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FiiO E7 Review
First Impressions: Gosh it looks really pretty. Hmm I can see this plastic faced front with a neon sign begging to get scratched which saddens me a little. It would be a shame to mar such a pretty little thing. It’s a lot lighter than I somehow expected it to be. The metal construction seems like it should be more weighty but it feels feather light. I really like the rubber suit for it too, so snug fitting and even has dimples for the buttons, yey for FiiO thinking ahead about this. I’m not however so sure about the little furry baggy mostly because I can’t see me ever wanting to use it but it would save that “scratch me please” front. I like it, it’s a nice little bundle. Oh and I love that the amp displays “BYE BYE” when you turn it off. More importantly of course that means you can turn it off (I’m looking at you Nu Force.)
Lows: The bass here is of a pretty decent quality. It’s pretty neutral not adding or subtracting any from what the iPod is putting out. It’s nice but nothing special. What is special is being a FiiO it naturally can boost that bass should you like and it has not, not 2 but 3 bass boost levels. Now do forgive me if I’m mistaken but can any other amp do that? I don’t know of one. Now I’m not usually one for bass boost but something’s really do benefit from it like the RE-0 and Ety ER4. In my head the RE-0 and E7 are a natural combination and the bass boost set at 3 really makes a difference to them. It’s a significant boost and still retaining the RE-0’s stupidly good levels of clarity. This is the combo they were intended for and it works damn well. I also love the idea that the variable bass boost could be gradually levelled down over time so budding audiophiles can be eased off their bass junkie status.
With the bass boost going the quality is still good and naturally it’s better than the E5 but it’s not entirely perfect. It can be a little monotone and at full whack the additional bass can just sound out of place. However that can easily be fixed by knocking the bass boost down a level or two. I feel like I should be coming up with more complaints but the biggest I can come up with is that the E5 isn’t that for behind the E7 in bass clarity. The E7 does though have much greater authority and fullness. Compared to the Icon Mobile, the icon is cleaner and tighter but it’s to the point of feeling thin. The E7 has a great full richness to the lows where the Icon Mobile is a much dryer sound. I’m not really going to say one is better as the Icon goes superbly well with bass heavy things like the IE7 or 8. On something like the RE-0 it feels thin and reserved on the lows. The versatility the E7 gives in the bass boost options really does give it the edge.
Mids: Rich. In one ward the vocals here feel rich and full to the extent maybe too rich and full. The 5G ipod is a warm source and the E7 is a warm amp and if you combine that with something that naturally tends to the rich and liquid mids like the PL-50 it creates a bit too liquid a sound. Not that it’s in anyway an unpleasant sound just very rich. On pairing this amp of with other warm sounding IEM’s there is a tendency towards making things too warm. Here the coolness of the Icon finds many a better match. On cooler sounding IEM’s the E7 and a hint of liquidy goodness and for the RE-0 makes that bit more organic and natural sounding. It really does work well so very well pairing those two up. I did test the E7 out with the cool mid’ed C751 but it really didn’t work out. Not one tiny bit in fact. The warmer and more bassy sound of the E7 when combined with the huge bass of the Denon just made for a ridiculous bass monster. Which highlighted just how recessed the C751’s mids are. The Icon tamed that bass and pulled the mids forward balancing them out, the E7 pushed them utterly in the opposite direction.
Once more with when the E7 is paired up with the RE-0 it just works so very, very well. Beverly Craven (who’s voice I adore above pretty much every other singer out there) just sounds spectacular.
Highs: Here a have a little mixed feelings. On one hand the highs are sharp, crisp and edgy which many want and will adore but I can’t ignore that I think they are too crisp and edgy. There is an element of artificiality about them that I don’t really like so much. Of course many will know I’m not fan of treble that behaves in the tiniest bit unruly. The treble is just too edgy, vastly better than that on the E5 of course but head to head with the Icon it falls short. The Icon has finesse and can convey a delicacy that the E7 doesn’t. On the E7 it’s here slapped down right in front of you. That said there isn’t an upsetting abundance of it, the quantity is pretty much in line with the mids and the bass. Even though the Icon has the better treble it’s a bright amp and paired with something like the RE-0 it’s just too much.
All that said, the treble isn’t a bother and in testing out different IEM’s that very crisp edginess does work quite well. It makes cymbals clearly stand out sharp and clean. They don’t really shimmer like I may want them to but it’s really the only thing I feel the Icon clearly wins at. Which is odd since the treble is too abundant on the Icon.
Screen: I really quite like the little screen but it seems odd it doesn’t switch off after a short while; this will over time murder the OLED pixels so seems an odd thing to do. (so shiny the camera focused on its own reflection)
UI: Well the UI is pretty basic stuff but it all works and is pretty obvious to use. That is how a UI ought to be so well done FiiO.
Power: I know there have been reports of the E7 not being quite able to provide the volume that some want and all I can say is What!!!!! Are you deaf!!!! Having the E7 power my HD600 (300Ω) I get to about 40 out of 60 before thinking erm no that’s getting too loud to listen to. Loud to the point of unpleasantly loud. If anyone is using more then I can only assume you actually are legally deaf and so do need things blasting at you to hear them or you soon will be. Currently I’m using a set of UE Super.fi 5 and the volume is at 5 and I’m perfectly happy with the volume.
Transparency: The E7 is a more closed in intimate sounding amp than it is open and airy. For me this pretty much goes hand in hand with its rich, liquid sound. If you’re looking for air and space no prizes for guessing where that can be better found. A/B ing the two of them I cannot say one is better than the other it has far more to do with the style and presentation you prefer, what suits that song and what pars better with your chosen headphone.
DAC: Testing the DAC section itself is impossible but you can gauge an idea of whether the DAC is of a worse quality than the amplifier is. The E7 DAC is lauded as being the Wolfson WM8740. I have no doubts many of you have come across the name Wolfson and the reverence with which it is often spoken of. Round Head-Fi Wolfson and its chips get great praise (and gets often beaten up for being cheapskates and no longer using them.) The thing is I can’t say I’m hearing the DAC stand out and it makes me suspect the amp is holding it back. Normally there would be no way to tell but FiiO has a dock on the bottom of the E7. This is designed to be paired up the FiiO E9 which will be small desktop amp and when connected together will use the DAC in the E7. Clearly FiiO think the DAC they have used can do even better with a bigger and better amp and I’d love to see just what it can do.
Comparing to the Dac in the Icon, I feel the amp of the Icon is a little held back by its DAC, the lovely Wolfson one in the iPod 5G pairs much better with its amp than its own DAC does. This leads me to conclude the DAC in the E7 is the better of the two. Should I get an E9 I’m sure it would confirm my suspicions.
Value: Pretty fantastic value. The E7 for all intents sits in a market position that it really doesn’t have much in the way of competition. Its main rivals are the E5 and the Icon Mobile. Clearly it’s a big step up on the E5 but not as much as one might have hoped for, that says more about what a little marvel that the E5 is than anything bad about the E7. Right now the E7 is available anywhere in the world for US$80 and that certainly can’t be said for the Icon Mobile. If I wanted to go buy it a can but the cheapest I can see it for in the UK is £115. Even at today’s terrible exchange rates Google tells me that’s US$183!!! As you can see there is a little price discrepancy there.
Edit: AMP3 (http://www.advancedmp3players.co.uk/shop/Headphones.6/FiiO.406/5510017/FiiO_E7_USB_DAC_and_Headphone_Amplifier.4495.html ) are now selling them in the UK for £65, its nice to see there things available localy and naturally will have ever so much quicker shipping.
If you’re American things get much more equal and accordingly the E7 isn’t such a comparative bargain. You need to look whether it’s more suited to what you’re after acoustically and in versatility.
Conclusion: I like the E7. I don’t like it as much as I thought I was going to but I suspect that because the E5 set the price to awesomeness ratio so very high. So why should you buy the E7 over the E5? The most blatant reason is the DAC. The E5 has none and I don’t know about your laptops but many have utterly crappy headphone out’s. Plugging in the E7 makes all that horror go away at a stroke and that there is worth the extra US$60. The sound quality over all is a clear step up on the E5 too with the treble in particular being improved. The E7 also gives you a hugely versatile bass boost that is actually a lot of fun. With the E5 it was on or off but with the E7 you can graduate it in much finer steps and that’s something i really very much like. Even with my XM5 it has a great bass boost but it’s either on or off, the E7 can have just a little boost if you like and that’s truly a step forward i believe. The E7 just gets a lot of those little things done well.
As a package the E7 is quite lovely, that little silicon jacket fits it just so perfectly and as cases go is about perfect. The options the E7 present is likewise great, the ability to plug it into an E9 and transform it into a desktop amp is something noting else offers as far as I know. The fact that it has an off button (oh hell yes I’m looking at you Nu Force) and that it also has a sleep timer on it. While it’s not something I do but many like to go to bed with headphones on and this means you can amp them too and not wake to a dead battery.
The only niggles I have with the E7 is that the screen and whole face while pretty is begging to be scratched. You know it’s only matter of time before you will spoil its looks. The other is that the sound quality isn’t all that i hoped it would be. While it’s very nice and represents good if not great value it isn’t making me go “WOW” like the E5 at its teeny tiny price did. When it comes to pure musical fidelity and finesse the Icon Mobile does have the edge but it lacks in that it has no bass boost and is just too darn bright for many. The E7 represents a more balanced and gently warmed sound that either works for you or it doesn’t.
As I have mentioned the E7’s natural pairing is with the RE-0 and based on that combo, both at US$80 each makes for a pretty unbeatable sound for the money. The 0 with its neutral / bright sound and the E7 with its warm hint and that variable bass boost button is pretty much a match made in acoustic heaven.
First Impressions: Gosh it looks really pretty. Hmm I can see this plastic faced front with a neon sign begging to get scratched which saddens me a little. It would be a shame to mar such a pretty little thing. It’s a lot lighter than I somehow expected it to be. The metal construction seems like it should be more weighty but it feels feather light. I really like the rubber suit for it too, so snug fitting and even has dimples for the buttons, yey for FiiO thinking ahead about this. I’m not however so sure about the little furry baggy mostly because I can’t see me ever wanting to use it but it would save that “scratch me please” front. I like it, it’s a nice little bundle. Oh and I love that the amp displays “BYE BYE” when you turn it off. More importantly of course that means you can turn it off (I’m looking at you Nu Force.)
Lows: The bass here is of a pretty decent quality. It’s pretty neutral not adding or subtracting any from what the iPod is putting out. It’s nice but nothing special. What is special is being a FiiO it naturally can boost that bass should you like and it has not, not 2 but 3 bass boost levels. Now do forgive me if I’m mistaken but can any other amp do that? I don’t know of one. Now I’m not usually one for bass boost but something’s really do benefit from it like the RE-0 and Ety ER4. In my head the RE-0 and E7 are a natural combination and the bass boost set at 3 really makes a difference to them. It’s a significant boost and still retaining the RE-0’s stupidly good levels of clarity. This is the combo they were intended for and it works damn well. I also love the idea that the variable bass boost could be gradually levelled down over time so budding audiophiles can be eased off their bass junkie status.
With the bass boost going the quality is still good and naturally it’s better than the E5 but it’s not entirely perfect. It can be a little monotone and at full whack the additional bass can just sound out of place. However that can easily be fixed by knocking the bass boost down a level or two. I feel like I should be coming up with more complaints but the biggest I can come up with is that the E5 isn’t that for behind the E7 in bass clarity. The E7 does though have much greater authority and fullness. Compared to the Icon Mobile, the icon is cleaner and tighter but it’s to the point of feeling thin. The E7 has a great full richness to the lows where the Icon Mobile is a much dryer sound. I’m not really going to say one is better as the Icon goes superbly well with bass heavy things like the IE7 or 8. On something like the RE-0 it feels thin and reserved on the lows. The versatility the E7 gives in the bass boost options really does give it the edge.
Mids: Rich. In one ward the vocals here feel rich and full to the extent maybe too rich and full. The 5G ipod is a warm source and the E7 is a warm amp and if you combine that with something that naturally tends to the rich and liquid mids like the PL-50 it creates a bit too liquid a sound. Not that it’s in anyway an unpleasant sound just very rich. On pairing this amp of with other warm sounding IEM’s there is a tendency towards making things too warm. Here the coolness of the Icon finds many a better match. On cooler sounding IEM’s the E7 and a hint of liquidy goodness and for the RE-0 makes that bit more organic and natural sounding. It really does work well so very well pairing those two up. I did test the E7 out with the cool mid’ed C751 but it really didn’t work out. Not one tiny bit in fact. The warmer and more bassy sound of the E7 when combined with the huge bass of the Denon just made for a ridiculous bass monster. Which highlighted just how recessed the C751’s mids are. The Icon tamed that bass and pulled the mids forward balancing them out, the E7 pushed them utterly in the opposite direction.
Once more with when the E7 is paired up with the RE-0 it just works so very, very well. Beverly Craven (who’s voice I adore above pretty much every other singer out there) just sounds spectacular.
Highs: Here a have a little mixed feelings. On one hand the highs are sharp, crisp and edgy which many want and will adore but I can’t ignore that I think they are too crisp and edgy. There is an element of artificiality about them that I don’t really like so much. Of course many will know I’m not fan of treble that behaves in the tiniest bit unruly. The treble is just too edgy, vastly better than that on the E5 of course but head to head with the Icon it falls short. The Icon has finesse and can convey a delicacy that the E7 doesn’t. On the E7 it’s here slapped down right in front of you. That said there isn’t an upsetting abundance of it, the quantity is pretty much in line with the mids and the bass. Even though the Icon has the better treble it’s a bright amp and paired with something like the RE-0 it’s just too much.
All that said, the treble isn’t a bother and in testing out different IEM’s that very crisp edginess does work quite well. It makes cymbals clearly stand out sharp and clean. They don’t really shimmer like I may want them to but it’s really the only thing I feel the Icon clearly wins at. Which is odd since the treble is too abundant on the Icon.
Screen: I really quite like the little screen but it seems odd it doesn’t switch off after a short while; this will over time murder the OLED pixels so seems an odd thing to do. (so shiny the camera focused on its own reflection)
UI: Well the UI is pretty basic stuff but it all works and is pretty obvious to use. That is how a UI ought to be so well done FiiO.
Power: I know there have been reports of the E7 not being quite able to provide the volume that some want and all I can say is What!!!!! Are you deaf!!!! Having the E7 power my HD600 (300Ω) I get to about 40 out of 60 before thinking erm no that’s getting too loud to listen to. Loud to the point of unpleasantly loud. If anyone is using more then I can only assume you actually are legally deaf and so do need things blasting at you to hear them or you soon will be. Currently I’m using a set of UE Super.fi 5 and the volume is at 5 and I’m perfectly happy with the volume.
Transparency: The E7 is a more closed in intimate sounding amp than it is open and airy. For me this pretty much goes hand in hand with its rich, liquid sound. If you’re looking for air and space no prizes for guessing where that can be better found. A/B ing the two of them I cannot say one is better than the other it has far more to do with the style and presentation you prefer, what suits that song and what pars better with your chosen headphone.
DAC: Testing the DAC section itself is impossible but you can gauge an idea of whether the DAC is of a worse quality than the amplifier is. The E7 DAC is lauded as being the Wolfson WM8740. I have no doubts many of you have come across the name Wolfson and the reverence with which it is often spoken of. Round Head-Fi Wolfson and its chips get great praise (and gets often beaten up for being cheapskates and no longer using them.) The thing is I can’t say I’m hearing the DAC stand out and it makes me suspect the amp is holding it back. Normally there would be no way to tell but FiiO has a dock on the bottom of the E7. This is designed to be paired up the FiiO E9 which will be small desktop amp and when connected together will use the DAC in the E7. Clearly FiiO think the DAC they have used can do even better with a bigger and better amp and I’d love to see just what it can do.
Comparing to the Dac in the Icon, I feel the amp of the Icon is a little held back by its DAC, the lovely Wolfson one in the iPod 5G pairs much better with its amp than its own DAC does. This leads me to conclude the DAC in the E7 is the better of the two. Should I get an E9 I’m sure it would confirm my suspicions.
Value: Pretty fantastic value. The E7 for all intents sits in a market position that it really doesn’t have much in the way of competition. Its main rivals are the E5 and the Icon Mobile. Clearly it’s a big step up on the E5 but not as much as one might have hoped for, that says more about what a little marvel that the E5 is than anything bad about the E7. Right now the E7 is available anywhere in the world for US$80 and that certainly can’t be said for the Icon Mobile. If I wanted to go buy it a can but the cheapest I can see it for in the UK is £115. Even at today’s terrible exchange rates Google tells me that’s US$183!!! As you can see there is a little price discrepancy there.
Edit: AMP3 (http://www.advancedmp3players.co.uk/shop/Headphones.6/FiiO.406/5510017/FiiO_E7_USB_DAC_and_Headphone_Amplifier.4495.html ) are now selling them in the UK for £65, its nice to see there things available localy and naturally will have ever so much quicker shipping.
If you’re American things get much more equal and accordingly the E7 isn’t such a comparative bargain. You need to look whether it’s more suited to what you’re after acoustically and in versatility.
Conclusion: I like the E7. I don’t like it as much as I thought I was going to but I suspect that because the E5 set the price to awesomeness ratio so very high. So why should you buy the E7 over the E5? The most blatant reason is the DAC. The E5 has none and I don’t know about your laptops but many have utterly crappy headphone out’s. Plugging in the E7 makes all that horror go away at a stroke and that there is worth the extra US$60. The sound quality over all is a clear step up on the E5 too with the treble in particular being improved. The E7 also gives you a hugely versatile bass boost that is actually a lot of fun. With the E5 it was on or off but with the E7 you can graduate it in much finer steps and that’s something i really very much like. Even with my XM5 it has a great bass boost but it’s either on or off, the E7 can have just a little boost if you like and that’s truly a step forward i believe. The E7 just gets a lot of those little things done well.
As a package the E7 is quite lovely, that little silicon jacket fits it just so perfectly and as cases go is about perfect. The options the E7 present is likewise great, the ability to plug it into an E9 and transform it into a desktop amp is something noting else offers as far as I know. The fact that it has an off button (oh hell yes I’m looking at you Nu Force) and that it also has a sleep timer on it. While it’s not something I do but many like to go to bed with headphones on and this means you can amp them too and not wake to a dead battery.
The only niggles I have with the E7 is that the screen and whole face while pretty is begging to be scratched. You know it’s only matter of time before you will spoil its looks. The other is that the sound quality isn’t all that i hoped it would be. While it’s very nice and represents good if not great value it isn’t making me go “WOW” like the E5 at its teeny tiny price did. When it comes to pure musical fidelity and finesse the Icon Mobile does have the edge but it lacks in that it has no bass boost and is just too darn bright for many. The E7 represents a more balanced and gently warmed sound that either works for you or it doesn’t.
As I have mentioned the E7’s natural pairing is with the RE-0 and based on that combo, both at US$80 each makes for a pretty unbeatable sound for the money. The 0 with its neutral / bright sound and the E7 with its warm hint and that variable bass boost button is pretty much a match made in acoustic heaven.
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