ACTIVO P1 Digital Audio Player - Coming Soon

[Coastal Bluff]

If the device does not have a feature it was advertised with, you can ask your money back, there is no need to sell it. You're making a loss doing that.

Yes it was advertised here on Head-Fi as being able to play Tidal offline from SD card.

As my device is already 8 months old, my retailer is not going to give me a refund. I can’t see Activo refunding me either.

Dual-band Wi-Fi and Google Play Store support allow users to download and install the most popular music streaming apps and easily stream their favorite music. With 64GB of internal memory and support for microSD cards up to 1.5TB, you have plenty of space to store music you own or download tracks from streaming services to listen to in offline mode.

Yes, you would need to download and install the Tidal app from the Google Play Store on the P1. Offline mode is fully supported in the app and you can choose to save offline tracks to internal memory or microSD card.

 

[Vamp898]

Yes it was advertised here on Head-Fi as being able to play Tidal offline from SD card.

As my device is already 8 months old, my retailer is not going to give me a refund. I can’t see Activo refunding me either.

Why not? This is false advertisement.

But A&K already fixed that and is going to release an update soon. I would give them the chance to do that first. If there is an defect in the product, the maker (by law) has a chance to fix that first and they are doing it right now.

I would not sell it yet, give them at least the chance to fix it with the next update and if it still doesn't work, its time to have some serious talk.

There have been much bigger issues with other makers and their DAPs, even with the Walkman. There are no perfect DAPs, just look into the iBasso Threads or others, how many issues they have.

I know that doesn't help you, but not being able to use Tidal Offline is, in the DAP World, a very small problem and if they really fix it, it was worth the wait imho

 

[XTF1]

But from an professional reviewer, i expect that they tell me what sounds objectively better and not what the reviewer might personally liked

That is not going to happen! That’ll be the apocalyptic end for most “professional reviewers”, Head-Fi as we know it, and a lot of bankrupted OEMs…
I personally accept that most of this hobby is entirely perception-based, so completely subjective and that these threads can go on forever !!!

“Long-live Head-Fi and the subjective reviewers !!!”

 

[Coastal Bluff]

Why not? This is false advertisement.

But A&K already fixed that and is going to release an update soon. I would give them the chance to do that first. If there is an defect in the product, the maker (by law) has a chance to fix that first and they are doing it right now.

I would not sell it yet, give them at least the chance to fix it with the next update and if it still doesn't work, its time to have some serious talk.

There have been much bigger issues with other makers and their DAPs, even with the Walkman. There are no perfect DAPs, just look into the iBasso Threads or others, how many issues they have.

I know that doesn't help you, but not being able to use Tidal Offline is, in the DAP World, a very small problem and if they really fix it, it was worth the wait imho

I haven’t seen anything yet that says the new firmware update will fix the Tidal offline issue. I hope it does, but it doesn’t look very promising to me.

I appreciate that in the DAP world, Tidal offline may be a very small problem, but for me, 99% of my music listening is through Tidal and I travel a lot. The only reason I bought the P1 was for Tidal offline playback. It is really disappointing for me that it does not work as advertised.

 

[Vamp898]

I haven’t seen anything yet that says the new firmware update will fix the Tidal offline issue. I hope it does, but it doesn’t look very promising to me.

I appreciate that in the DAP world, Tidal offline may be a very small problem, but for me, 99% of my music listening is through Tidal and I travel a lot. The only reason I bought the P1 was for Tidal offline playback. It is really disappointing for me that it does not work as advertised.

I think it was said earlier in this thread. The update is already finished and they are working on pushing them to the OTA Servers (which caused complains why they do not release it as an file so people can update manually which i understand, but i also understand why they don't want to do that)

 

[mechHead631]

That is very common with almost all DAP (the CS43131 especially struggles with that).

Its not that big of a problem because it is very rare to have an low ohm receiver that needs a lot of power but yes, if you go below 32 Ω, with most amps, power goes down and THD+N goes up.

It is actually beneficial as you can listen at higher volumes (as you have less voltage) and so you have a lower THD+N at listening volume than you would have with the actual voltage. As most amps are absolutely overpowered, most people will have pretty bad THD+N when listening to music at listening level. Its a worrying trend but numbers on paper do sell. People rather buy 12 Vrms Amp and listen at 10% volume at bad performance than buy a 2 Vrms Amp and listen at 70% volume at excellent performance (random numbers for the sake of explanation) because the 2Vrms ""Doesn't have enough power©®™"

I've seen so many threads here where people buy several thousand $ DAC with excellent THD+N, SNR and so on and then destroy it by plugging an overly powered amp behind it that forces them to listen at so small levels, that often R/L are no longer properly balanced anymore... its just hilarious.

But with 70 Ω for the LCD-2C, that does not matter at all

Update: Got the P1 yesterday and tried it with my LCD-2C. To be very honest, I hear no difference at all in sound when I change from FiiO KA15 to P1. The form factor, UI and UI responsiveness is great! I used the balanced port with LCD-2C and I never went beyond 90-95 volume out of 150 volume steps. Works great for me!
Only things that I don't like about it is that the audio jacks are located on top and no dedicated track change buttons. I prefer audio jackson on bottom side.
But overall a solid DAP for the price! Fulfills my needs and requirements easily!

 

[Nipper Reed]

I will never understand why a manufacturer puts the audio jacks on top.

 

[rosiedog]

I will never understand why a manufacturer puts the audio jacks on top.

I prefer the jacks on top. I listen while walking so having the jack on top is mandatory for me. It's meant to be portable after all.

 

[Vamp898]

I prefer the jacks on top. I listen while walking so having the jack on top is mandatory for me. It's meant to be portable after all.

I do not care as i put the thing in my pocket anyway and i put it the way in, that the cable sticks out^^ no matter which direction that might be.

But i prefer on top

 

[mikaik]

I do not care as i put the thing in my pocket anyway and i put it the way in, that the cable sticks out^^ no matter which direction that might be.

But i prefer on top

Same here. It doesn't matter which way it goes in my pocket. For desk listening though, I prefer to have them on top. This way I can use a stand, with the DAP on one side, amp on the other, the cables sticking out at the bottom would make it impossible.

 

[JasonNYC]

Next P1 firmware update is scheduled for the last week of June. This will fix the Tidal offline issue, along with several other issues. I will have more details as it gets closer to release.

 

[fish1050]

Next P1 firmware update is scheduled for the last week of June. This will fix the Tidal offline issue, along with several other issues. I will have more details as it gets closer to release.

Wow so just in time for the 1 year anniversary of the release of this DAP. Nice to see Activo is really on the ball with firmware updates . So glad I waited for the M21 which I have been enjoying greatly for a couple of weeks now. I do hope for the sake of all you patient owners the wait will be worth it.

 

[Vamp898]

Wow so just in time for the 1 year anniversary of the release of this DAP. Nice to see Activo is really on the ball with firmware updates . So glad I waited for the M21 which I have been enjoying greatly for a couple of weeks now. I do hope for the sake of all you patient owners the wait will be worth it.

For people using 3.5mm (aka everyone with IEM) it will be worth the wait. -139db Crosstalk on the P1 vs. -74db on the M21 (which is pretty bad, every 50$ Dongle i can think of has better cross talk. My DAWN PRO has -110db) and 25% longer battery life. On 4.4mm it has 109db Crosstalk (So it has worse crosstalk on 4.4mm than the P1 on 3.5mm which is ridiculous as 4.4mm should have zero crosstalk, this shows they used very cheap parts in the M21)

Beside the fact that a lot of people don't use Tidal to begin with, so the issue didn't affect everyone to begin with. I think after the MQA scam, that they don't show you the price to their plans upfront and region lock which keeps you from listening to a lot of international songs, a lot of people lost interest in Tidal

 

[nioh]

I will never understand why a manufacturer puts the audio jacks on top.

I will never understand why they put it at the bottom.

This is a personal preference and it’s different for everyone

 

[stersa]

I love My P1..Here with the awesome Penon Archangel..really great combo

Best Regards

Sisco