MedicalFlyer
New Head-Fier
I recently purchased an X3 III player from the FiiO store on AliExpress during the 11.11 sales.
Having had an original X1 for a few years I thought the X3 III would prove to be a good upgrade with the bluetooth and other features it provides.
However, I can't help but feel this unit is actually worse than my older X1 for a number of reasons
I have checked the unit is running the latest 1.24 firmware and am using the same 128GB card I have always used in my X1 with the same files (320kbps MP3 mostly).
1) Bluetooth
The bluetooth is unable to connect to devices that require a pin to be entered. I would like to use it with the hands free kit in my car that supports A2DP but when I try to connect it always shows connection failed. The PIN for this unit is 1234. If what I can see on the forums is correct for the X1 II applies also to the X3 III then if it can only connect to devices with 0000 or 8888 PIN's then it is severely limited.
2) Album Art
I have spent a long time ensuring the album are for my music is of high quality but compatible with being read from either embedded or as folder.jpg. All of my album art is a maximum of 1200x1200 and less than 1MB in size as this has proven to be suitable for the X1. On the X3 III however it fails to display any album art for at least half of my music that I know has worked fine previously.
3) Playlists
I have a few playlists I made via WinAmp on the PC that have always worked for the X1. The X3 III loads and shuffles them just fine but if the unit is turned off it won't remember the playlist is being played when next powered up. Instead it reverts to the album the last song was from. This makes it extremely annoying to use as I am unable to resume a playlist and have to reselect it each time I power on the unit. the X1 never had this trouble.
4) Interface speed
The X3 III does not seem to be any faster than the old X1 and the UI shows a lot of slow down when loading categories or any long list of songs. When playing via bluetooth things are even worse. With song changes and UI updates taking a long time. Also updating the media library still takes around 15 minutes for 15,000+ songs which is far too slow.
5) Customising Firmware
One thing I liked with the X1 was the ability to edit the UI elements of the firmware and even customise the themes. There appears to be no way to do so with the X3 III as I would like to make some small changes similar to those I had on the X1. Namely replacing the background with something plain black as the default one actually makes the text hard to read.
Unfortunately I was expecting a much better unit as there has been some time between the X1 and the release of this. However, being that it is unable to connect to a wider range of bluetooth devices and the extreme slow down in UI speeds and the problems it has I feel I am better off with my older X1 until I can find something more suitable.
It's a shame as the device is very nicely made and nice to use.
I also wonder, as little information is available, if the M7 which is a similar price would have more flexibility in connecting to bluetooth devices (allowing PIN's to be manually entered). If so, and it also updated the library and worked faster and more reliably than the X3 III I may consider that as the series seems to be their new lineup.
Also if anyone knows of a good quality DAP with fully usable bluetooth and preferably hardware buttons to change tracks (I use it in the car so it makes things easier to do when driving) I'd like to hear about them.
I've seen the Cayin and while it seems to work quicker than the X3 III the bluetooth is still limited so wouldn't offer much over my X1.
If all else fails it may be time to just change the stereo in the car if I can find something the displays track information (including Korean and Japanese characters) and artwork at a reasonable price.
Having had an original X1 for a few years I thought the X3 III would prove to be a good upgrade with the bluetooth and other features it provides.
However, I can't help but feel this unit is actually worse than my older X1 for a number of reasons
I have checked the unit is running the latest 1.24 firmware and am using the same 128GB card I have always used in my X1 with the same files (320kbps MP3 mostly).
1) Bluetooth
The bluetooth is unable to connect to devices that require a pin to be entered. I would like to use it with the hands free kit in my car that supports A2DP but when I try to connect it always shows connection failed. The PIN for this unit is 1234. If what I can see on the forums is correct for the X1 II applies also to the X3 III then if it can only connect to devices with 0000 or 8888 PIN's then it is severely limited.
2) Album Art
I have spent a long time ensuring the album are for my music is of high quality but compatible with being read from either embedded or as folder.jpg. All of my album art is a maximum of 1200x1200 and less than 1MB in size as this has proven to be suitable for the X1. On the X3 III however it fails to display any album art for at least half of my music that I know has worked fine previously.
3) Playlists
I have a few playlists I made via WinAmp on the PC that have always worked for the X1. The X3 III loads and shuffles them just fine but if the unit is turned off it won't remember the playlist is being played when next powered up. Instead it reverts to the album the last song was from. This makes it extremely annoying to use as I am unable to resume a playlist and have to reselect it each time I power on the unit. the X1 never had this trouble.
4) Interface speed
The X3 III does not seem to be any faster than the old X1 and the UI shows a lot of slow down when loading categories or any long list of songs. When playing via bluetooth things are even worse. With song changes and UI updates taking a long time. Also updating the media library still takes around 15 minutes for 15,000+ songs which is far too slow.
5) Customising Firmware
One thing I liked with the X1 was the ability to edit the UI elements of the firmware and even customise the themes. There appears to be no way to do so with the X3 III as I would like to make some small changes similar to those I had on the X1. Namely replacing the background with something plain black as the default one actually makes the text hard to read.
Unfortunately I was expecting a much better unit as there has been some time between the X1 and the release of this. However, being that it is unable to connect to a wider range of bluetooth devices and the extreme slow down in UI speeds and the problems it has I feel I am better off with my older X1 until I can find something more suitable.
It's a shame as the device is very nicely made and nice to use.
I also wonder, as little information is available, if the M7 which is a similar price would have more flexibility in connecting to bluetooth devices (allowing PIN's to be manually entered). If so, and it also updated the library and worked faster and more reliably than the X3 III I may consider that as the series seems to be their new lineup.
Also if anyone knows of a good quality DAP with fully usable bluetooth and preferably hardware buttons to change tracks (I use it in the car so it makes things easier to do when driving) I'd like to hear about them.
I've seen the Cayin and while it seems to work quicker than the X3 III the bluetooth is still limited so wouldn't offer much over my X1.
If all else fails it may be time to just change the stereo in the car if I can find something the displays track information (including Korean and Japanese characters) and artwork at a reasonable price.
