[SteffSergeant]

Miles away, for sure. The CA1000 is detailed, punchy and has a very good depth. But to me it sounds sometimes a bit metallic and lean. The N8ii has all the pros of the CA1000, but the timbre is a way more natural to me - not only in the tube mode, also in SS. Maybe I connect a tube amp to thicken the sound and make it a bit more rounded.

 

[gjustinfong]

Hows everyones experience of hooking up the CA 1000 to PC as a DAC?
I have a Topping EX5 DAC/AMP right now, contemplating selling it and using the CA 1000 as the main DAC/AMP for my PC.
However, I couldn't find a way to know the sampling frequency of the audio currently playing on my computer on the CA 1000.
Also, it is possible to charge while the CA 1000 is connected to the PC via the data cable? Or I need to connect another cable to the charge port as well?

 

[saudio7]

You have to use secend cable for charging and connect it to charging USB port.

 

[-kent-]

@JasonNYC - I actually have a few questions. I couldn't find any info anywhere, so you could help out

I was wondering if you could hook up an external HDD/SSD to the USB-C data port of the ACRO CA1000. "Data" could mean anything without a specification, so a direct info would help. The other thing is the ripping mode for CDs. I know A&K are selling their own drive to rip CDs, but can I use my own USB-C drive aswell? That option would skyrocket the ACRO CA1000 for me.

@Everyone else - I'm between the ACRO CA1000 and the SP2000T. I don't really need them outside of my home, so "portable" is only important inside my house. Has anyone compared these two? I really dig the tube idea, but it's not a deal breaker if I had to skip it. There doesn't seem to be any dock for the SP2000T though, which would come in handy for me.

 

[-kent-]

Anyway, in the end I bought the ACRO CA1000 and was able to test it out a few days.

There are a bunch of things I should tell you @JasonNYC - the player crashed several times with my SSD attached directly to the data port of the DAP. By crash I mean:

I went into the album view of the player, and the player stopped responding. After trying to scroll, it went into the korean "info page" - I can't really tell what it says since I can't read the language, but it's the exact same page you get when you try to enable the developer mode inside the player (touching the firmware version a bunch of times like in any other Android brings you to the same page) - there you see details like how much GB are free, what the MAC / IP is, the name of the Wifi Spot and so on.

I guess someone else had a similar issue if I remember correctly?
It looks like it loads too long, then freezes, then crashes.

The other thing is - I read the manual, and also of my other A&K player, but there is one icon missing in all of them and I have _no_ clue what it does. In artist view there is an emoji like icon in the upper right. It changes to a CD once touched. What does this do exactly? It sorts my artists in a weird way I can't really say. Like 1298 albums are suddenly in an "<unknown>" folder, even though I ripped all my CDs with as much info as possible.

Then two ideas. I don't know if you're also in contact with the OS team / Design team of the OS, but just as my two cents:

- Could you add an option to ignore "the" in the artist view?
- Could you add a letter scrolling to every list view? I mean when I fast scroll through some artists, it's nice to just see the letters in big in the middle of the screen instead of pinching my eyes to see the right letter... The iPod Classic did that pretty well. It was an awesome feature back in the day, something I really miss in my SR25 and the ACRO CA1000

That's all. Hope to hear from you soon!

 

[saudio7]

As far as I know software team is working to fix restart issue in Album view.

 

[-kent-]

That would be great, since it works flawless on my SR25. Speaking of the SR25, I still hope we get the Crossfeed from the ACRO. It's a really nice feature and something forgotten over the years.

 

[Cat Music]

@JasonNYC
Can the ACRO ca1000 be powered from an external source without having to use the built-in battery?
That is, once the charge cycles of the internal battery are exhausted, will this beauty stop working?

 

[-kent-]

Jason confirmed that a few pages down - yes, he said that all A&K players stop charging and use the external power instead

 

[JasonNYC]

Anyway, in the end I bought the ACRO CA1000 and was able to test it out a few days.

There are a bunch of things I should tell you @JasonNYC - the player crashed several times with my SSD attached directly to the data port of the DAP. By crash I mean:

I went into the album view of the player, and the player stopped responding. After trying to scroll, it went into the korean "info page" - I can't really tell what it says since I can't read the language, but it's the exact same page you get when you try to enable the developer mode inside the player (touching the firmware version a bunch of times like in any other Android brings you to the same page) - there you see details like how much GB are free, what the MAC / IP is, the name of the Wifi Spot and so on.

I guess someone else had a similar issue if I remember correctly?
It looks like it loads too long, then freezes, then crashes.

The other thing is - I read the manual, and also of my other A&K player, but there is one icon missing in all of them and I have _no_ clue what it does. In artist view there is an emoji like icon in the upper right. It changes to a CD once touched. What does this do exactly? It sorts my artists in a weird way I can't really say. Like 1298 albums are suddenly in an "<unknown>" folder, even though I ripped all my CDs with as much info as possible.

Then two ideas. I don't know if you're also in contact with the OS team / Design team of the OS, but just as my two cents:

- Could you add an option to ignore "the" in the artist view?
- Could you add a letter scrolling to every list view? I mean when I fast scroll through some artists, it's nice to just see the letters in big in the middle of the screen instead of pinching my eyes to see the right letter... The iPod Classic did that pretty well. It was an awesome feature back in the day, something I really miss in my SR25 and the ACRO CA1000

That's all. Hope to hear from you soon!

The CA1000 should read a portable HDD/SSD drive. I was having issues with the one I have also. I just pulled a new retail unit out of inventory and will do some additional testing with that. I will pass on your suggestions to the dev team.

 

[JasonNYC]

@JasonNYC
Can the ACRO ca1000 be powered from an external source without having to use the built-in battery?
That is, once the charge cycles of the internal battery are exhausted, will this beauty stop working?

Yes, as mentioned a few pages back, all AK devices, including the CA1000 will shut off charging to the battery once it is fully charged to prevent damage to the battery. There is no issue leaving the CA1000 plugged in all the time.

 

[saudio7]

Any indication on time when new firmware update will be available?

 

[-kent-]

@JasonNYC

I also found another inconvenience - having plugged in two headphones, the amp section of the output select (dropdown in the notification center of android) isn't responding. You can see which amp you selected, but you have to unplug a headphone to be able to select the amp again. It feels though it was ment to remember the amp output of the headphone port (?)

I used the two unbalanced ports for the test.

And thank you for letting the dev team know. I would be extremely happy for those changes

I also have some other ideas. Like remembering where you were in the album view, when you click on an album and then go back, that the player remembers your position

 

[kel77]

The other thing is - I read the manual, and also of my other A&K player, but there is one icon missing in all of them and I have _no_ clue what it does. In artist view there is an emoji like icon in the upper right. It changes to a CD once touched. What does this do exactly? It sorts my artists in a weird way I can't really say. Like 1298 albums are suddenly in an "<unknown>" folder, even though I ripped all my CDs with as much info as possible.

This changes between Artists and Album Artists.

 

[JasonNYC]

@JasonNYC

I also found another inconvenience - having plugged in two headphones, the amp section of the output select (dropdown in the notification center of android) isn't responding. You can see which amp you selected, but you have to unplug a headphone to be able to select the amp again. It feels though it was ment to remember the amp output of the headphone port (?)

I used the two unbalanced ports for the test.

And thank you for letting the dev team know. I would be extremely happy for those changes

I also have some other ideas. Like remembering where you were in the album view, when you click on an album and then go back, that the player remembers your position

Are you referring to the screen below? If so, I am able to adjust amp level without issue while having multiple headphones in any of the headphone jacks.