Change of sampling rate disables equalizer
That's a surprising experience, also that I didn't notice it any earlier. Firmware is the latest, «definitive» 2.1. The music stored on the two µSD cards mainly consists of Flac files and some MP3s with sampling rates of 44.1 kHz and 48 kHz (about 2%). (Note that I'm aware of the limitation of the equalizer to 48 kHz!) As soon as the sample rate changes from one file to the next (shuffle or continuous play), the equalizer is disabled, until it's changed to another EQ preset and back to the desired one. Anybody experienced the same? I could change the firmware to earler versions, but this would imply some work in the form of reproducing a couple of customizations. So maybe others have already found a solution to this issue? I've contacted FiiO two weeks ago and again two days ago, but got no response yet. As an interim solution I now use my first-generation X5, which fortunately sounds the same with both the Hugo₂ and the DAVE, unlike the Hugo₁ (which sounds better with X5 II and X3 II).
Thanks in advance for any help!
Another old issue is waking up from deep sleep mode. Since I use my X5 II almost exclusively at home for feeding an external DAC, it's connected to the latter via coax cable – the headphone socket is empty. In this configuration in about 20% of the cases the player won't begin to play. Other commands are accessible, just the play button doesn't respond. Plugging the coax cable into the headphone socket (or any headphone) and fast-forward a bit, followed by fast-rewind, does the trick respectively.
And before I forget: I'm rather sure that the shuffle algorithm isn't up to the task. There are so many songs that are played on a regular basis, almost at every listening session, while others are never played. Do the newer FiiO players benefit from better shuffle algorithms? It's my preferred play mode, so it's an important feature for me.