CharlyBrown
1000+ Head-Fier
That's because you have DAR enabled.Just tried. Using Tidal and it shows "blue".
Astell&Kern A&ultima SP3000
- Thread starter JasonNYC
- Start date
A&K is quite lucky this thing is a top-tier player sound wise and for local files. They have dropped the ball on it otherwise.
I agree! If the SP3000 didn't sound so damn good and if I could find a (for me) comparable DAP, I would switch immediately due to the very poor support.
Honestly A&K, you just can't do that, not in general and let alone for a flagship worth 4200€. You have to do something!
Have you read all the horror stories about their customer service? I mean, it's disappointing but not surprising. I regret not getting a Cayin.
Let’s not sound overly dramatic. If you have bought an A&K product you would know that software updates only bring extremely incremental improvements.
Luckily, the things I care about: sound quality, Roon endpoint support and Roon Arc are all in place.
It seems other features/improvements depend on a bunch of people that develop at a very slow pace and not necessarily in sync with requests made on Headfi.
@JasonNYC it would be good to communicate this to devs; other companies are quite a bit more forthcoming what is on the roadmap and what updates actually fix/change- just an idea for ya
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I just don't understand how a hold button for the physical buttons is not present. Absolutely baffling. My CD walkman in 1999 had one.
I usually put together a summary list once a month of all the previous requests that I sent to the team. Will be doing that in the next few days. A bit behind due to the Thanksgiving holiday here in the US last week.
I didn't see the change log for the latest update. I do know there was at least 1 new feature - support for Gboard for additional keyboard language and layout support. App versions on download tab should have also been updated. For the embedded Tidal app, Tidal only recently provided thr SDK for manufacturers with embedded Tidal apps to support Tidal FLAC lossless. I will confirm the ETA in that. I did see UAPP just added it to their app in the release that is on my Android phone yesterday. As far as I know, they are the only ones to update their custom app with Tidal FLAC support so far.
There were also a number or bug fixes. Not sure why the Gboard was not listed out as a new feature. I have not had a chance to download it yet on my SP3000.
To be honest, I can't confirm that. On the contrary, at least as far as the EU / Germany is concerned, customer service has been excellent. I had to have my first SP3000 exchanged because it was defective.
I also had very good experiences with Cayin here. On the other hand, I would advise you to take a look at the N30LE thread. You'll find that quite a few units are faulty for various reasons or that the software keeps having bugs. I would therefore rather not buy the N30LE.
Thank you very much for this answer. Transparency: That's enough for me to be content!
OT
Just for correct information: it is true that initially there were customers who had hiss problems with their N30LE, however Cayin quickly intervened, recalibrating the bias and sending the units back to their owners.
For a week, I have an N3OLE AP edition, and I have no hardware/software problems. And the sound performance of this DAP is out of category, especially in tube mode
End OT
It would also be good to have a guide on how to install Gboard. Had no idea that is coming (curious to know what the use case for this is- searching for songs in Tidal/Qobuz?).
At any rate, glad to have you on here. Hopefully some of the big issues people are having start getting addressed in earnest.
Big issues? I am really curious about what "big" issues folks are facing. Installing GBoard, Hold Button, LED color around the volume knob, FLAC support(I have no idea, don't use Tidal). Issues and features are two different things.
If you bought the unit without doing your research that's on you. There has never been an option to render the buttons dead, only the wheel lock. Poor customer service, you would have known that before purchase as well.
I am not saying these aren't important things to the person posting them. I would never buy a unit waiting for an update or a feature add that was never promised in the first place.
About Cayin...there are other issues folks are having. I have been following the thread since the beginning. Cayin did step in and intervene on a issue with hissing as they should have on their 5000-6000 DAP. I have no doubt it is a good sounding unit. I would love to hear it and whether I can afford it or not I will wait until someone maybe needs a car or another big purchase and then buy their used unit.
If you bought the unit without doing your research that's on you. There has never been an option to render the buttons dead, only the wheel lock. Poor customer service, you would have known that before purchase as well.
I am not saying these aren't important things to the person posting them. I would never buy a unit waiting for an update or a feature add that was never promised in the first place.
About Cayin...there are other issues folks are having. I have been following the thread since the beginning. Cayin did step in and intervene on a issue with hissing as they should have on their 5000-6000 DAP. I have no doubt it is a good sounding unit. I would love to hear it and whether I can afford it or not I will wait until someone maybe needs a car or another big purchase and then buy their used unit.
As far as I'm concerned, I'm very happy with the SP3000. The only thing I'm missing is FLAC support for Tidal. The LED color is related to this: it has nothing to do with the color itself, but with the audio quality; by keeping the color red, there is obviously no support for FLAC +16bit. So that's the issue: a worse audio quality since the FLAC support. Tidal is an essential app for such a device, it has to work properly.
I was a Tidal user for many years, switched to Qobuz. I never used the baked in Tidal version on the AK and always sideloaded the APK. I never paid attention to the sound quality limitations. I understand that the color is related to the quality of the music. I am not debating that this is important to you, and have no horse in the AK race, I am only seeing very dramatic reactions for features, not issues with the sound, such as hissing, clicks and pops etc. and all of the other things you have seen in the Cayin thread, as I see you there as well.
Let me add, there are things on my wish list too. Things I was aware of before I bought the unit.
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