[originalsnuffy]

Can you please list all these "urgent issues"? .... BUT, can you please list urgent firmware issue that preventing anybody from using this DAP? I would like to confirm them with my unit.

Twister: I am very glad you are not having any major issues with the unit. I wish you good listening. When it is stable this is a very fine machine.

Many others of us are in fact experiencing issues; some minor and some severe. As noted, a quick review of the last few pages will show plenty of issues that have been noted. I have had most of the issues stated by mrphoebs and a few more.

The unit is not stable when transferring files, and I have experienced the unit not being able to recognize music on cards at all. It freezes when playing music in the special Cayin mode that turns off all other apps.

Fortunately, I have communicated that I have had issues with my dealer (vendor) and they have agreed to extend a return window so I can wait for the new firmware and test it out. Maybe this is a good time for a positive shout out to Andrew of Musictech.

I want Cayin to sort things out. I really want to keep the unit if at all possible. However, if I did not know a new firmware was around the corner, I would likely return the unit. And by the way, I am not a "buy and return" kind of person. I want our vendors to do well; both manufacturers and dealers. I totally support these kinds of businesses.

 

[twister6]

Issues I Encountered
- USB-C to mini-usb to chord mojo not working(noise/ crackling)
- Volume randomly changing without touching the volume wheel
- Tracks pausing randomly and only continuing when unlocking the screen
- Current track randomly stops playing when putting the screen to sleep and the current song is replaced by default cayin track
- EQ suckage
- Player failing to scan SD cards forcing me to use folder mode
- Even when it did scan the album logic was messed up (what comprises an album, including clubbing songs from other albums)

If you want to see others encountering issues, maybe scroll up through the thread.

As I've said before, I love how the dap sounds and I understand cayin are working to fix the issue (and I expect them to)

The truth of it, which is evident from a cursory look through the thread is what we got was not what was advertised or expected for our purchase. (A refined product on release)

For Chord Mojo pair-up, Cayin recommends CS-40TC35 cable (under $20).

With usb-c to micro/mini usb, it's a hit or miss, for usb-c to micro-usb I recommend Shanling L2 cable, very high quality for $25. I had a number of other ebay cables, only L2 works reliably when I connect N5ii to HA-2.

EQ implementation, album display logic, etc. - that's Hiby firmware, kind of a copy'n'paste between Cayin, Shanling, Hidizs, and other DAPs which all use the same "code" blocks. Or who knows, maybe some new issue. Keep in mind, Hiby is writing firmware, and as you have seen they released their own DAP so I'm sure software resources are shared and prioritized. I'm actually surprised a new fw update is coming for Cayin that soon.

Btw, I did see Cayin default track loaded after restart, yeah, it gets annoying.

I don't know how many Chi-fi DAPs you have owned before, but hardly nobody will have a finalized firmware in the first few months, unless you have a dedicated sw/fw team and deep pockets like A&K or Sony. And considering they all (Cayin, Shanling, Hidizs, Questyle, older FiiO, and new Hiby) have to wait in queue when Hiby software group going to update their firmware because these companies design hardware, not write their own fw - I would say N5ii was pretty damn usable after the X-mas update of fw2.1en.

 

[originalsnuffy]

Twister; like I said its great that everything works well for you. Not for all of us, however. Nuff said.

 

[twister6]

Twister; like I said its great that everything works well for you. Not for all of us, however. Nuff said.

Bro, I'm not a power user, I'm power reviewer, and my focus is usually on sound analysis, pair up, playback (I play through folders, no fancy sorting), stability of different connections, etc. I wasn't being sarcastic or condescending when I posted my original reply. I was honestly asking about the issues, and just because I don't see it, doesn't mean they don't exists because I can't test everything and I truly appreciate others feedback. You know what I mean. So, I was curious about it, and the post I replied to sounded like N5ii is a POS brick which doesn't work and needs an "urgent firmware update". To my surprise, I had a few people (potential buyers) ping me about it after reading this thread, asking how bad N5ii really is, and I was honestly surprised, thought maybe they are talking about AP200

 

[mrphoebs]

For Chord Mojo pair-up, Cayin recommends CS-40TC35 cable (under $20).

With usb-c to micro/mini usb, it's a hit or miss, for usb-c to micro-usb I recommend Shanling L2 cable, very high quality for $25. I had a number of other ebay cables, only L2 works reliably when I connect N5ii to HA-2.

EQ implementation, album display logic, etc. - that's Hiby firmware, kind of a copy'n'paste between Cayin, Shanling, Hidizs, and other DAPs which all use the same "code" blocks. Or who knows, maybe some new issue. Keep in mind, Hiby is writing firmware, and as you have seen they released their own DAP so I'm sure software resources are shared and prioritized. I'm actually surprised a new fw update is coming for Cayin that soon.

Btw, I did see Cayin default track loaded after restart, yeah, it gets annoying.

I don't know how many Chi-fi DAPs you have owned before, but hardly nobody will have a finalized firmware in the first few months, unless you have a dedicated sw/fw team and deep pockets like A&K or Sony. And considering they all (Cayin, Shanling, Hidizs, Questyle, older FiiO, and new Hiby) have to wait in queue when Hiby software group going to update their firmware because these companies design hardware, not write their own fw - I would say N5ii was pretty damn usable after the X-mas update of fw2.1en.

I agree that cayin is not alone in releasing pre-betaish products, I can also appreciate that there a lot of moving parts. But a tacit expectation that buying a dap below 600$ comes with flawed software is ridiculous.

I don't blame the companies for this, companies will do what they can get away with, in pursuit of profits.

I blame the reviewers who haven't taken these companies and their products to task (unless they only review the sound of the DAPs) and fail to educate consumers of their shortcomings.
I also blame consumers who hype up these products while downplaying their flaws as if the rest of us need to get with the program.

It's our job as consumers and reviewers to make sure the companies don't get complacent with this culture of releasing half baked products.

So reviewers please call a spade a spade, If you are reviewing sound make sure your rating reflects that you are only rating sound.

The N5II had/has the potential to be a great value DAP, hopefully this gets fulfilled with quick firmware releases.

@twister6 I am not directing the above statement at you (I've read a lot of your informative reviews in the past to my benefit and pleasure)

PS: My usb-c to mini-usb cable works fine with my phones, don't understand why a specific cable is required, but I can understand that it's the one you've listened to and it works (thanks for the recommendation)

 

[twister6]

I agree that cayin is not alone in releasing pre-betaish products, I can also appreciate that there a lot of moving parts. But a tacit expectation that buying a dap below 600$ comes with flawed software is ridiculous.

I don't blame the companies for this, companies will do what they can get away with, in pursuit of profits.

I blame the reviewers who haven't taken these companies and their products to task (unless they only review the sound of the DAPs) and fail to educate consumers of their shortcomings.
I also blame consumers who hype up these products while downplaying their flaws as if the rest of us need to get with the program.

It's our job as consumers and reviewers to make sure the companies don't get complacent with this culture of releasing half baked products.

So reviewers please call a spade a spade, If you are reviewing sound make sure your rating reflects that you are only rating sound.

The N5II had/has the potential to be a great value DAP, hopefully this gets fulfilled with quick firmware releases.

@twister6 I am not directing the above statement at you (I've read a lot of your informative reviews in the past to my benefit and pleasure)

PS: My usb-c to mini-usb cable works fine with my phones, don't understand why a specific cable is required, but I can understand that it's the one you've listened to and it works (thanks for the recommendation)

Anybody who buys a product based on a single review or a few impressions in the thread is not doing their homework. And even a comprehensive review is just one data point which doesn't paint the whole picture because often a reviewer can't test every single feature, has different preferences and priorities, and doesn't spend as much time with a unit as a consumer who uses it exclusively many hours a day, every day. Thus a complete review picture is a combination of all of these bits'n'pieces across different reviews, impressions, including a forum rant (that's important too!!!). I do appreciate your and others feedback - I will try to be more clear in my write up to point out what is a description of the product vs what I have actually tested.

Btw, I wasn't downplaying fw issues in my replies yesterday, and I did say what I have tested and that I'm satisfied with it for what and how I use it. But in no way am I downplaying the fw bugs others encountered. Just that I have been through so many DAPs, my threashold is different I have AP200 on my desk which doesn't connect to WiFi, plays music yes, but I can't connect to wifi, can't access google play, can't test apps. That's a real problem in my book with a release which still on fw 0.2.2 beta. N5ii doesn't offer a full android experience, it's a "secondary" thing in its functionality, but I was able to sign in to my googe account, go to Play store, download Spotify, and was streaming audio within minutes.

I'm not affiliated with Cayin, and it doesn't matter if you buy or don't buy this DAP. My point for those who are interested in this DAP that yes, there are fw bugs, just like with any DAP release, and I'm not downplaying it just because I didn't encounter those due to a nature of what I have tested. And yes, it requires fw update to fix those bugs, and I'm glad Cayin reading this thread closely (Andy is one of a kind) and reports all these bugs to Hiby which suppose to update the fw. But at the same time, I haven't come across any "urgent" showstoppers which disable the playback or the functionality of this DAP

Let's hope the next fw release will bring it closer to perfection!

 

[mrphoebs]

Anybody who buys a product based on a single review or a few impressions in the thread is not doing their homework. And even a comprehensive review is just one data point which doesn't paint the whole picture because often a reviewer can't test every single feature, has different preferences and priorities, and doesn't spend as much time with a unit as a consumer who uses it exclusively many hours a day, every day. Thus a complete review picture is a combination of all of these bits'n'pieces across different reviews, impressions, including a forum rant (that's important too!!!). I do appreciate your and others feedback - I will try to be more clear in my write up to point out what is a description of the product vs what I have actually tested.

Btw, I wasn't downplaying fw issues in my replies yesterday, and I did say what I have tested and that I'm satisfied with it for what and how I use it. But in no way am I downplaying the fw bugs others encountered. Just that I have been through so many DAPs, my threashold is different I have AP200 on my desk which doesn't connect to WiFi, plays music yes, but I can't connect to wifi, can't access google play, can't test apps. That's a real problem in my book with a release which still on fw 0.2.2 beta. N5ii doesn't offer a full android experience, it's a "secondary" thing in its functionality, but I was able to sign in to my googe account, go to Play store, download Spotify, and was streaming audio within minutes.

I'm not affiliated with Cayin, and it doesn't matter if you buy or don't buy this DAP. My point for those who are interested in this DAP that yes, there are fw bugs, just like with any DAP release, and I'm not downplaying it just because I didn't encounter those due to a nature of what I have tested. And yes, it requires fw update to fix those bugs, and I'm glad Cayin reading this thread closely (Andy is one of a kind) and reports all these bugs to Hiby which suppose to update the fw. But at the same time, I haven't come across any "urgent" showstoppers which disable the playback or the functionality of this DAP

Let's hope the next fw release will bring it closer to perfection!

Agreed, and I don't regret buying the N5II, it's hit the sweet-spot of my most desired features (Massive storage, Decent Sound, No Hiss, Low Impedance, Good Battery Life, value for price). I'll join you in hoping fw updates will fix the flaws.

 

[Terthna]

Agreed, and I don't regret buying the N5II, it's hit the sweet-spot of my most desired features (Massive storage, Decent Sound, No Hiss, Low Impedance, Good Battery Life, value for price). I'll join you in hoping fw updates will fix the flaws.

I just hope they can take care of all the truly dire issues soon, so that they can move on to the "quality of life" stuff; like giving us more ability to customize the interface (as pretty much anything other than folder browsing is practically useless at the moment).

 

[Andykong]

Is anyone else observing significant battery drain when the player is off.

After charging the player to 100% and leaving it off for a day it's down to the low 60% and in a couple of days it's down to 16%ish.

Did you charge your N5ii at power off?

This is a silly mistakes of ours. The player remains in standby mode after you disconnect it from the USB charger. We have corrected this in the next firmware update.

 

[mrphoebs]

Did you charge your N5ii at power off?

This is a silly mistakes of ours. The player remains in standby mode after you disconnect it from the USB charger. We have corrected this in the next firmware update.

Yes, I think this is what happened, glad to hear abt the fix, thanks for the update @Andykong

 

[twister6]

I just hope they can take care of all the truly dire issues soon, so that they can move on to the "quality of life" stuff; like giving us more ability to customize the interface (as pretty much anything other than folder browsing is practically useless at the moment).

Interface as in GUI or are you talking about some other "interface"?

I typically use folder view as my default because I have a ton of loose songs and about half a dozen of albums (including compilations), not everything properly tagged, but when I click on Album all of them show up as a separate thumb with corresponding embedded artwork and number of tracks in the album; while single songs show up as 1-track album, and the rest is under Unknown. Clicking on Artist brings up a list with every artist, and when you click on it - shows separate songs and albums under that artist. Clicking on Genres, bring up thumbs with common genres (most of mine under pop and dance and classic). Clicking on Tracks brings all the songs in alphanumeric order. Running on fw2.1en, all test tracks on internal memory. When I refer to "everything else" useless, it's because folder browsing makes sense in my situation, but based on what I have described above, firmware seems to sort everything out according to ID3 tags of the song. Again, I'm not sure what am I missing and pard my ignorance since I don't usually sort by artists/albums/genres, just use folder browsing. Please let me know what is "practically useless" at the moment, because I don't want to mislead my readers saying it works for me, unless you're being sarcastic and pulling my leg

 

[Andykong]

Issues I Encountered
- USB-C to mini-usb to chord mojo not working(noise/ crackling)
- Volume randomly changing without touching the volume wheel
- Tracks pausing randomly and only continuing when unlocking the screen
- Current track randomly stops playing when putting the screen to sleep and the current song is replaced by default cayin track
- EQ suckage
- Player failing to scan SD cards forcing me to use folder mode
- Even when it did scan the album logic was messed up (what comprises an album, including clubbing songs from other albums)

If you want to see others encountering issues, maybe scroll up through the thread.

As I've said before, I love how the dap sounds and I understand cayin are working to fix the issue (and I expect them to)

The truth of it, which is evident from a cursory look through the thread is what we got was not what was advertised or expected for our purchase. (A refined product on release)

We apologize for all the inconvenient caused to N5ii usres. Please wait for a few days and checked out the new firmware because we have attended to some of the problems on this list.

The USB Audio problem will not be addressed in the coming firmware update. We started to work this out, but not yet solving the problem completely, We have to defer this solution for next firmware update.

The volume bug is a random issue, not everyone is having it, it just happened on some player under certain condition, we have spend a lot of resource trying to resolve this bug, we have identified several conditions and triggers and solved them already, we can't be 100% sure that we have removed all the potential cause of this bug, but the new firmware will dramatically reduce the frequency of this bug. We'll continue to work on this in next firmware cycle.

The music scanning issue related to small music files in a large library, the heavy indexing process will jam the data bus that controlled the TF cards and OTG storage and push the MCU utilization to very high suddenly, if user continue their operates on the DAP when the while the MCU is fully occupied, the device sill behave abnormally. The problem is less likely to happen if you are using one TF card only, but will be happened frequently when you are using wo TF cards or TF card + OTG storage. Once we have identify the problem, the solution is actually fairly straight forward, so this issue will be resolved in next firmware update.

Please do not assume that Cayin has deliberate roll out half-cooked products because of these bugs. A lot of the bugs require a very large testing sample to bring them to surface, but once they have been identified, the solution can be as simple as a few command lines in less than an hour of coding, there is no way we won't work on these bugs if we knew they were there in our product. Lets take the three bugs I mentioned above as example, only the USB Audio bug is a structural issue (i.e., everyone will run into the problem when they tried this feature), the other two bugs are "randomly appeared" as only some users are running into these issues. We have definitely tested the volume control and music scanning feature during our in-house development and Beta-test with selected users (we have appointed 10 beta testers before the product launch), but we couldn't catch these bugs at that time. These bugs started to showed up after our user based has grown to a substantially large sample. However, as I have mentioned previously, there can be multiple conditions or triggers to these fairly random issues, so even we have resolved some of them already, we still can't be 100% sure that every triggers have been removed completely.

 

[griff06]

We apologize for all the inconvenient caused to N5ii usres. Please wait for a few days and checked out the new firmware because we have attended to some of the problems on this list.

The USB Audio problem will not be addressed in the coming firmware update. We started to work this out, but not yet solving the problem completely, We have to defer this solution for next firmware update.

The volume bug is a random issue, not everyone is having it, it just happened on some player under certain condition, we have spend a lot of resource trying to resolve this bug, we have identified several conditions and triggers and solved them already, we can't be 100% sure that we have removed all the potential cause of this bug, but the new firmware will dramatically reduce the frequency of this bug. We'll continue to work on this in next firmware cycle.

The music scanning issue related to small music files in a large library, the heavy indexing process will jam the data bus that controlled the TF cards and OTG storage and push the MCU utilization to very high suddenly, if user continue their operates on the DAP when the while the MCU is fully occupied, the device sill behave abnormally. The problem is less likely to happen if you are using one TF card only, but will be happened frequently when you are using wo TF cards or TF card + OTG storage. Once we have identify the problem, the solution is actually fairly straight forward, so this issue will be resolved in next firmware update.

Please do not assume that Cayin has deliberate roll out half-cooked products because of these bugs. A lot of the bugs require a very large testing sample to bring them to surface, but once they have been identified, the solution can be as simple as a few command lines in less than an hour of coding, there is no way we won't work on these bugs if we knew they were there in our product. Lets take the three bugs I mentioned above as example, only the USB Audio bug is a structural issue (i.e., everyone will run into the problem when they tried this feature), the other two bugs are "randomly appeared" as only some users are running into these issues. We have definitely tested the volume control and music scanning feature during our in-house development and Beta-test with selected users (we have appointed 10 beta testers before the product launch), but we couldn't catch these bugs at that time. These bugs started to showed up after our user based has grown to a substantially large sample. However, as I have mentioned previously, there can be multiple conditions or triggers to these fairly random issues, so even we have resolved some of them already, we still can't be 100% sure that every triggers have been removed completely.

I love you.

 

[CongoFather]

If only every test engineer of Cayin were at least as dedicated as you are. Then a structural bug like USB-AUDIO would have never occured as it would have been easily detected during the functional test or UAT phase.
You are always positive and helpful. I still think the problems may be solved soon if you follow these problems so closely.. Thank you

We apologize for all the inconvenient caused to N5ii usres. Please wait for a few days and checked out the new firmware because we have attended to some of the problems on this list.

The USB Audio problem will not be addressed in the coming firmware update. We started to work this out, but not yet solving the problem completely, We have to defer this solution for next firmware update.

The volume bug is a random issue, not everyone is having it, it just happened on some player under certain condition, we have spend a lot of resource trying to resolve this bug, we have identified several conditions and triggers and solved them already, we can't be 100% sure that we have removed all the potential cause of this bug, but the new firmware will dramatically reduce the frequency of this bug. We'll continue to work on this in next firmware cycle.

The music scanning issue related to small music files in a large library, the heavy indexing process will jam the data bus that controlled the TF cards and OTG storage and push the MCU utilization to very high suddenly, if user continue their operates on the DAP when the while the MCU is fully occupied, the device sill behave abnormally. The problem is less likely to happen if you are using one TF card only, but will be happened frequently when you are using wo TF cards or TF card + OTG storage. Once we have identify the problem, the solution is actually fairly straight forward, so this issue will be resolved in next firmware update.

Please do not assume that Cayin has deliberate roll out half-cooked products because of these bugs. A lot of the bugs require a very large testing sample to bring them to surface, but once they have been identified, the solution can be as simple as a few command lines in less than an hour of coding, there is no way we won't work on these bugs if we knew they were there in our product. Lets take the three bugs I mentioned above as example, only the USB Audio bug is a structural issue (i.e., everyone will run into the problem when they tried this feature), the other two bugs are "randomly appeared" as only some users are running into these issues. We have definitely tested the volume control and music scanning feature during our in-house development and Beta-test with selected users (we have appointed 10 beta testers before the product launch), but we couldn't catch these bugs at that time. These bugs started to showed up after our user based has grown to a substantially large sample. However, as I have mentioned previously, there can be multiple conditions or triggers to these fairly random issues, so even we have resolved some of them already, we still can't be 100% sure that every triggers have been removed completely.

 

[Terthna]

Interface as in GUI or are you talking about some other "interface"?

I typically use folder view as my default because I have a ton of loose songs and about half a dozen of albums (including compilations), not everything properly tagged, but when I click on Album all of them show up as a separate thumb with corresponding embedded artwork and number of tracks in the album; while single songs show up as 1-track album, and the rest is under Unknown. Clicking on Artist brings up a list with every artist, and when you click on it - shows separate songs and albums under that artist. Clicking on Genres, bring up thumbs with common genres (most of mine under pop and dance and classic). Clicking on Tracks brings all the songs in alphanumeric order. Running on fw2.1en, all test tracks on internal memory. When I refer to "everything else" useless, it's because folder browsing makes sense in my situation, but based on what I have described above, firmware seems to sort everything out according to ID3 tags of the song. Again, I'm not sure what am I missing and pard my ignorance since I don't usually sort by artists/albums/genres, just use folder browsing. Please let me know what is "practically useless" at the moment, because I don't want to mislead my readers saying it works for me, unless you're being sarcastic and pulling my leg

Yes I mean the GUI. When I say "practically useless", I mean useless in a practical sense; in other words, using folder browsing is just more practical. Album and Artist browsing isn't that bad, it's just annoying trying to get the letter skipping to work properly. Genre browsing, however? I'm sorry, but the generic ones that are locked to the top of the list just irritates my OCD something fierce; half of them don't have any songs listed under them, and they likely never will, as I try to label things with their proper genre (seriously, what the heck am I supposed to categorize as "vocal"?). Also, for some reason, it dosen't seem to want to recognize the songs I've actually labeled under "blues", and just repeats it under "other genre". Don't even get me started on how it jumps immediately to an alphabetical list of all tracks within a particular genre, instead of just giving you a list of artists, then a list of albums for said artist, and then a list of tracks for said album, sorted by track number (I can almost see why they did it, as it does make it easier if all you want is to listen to all the music within a particular genre, but that's not how I want to use it). All of which adds up to me being especially aggravated; because up until I got this thing, Genre browsing was my preferred method to peruse my library of music.