[iancraig10]

Fiio aren't on their own with regards to non-removable batteries, but this is also because the life of the units are probably seen to be around 2 - 3 years before users will throw them away and buy something else. The life of the X series has been quite short with mk II and mk III's on the way now so companies can resell units quite regularly.

If batteries were made to be changed, the unit life would be way longer in effect so companies aren't so keen.

A 12 hour battery life is great when the battery is new, but it starts to drop away with time. My last IPod Touch died and had to be replaced because the battery had dropped too far. If I was able to easily change the battery, I would have kept the IPod, but I bought another one. Would you want to change the unit once the battery life of the X1 drops to say, 8 hours or less? They take so many charges and that's it. End of unit.

So while discussions about batteries might be quite funny, that's because we have learned to be a throwaway society. I'd love to change my car when the ash tray is full. Actually, some mobile phones do the same now as well. I have a Sony which has a battery sealed in so when it drops to the point of not lasting a day, I'll need a new phone.

Not everyone wants to keep changing their players.

Fiio is not alone though with regards to this.

 

[JK1]

  there are limitations (in terms of hardware) for rockbox. It can run on some devices, but not others. I think it's better to use hardware for a specific purpose, rather than trying to use hardware simply to accommodate a certain OS.

But I hear what you're saying. Fiio just need to pull their fingers out and focus on getting their software right. 

I'm hoping that Rockbox will come out with a Rockbox Light that won't have the full Rockbox implementation, but will be able to run on  players with less powerful processors. Buying a player isn't just about sound quality and price. Battery life, size and weight, features the player has, and the user interface are all very important. Included in features is how easy is it to make playlists on the player itself, and to put full albums into a playlist in just one step. Included in the user interface is how ergonomic the buttons are, and how easy it is to pause or restart the player without removing it from the pocket it is in.

 

[fish1050]

With all this talk about user replaceable batteries I had an E11 for a time and used the replaceable battery feature quite frequently.  A non-replaceable battery on a $150.00 to maybe $300.00 not a big deal as these tend to be replaced with new models pretty frequently.  But as the price of the DAP goes up the non-replaceable battery becomes a bigger factor.  I for one will never spend more than $300.00 on a DAP mainly because of the battery.
 
People rushing to spend $1200.00 on a Sony WM-1A or the $3200.00 WM-1Z seem crazy to me.  If I am going to spend that much on a DAP I am going to want to keep if for a number of years.  Not possible with a non-replaceable battery.  I would much rather spend that money on a home system where I can hear my music in an ideal environment.
 
Once you get above $1000.00 I think manufacturers should include at least one free battery replacement within the first 3 years.  There is more than enough profit built into these expensive DAP's to make it worthwhile.  Knowing I would get at least 4 or even 5 years out of a $1000.00+ DAP with one free battery replacement might get me to pull the trigger.  But maybe two years with a fixed battery, no thank you not worth the investment

 

[iancraig10]

Quite right. Lithium ion batteries don't suffer heat well and don't like being fully charged and left at full charge. They take a limited number of charges which means, within quite a short period of time, they will fail and most manufacturers would then expect you to change it for the latest model.

Precisely what stopped me getting anything more expensive than the x5 which even now, I'm wobbly about due to having a sealed battery in there. Mine will start to fade soon ......

 

[JK1]

  With all this talk about user replaceable batteries I had an E11 for a time and used the replaceable battery feature quite frequently.  A non-replaceable battery on a $150.00 to maybe $300.00 not a big deal as these tend to be replaced with new models pretty frequently.  But as the price of the DAP goes up the non-replaceable battery becomes a bigger factor.  I for one will never spend more than $300.00 on a DAP mainly because of the battery.
 
People rushing to spend $1200.00 on a Sony WM-1A or the $3200.00 WM-1Z seem crazy to me.  If I am going to spend that much on a DAP I am going to want to keep if for a number of years.  Not possible with a non-replaceable battery.  I would much rather spend that money on a home system where I can hear my music in an ideal environment.
 
Once you get above $1000.00 I think manufacturers should include at least one free battery replacement within the first 3 years.  There is more than enough profit built into these expensive DAP's to make it worthwhile.  Knowing I would get at least 4 or even 5 years out of a $1000.00+ DAP with one free battery replacement might get me to pull the trigger.  But maybe two years with a fixed battery, no thank you not worth the investment

Others though wouldn't spend more than $100 on an item that didn't use an easily swappable standard battery that can be purchased inexpensively. i have a few shavers that all died the same way. The rechargeable battery wore out. Now I no longer buy shavers that are over $50.

 

[FizzlePop]

   
Have you guys ever considered using the very lightweight and music focused Rockbox as a base OS for a device? I've always thought that with some effort in to customizing it, you could get a pretty solid UI on top of what is a stable and lightweight OS designed around playing music. 

Because the Rockbox license would require FiiO to release the source code. Which means it's fair game for iBasso, xDuoo, whoever to use after FiiO dumps loads of $$$ into it. 
 
And last I checked Rockbox downsamples anything over 16-bit. Some people (like me) don't care about that, but that's not exactly a feature in this hobby to be proud of. 

 

[Dobrescu George]

Quite right. Lithium ion batteries don't suffer heat well and don't like being fully charged and left at full charge. They take a limited number of charges which means, within quite a short period of time, they will fail and most manufacturers would then expect you to change it for the latest model.

Precisely what stopped me getting anything more expensive than the x5 which even now, I'm wobbly about due to having a sealed battery in there. Mine will start to fade soon ......

 
 I had both X5 players, sold both. Both shown literally zero battery degradation in 2 years of intense usage / DAC usage / any kind of usage. 
 
All FIIO daps have the battery possible to be replaced with enough patience and knowledge. 
 
User replaceable - would probably be nice - but most of my friends who still have an X5 1st gen have the exact same runtime as they had the first day they used it. 

 

[fish1050]

   
 I had both X5 players, sold both. Both shown literally zero battery degradation in 2 years of intense usage / DAC usage / any kind of usage. 
 
All FIIO daps have the battery possible to be replaced with enough patience and knowledge. 
 
User replaceable - would probably be nice - but most of my friends who still have an X5 1st gen have the exact same runtime as they had the first day they used it. 

Have they actually tried to do some kind of actual comparison or is this just speculation on your part?  The battery on my A17 dropped by almost 50% at less than two years based on actual calculations I performed.  Every lithium ion battery loses battery life over time it is unavoidable.

 

[noobandroid]

my review is up at the x1ii gear section, go and have a look, i have a speed test among x1 to x5 2nd gens, some are interesting results on microsd scan time

sq part still pending editing

http://www.head-fi.org/products/fiio-x1-ii-high-resolution-lossless-music-player-2nd-generation-silver/reviews/17167

 

[iancraig10]

 I had both X5 players, sold both. Both shown literally zero battery degradation in 2 years of intense usage / DAC usage / any kind of usage. 

All FIIO daps have the battery possible to be replaced with enough patience and knowledge. 

User replaceable - would probably be nice - but most of my friends who still have an X5 1st gen have the exact same runtime as they had the first day they used it. 

The lithium batteries inside the x5 are no different to other batteries George. Usage, temperature and level of power they are held at affect all of them and eventually, they drop like a stone. They also don't like being run flat.

My Touch battery suddenly went after a couple of years until its life was probably two hours playing.

It seems to happen very gradually and then suddenly, they drop.

Aren't the batteries soldered in?

 

[iancraig10]

my review is up at the x1ii gear section, go and have a look, i have a speed test among x1 to x5 2nd gens, some are interesting results on microsd scan time

sq part still pending editing

http://www.head-fi.org/products/fiio-x1-ii-high-resolution-lossless-music-player-2nd-generation-silver/reviews/17167

Thank you. The timings made me chuckle ....

Scanning a media SD of 128GB
x1ii: 6 minutes 49 seconds
x3ii: 1 minute 12 seconds
x5ii: 1 minute

Shutting down:
x1ii: 14 seconds
x3ii: 1 second
x5ii: 3 seconds

 

[bruce1967]

   
 I had both X5 players, sold both. Both shown literally zero battery degradation in 2 years of intense usage / DAC usage / any kind of usage. 
 
All FIIO daps have the battery possible to be replaced with enough patience and knowledge. 
 
User replaceable - would probably be nice - but most of my friends who still have an X5 1st gen have the exact same runtime as they had the first day they used it. 

My X3II is a year old and has the same battery life it did a year ago. A good 10-11 hours.

 

[tackytiger]

  Because the Rockbox license would require FiiO to release the source code. Which means it's fair game for iBasso, xDuoo, whoever to use after FiiO dumps loads of $$$ into it. 
 
And last I checked Rockbox downsamples anything over 16-bit. Some people (like me) don't care about that, but that's not exactly a feature in this hobby to be proud of. 

 
I think manufacturers also have to sign NDAs for the SOCs they use, so they can't publish details.
 
It's a shame though, in an ideal world companies with a talent for hardware would concentrate their efforts on that.
 
Rockbox also downsamples to 44.1k/48k, but I haven't a problem with that either - I believe in the Nyquist–Shannon sampling theorem.

 

[iancraig10]

My Classic and Touch both went and the weird thing about both was that they took a sudden dive at the end. I expected them to slowly lose play time, but that didn't seem to happen. One day, I just noticed the battery indicator started to drop more rapidly than usual and then they both took a rapid dive after that.

I bought another Touch but replaced the Classic with an X5 and X3.

You're right. It's not the end of the world. Just buy another one when it goes. That's exactly how the industry sees it. Or try to repair it. I tried that with the Touch. Awful job!!

Sadly, things aren't built to last any more and it's seen as odd that anyone might keep things for more than three years I guess.

 

[Parker75]

Isn't that like saying that levis has a scam on us because after some years of abuse their jeans just break? but I get your point, it also depends of how we treat our devices right? It says more about the user when the same thing happened to 2 different ipod models... but actually, one of my ipods had a battery that would only last like 2 hours, an ipod photo that I got used on ebay this year, so it was already like 11 years old, but I just got a new battery for $15, opened it without any tools (only a guitar pick) and now I got 10 hours from it and it's good to go for many more years.