firmware and all files loaded onto memory cards.

 

[Ross]

When I restarted it did appear to be about 50% full. I've left it charging overnight so will test it some more today.