[estreeter]

Quote:

I for one wouldn't pay more than double the price of the E9 just because the 3.5mm jack is a bit of a pain to plug into, and because there is some noise when adjusting volume. That's ridiculous.

I disagree - read the entire thread and you will find more than one instance where Fiio's quality control has forced a new owner to send his amp back. For those with an amp that is working perfectly, none of the above will seem like a valid reason to stop someone buying the E9 - its reminiscent of the debate which raged over early releases of the iPod, particularly the Nano, where one or two people would get a 'Monday morning special' and other posters would protest loudly that these poor fools must have cloth ears.
 
When you say 'double the price of the E9', both are bargain basement amps - the key is to still be able to enjoy your purchase long after the price has been forgotten. We take a risk with any product, and you dont have to go far to find a review of big buck kit where the reviewer had to send his sample back for repair, but I believe that you need to get a few things right with a headphone amp, and the socket for plugging your headphones in is definitely one of them .......
 

 

[Riku540]

In all fairness, sending a product back is disappointing and inconvenient, but long term it's still very worth the while.
 
Sure there are a few that got overlooked and are defective, but the ones that work perfectly fine, are perfectly fine.
 
It's not so much the fault of the product as it is quality inspection and control. FiiO is still an up and coming brand and their communication and service is outstanding. I'm sure they're learning as they push more and more advanced products out over the years and will be quite reputable one day.
 
A lot of reputable companies didn't start out that way, they had to fall a few times before getting to where they are.

 

[estreeter]

Quote:

 
A lot of reputable companies didn't start out that way, they had to fall a few times before getting to where they are.

 
Agreed - do a Google search on 'Dell Hell', 'Dont buy HP' etc. I was merely pointing out that, for me personally, the E9 seems to have been let down by said quality control - I'm sure Fiio are shipping thousands of them at the price they are charging, but life is too short to be shuffling gear back and forward to the manufacturer for repair.
 

 

[Syliano]

Both of my e9 sockets are perfectly fine. The only issue that occured was the noise when raising or lowering the volume, that disappeared after a while though, don't ask me how that happened. I have a bigger isue with  how hard it is to see where the volume button is at, but that isn't a dealbreaker for me, neither is the noise when raising or lowering the volume.

 

[abhisheknath]

Has anyone paired the e7/e9 combo with dt880 pros 250ohm? What do you think of the combination?

 

[hudamanium]

Has anyone paired the e7/e9 combo with dt880 pros 250ohm? What do you think of the combination?

Yep. The DT880s 250 ohms are the headphones that I use the most cause they're so comfy and nice.

The E7/E9 doesn't take anything away or add anything as far as I can tell. So if you like the sound of your headphones, it will just make it sound better. If you don't like the sound, don't expect it to suddenly change your opinion about the headphones.

 

[JamesFiiO]

I know we are far away from a real good company in quality.  especially compare with some like Apple, Dell, HP and lots of other! but we will help anyone who have problem in our products. and improve our
 
design and quality control!
 
Also please buy our products from local seller! in case you are not so lucky and need to send back the defective unit to get replacemen. 
 
Anyway, so far all is individual case, and sometimes we found people send back the good unit. in fact, you all know we are making affortable products, so the high defective rate will cause huge
 
problem to us, that means we have to recall lots of unit from all over the world, I guess you can image that it means we need to pay more money than the value of our products!
 

 

[JamesFiiO]

BTW, I belive we maybe the biggest manufacturer in headphone amplifier. of course I means in quantity. so, good thing is we can purchase all our component from some big supplier , in fact, it help us
 
buy the quality components. and we keep manufacture some model more than 3 years, for example, we still mass produce E3 to the market which is release in 2007! it means that you can buy a mature
 
products , both in design and production, and QC.  and usually mass production is more easy to control the quality.

 

[Lan647]

I hope i will get a non-defective unit when I order, will order at pjbox.uk as there is no retailer where I live...

 

[estreeter]

Quote:

 
that means we have to recall lots of unit from all over the world, I guess you can image that it means we need to pay more money than the value of our products!
 

Thanks for your response, feiao, and I absolutely agree that it makes no sense to sell a product with a low margin and a high defect rate, as the cost of remedying any defects will outstrip the profit made from being able to sell a large number of products. That said, I suspect that we both know that there are amp makers who seem happy to let their customers deal with the 'idiosyncrasies' of their products - its almost a badge of honour among some on Head-Fi to be able to dismantle a new amp, fix the faults themselves and then post photos of the internals that needed to be rejigged.
 
I hope that any subsequent revisions to the E9 will address the small-but-significant issues raised in this thread, particularly the problem where volume adjustments are accompanied by unwelcome noise. The headphone community has needed an affordable fullsize amp for a very long time, and I applaud your efforts in bringing the E9 to market at such a low price.

 

[JamesFiiO]

So far we only received three defective E9, and the total report about the defect unit is not more than 20pcs, I guess the chance to buy a defective unit is like won the first prize.

 

[Syliano]

No disrespect or anything as I said my e9 is perfectly fine and I love em with my k701, but the low amount of send backs could be because sending the amp back to china costs almost half of what the amp does, atleast were I live it does. I don´t think it would be MUCH higher, but I think it would be higher.

 

[Riku540]

... Except returns aren't all going to China. I had to send back my E7/E9 when the bundle first came out and it went to Micca where I bought it from which actually isn't too far from where I live in VA. They covered the return shipping and gave me free expedited shipping on the replacement; I was back up and running within 2 days.
 
It cost me nothing.

 

[Jack C]

Hey,
 
I can't divulge exact numbers, but the return rate for the E9 for us has been extremely low, and that includes those that are returned because the customer just changed their mind. Beyond our 30 day return/exchange period, we have our extended exchange program, which allows a customer to send a defective product to us during the warranty period instead of having to send it to FiiO for service/repair.  These policies are in place to make it easy and convenient for customers to get service/support for their FiiO products. 
 
Jack
 

 

[JamesFiiO]

Quote:

No disrespect or anything as I said my e9 is perfectly fine and I love em with my k701, but the low amount of send backs could be because sending the amp back to china costs almost half of what the amp does, atleast were I live it does. I don´t think it would be MUCH higher, but I think it would be higher.

We are a little different with other, because we have so many salea agent all over the world. so it is not a big problem to send the defective unit to local seller. and we also need to caculate the defective rate  from the
 
feedback of our sales agent. and all the defective unit finally will back to our office.
 
As a business secret, I can not tell you how many amp we sold, but I guess you can visit Head Gear or take a look at the right column of current website, you will find that how people own our amp. and don't forget that
 
E1, E3, E5 is mainly sold to non-audiophile . and you may notice that many other chinese brand sell headphone amplfier dierectly and ship from china, at the other hand, we sell to our sales agent and they help us sell to
 
end user and ship from local.