[bcarr112281]

Hi, Joe -
 
I know that photos are a requirement for the review. How many are necessary, and are there specific aspects of the X5 that you particularly want us to photograph?
 
Thanks,
Brian

 

[bowei006]

  Hi, Joe -
 
I know that photos are a requirement for the review. How many are necessary, and are there specific aspects of the X5 that you particularly want us to photograph?
 
Thanks,
Brian

What's your favorite food? What's the food you eat the most?
 
Take a picture every time you eat a piece is my go to rule. 

 

[JamesFiiO]

We are working in the new firmware and hope it can be released on 15th, March. so far we are testing the new data base and it is much faster than the old one and one member help us tested and he can upgrade his 2 64g mirco card now. also 
 
the artist-->album may be included in the next version and the gapless time will reduce to minimum. 
 
I am sorry I am not working now so I can only get very few news from our engineer but I believe most bugs should be fixed and some new features should be added when it is global launch .

 

[cooperpwc]

^ Great news, James! Thanks for the update.

 

[H20Fidelity]

  Hi, Joe -
 
I know that photos are a requirement for the review. How many are necessary, and are there specific aspects of the X5 that you particularly want us to photograph?
 
Thanks,
Brian

You must photograph every single component inside X5 using macro zoom lens. (without opening the unit). 

This can be done by looking through the headphone jack to the inside.

 

[musicheaven]

  We are working in the new firmware and hope it can be released on 15th, March. so far we are testing the new data base and it is much faster than the old one and one member help us tested and he can upgrade his 2 64g mirco card now. also 
 
the artist-->album may be included in the next version and the gapless time will reduce to minimum. 
 
I am sorry I am not working now so I can only get very few news from our engineer but I believe most bugs should be fixed and some new features should be added when it is global launch .

 
Thanks James and your engineers to put the effort in fixing fw issues.
 
I hope it will eventually read my cards, right now for me the library mode has been anything but missing. I can get by with directory scan but I really prefer a dap that gives me the choice and truly works fine with the library I spent lots of time fixing and getting it to work right.

 

[musicheaven]

  Hi, Joe -
 
I know that photos are a requirement for the review. How many are necessary, and are there specific aspects of the X5 that you particularly want us to photograph?
 
Thanks,
Brian

 
To be honest, we have seen enough of the X5 to know how it looks like. My take is put the effort in the review.

 

[LargoCantabile]

Hi James:
 
I see you are working on firmware. Question: As I play classical music only and have used Microsoft's GENRE to label the composer's names to group together under a composer folder the folders containing each of the power's works NOT SONGS. Classical music often requires several TRACKS to played in ONLY ONE ORDER successively without break. Sometimes some CDs irritating break One movement of a work across several tracks and that requires GAPLESS playing otherwise in the middle of a work there is a peculiar hiccup.
I find most players UI totally unsatisfactory for coping with classical music. So far the best interfaces I found have been CREATIVE's W (now defunct) and COWAN's X7 which I think is an adaptation of JETAUDIO UI software for Laptop.
My TWO questions are:
1. Will your UI allow Music to be sported by COMPOSER (aka GENRE) and then WORK (aka ALBUM) as that is what I have used tor my 1 gigabyte of ripped CDs as workable?
2. Can one select a folder at any level, i.e. either Composer or Album, and execute PLAY and then the player will continue plating all the folders and tracks in order until one shuts it down, as that is what I usually do. For Example, Select Folder Mozart, and then select Piano Sonatas, which has many folders under it each containing one sonata, but i let it play on listening form the first sonata or which even on I select until I have to stop listening and shut it down.
 
No I don't ever make playlists as it is too time consuming and I would never organize works in the same way.
 
Thanks for considering us minority maybe classical music lovers as well in developing UI for players.

 

[frankrondaniel]

I don't know of any DAP that provides strong support for library functions useful for Classical music.  That's where having a well defined folder structure and browsing by folder is crucial.  My hope is someday someone will implement better support for Classical.

 

[H20Fidelity]

I believe if all goes well the New Zealand/Australia X5 tour unit should be with me early this week, 

 

[bcarr112281]

Quote:

  What's your favorite food? What's the food you eat the most?
 
Take a picture every time you eat a piece is my go to rule. 

 
Thanks for the advice. Still, I have to agree with musicheaven (see below), especially since I've got relatively limited use of my hands. Indeed, it's part of the reason I wanted to evaluate the X5--to determine whether I could use it effectively.
 
Quote:

 
To be honest, we have seen enough of the X5 to know how it looks like. My take is put the effort in the review.

 
What--you mean you don't want macro shots of my fingerprints!?

Joking aside, I'm inclined to agree. Nevertheless, if The Powers That Be tell me they want photos, I'll certainly oblige.
 
Quote:

  Question: As I play classical music only . . . [c]lassical music often requires several TRACKS to played in ONLY ONE ORDER successively without break. Sometimes some CDs irritating break One movement of a work across several tracks and that requires GAPLESS playing otherwise in the middle of a work there is a peculiar hiccup.

 
Most of my music collection is classical, and much of it has no gaps between tracks. I had read many complaints about the X5's lack of true gapless playback, so I was pleasantly surprised to discover that its gapless performance is genuinely acceptable. You'll hear an extremely minute pause--more a slight clicking noise than a gap. It's not perfect, but it's not annoying, either. Slightly more significant is the screen, which doesn't immediately update in sync with the start of each new track. The delay is minimal, but it is noticeable.
 
Regarding the UI, it is not configured for properly indexing classical music. However, I found it perfectly adequate for browsing by "album," or folder-by-folder. As such, I had no trouble sorting music and keeping it in the correct order. I recommend using computer software such as dBpoweramp, which can automatically tag tracks using information from online databases.
 
Thanks,
Brian

 

[cooperpwc]

  I had read many complaints about the X5's lack of true gapless playback, so I was pleasantly surprised to discover that its gapless performance is genuinely acceptable. You'll hear an extremely minute pause--more a slight clicking noise than a gap. It's not perfect, but it's not annoying, either. 

 
Good observation! I have been pointing this out for some time. The people screaming about the lack of gapless (two in particular), have never heard the X5. 
 
And according to James, gapless will be even better in the next firmware.

 

[nmatheis]

Good observation! I have been pointing this out for some time. The people screaming about the lack of gapless (two in particular), have never heard the X5. 

And according to James, gapless will be even better in the next firmware.

I'm strongly considering the X5. My experience with the X3 is that Gapless sounds great - hardly anything to notice between songs that should be Gapless. However, on the X3 enabling Gapless destabilizes the DAP and leads to crashes/freezes. Is this a concern with the X5, or is it stable with Gapless enabled?

 

[cooperpwc]

I'm strongly considering the X5. My experience with the X3 is that Gapless sounds great - hardly anything to notice between songs that should be Gapless. However, on the X3 enabling Gapless destabilizes the DAP and leads to crashes/freezes. Is this a concern with the X5, or is it stable with Gapless enabled?

 
I cannot really compare on and off since I always leave gapless on. Browsing by folder, It has been quite stable. I have had the power unexpectedly turn off on me exactly twice over a five week period of a lot of use. I think that that is pretty good for a first firmware (1.0).

 

[bcarr112281]

   
Good observation! I have been pointing this out for some time. The people screaming about the lack of gapless (two in particular), have never heard the X5. 
 
And according to James, gapless will be even better in the next firmware.

 
I should qualify my statement. After further listening with gapless "albums," I've discovered that the X5's gapless performance is inconsistent, at least with firmware 1.1. Often, one might be hard-pressed to discern when the unit has switched tracks. Unfortunately, there are other occasions when the player stutters significantly. It seems to occur less than half the time, but it is annoying. Here's hoping the new firmware truly resolves the problem.
 

I'm strongly considering the X5. My experience with the X3 is that Gapless sounds great - hardly anything to notice between songs that should be Gapless. However, on the X3 enabling Gapless destabilizes the DAP and leads to crashes/freezes. Is this a concern with the X5, or is it stable with Gapless enabled?

 
I've had no stability problems with gapless on, and it's always been enabled since I first got the unit ten days ago. On one occasion the unit did shut down randomly as it sat on a tabletop. (Music was playing, and functions such as "Sleep" were off.)
 

   
I cannot really compare on and off since I always leave gapless on. Browsing by folder, It has been quite stable. I have had the power unexpectedly turn off on me exactly twice over a five week period of a lot of use. I think that that is pretty good for a first firmware (1.0).

 
Yes, it's happened to me with firmware 1.1.
 
Regards,
Brian