[musicheaven]

The audio business is not any different than other types of businesses, all manufacturers are fighting to release their products first because of the old saying, early birds get the worms still stands. In order to make more sales they have to sell their gear before consumers money runs out and it runs out pretty fast when competitors join the club.

 

[Gurashieruro]

The audio business is not any different than other types of businesses, all manufacturers are fighting to release their products first because of the old saying, early birds get the worms still stands. In order to make more sales they have to sell their gear before consumers money runs out and it runs out pretty fast when competitors join the club.

Here's the problem. Consumers can and will return items if they are severely disappointed with it. Look at the latest Batman for PC. I get the reasoning for releasing early or before the competition but the poor unveil will result in severe damage to a company's reputation and overall sales. For large companies, that is not much of a problem but for a smaller company like Fiio, it can be bad news for them for current times and any of their future products.
Who knows, they might be able to get away with a buggy device but there can be many problems and I just wanted to address why waiting might be the best course of action for stuff like this.

 

[musicheaven]

Here's the problem. Consumers can and will return items if they are severely disappointed with it. Look at the latest Batman for PC. I get the reasoning for releasing early or before the competition but the poor unveil will result in severe damage to a company's reputation and overall sales. For large companies, that is not much of a problem but for a smaller company like Fiio, it can be bad news for them for current times and any of their future products.
Who knows, they might be able to get away with a buggy device but there can be many problems and I just wanted to address why waiting might be the best course of action for stuff like this.

Understood that's part of doing business, the return rules are getting more generous these days. The other issue is one of quality control. I have seen products being churned quickly but with acceptable quality while others taking years and failing in their customers hands. If Fiio is good as they are and demonstrated, they should have no problem upping their QC and manufacturing process to release their products earlier unless you feel it's not the case. By the way that never stopped a company like iBasso to release buggy products, including Fiio. That's why they have firmware updates. As long as they have good, dedicated firmware developers, they should be just fine. I thought the X5 was released rather quickly but never had any lack of enjoyment listening to it. It took them few firmware releases to have it right but eventually it turned out to be a great DAP.

 

[x RELIC x]

There's no delay. They've always said August in China and a couple months later for the rest of the world, bringing us to October for release, maybe November. They want to keep it close to home initially to weed out any returns and QC issues and it's easier to do that on your home turf.

 

[xuan87]

No laggy Android UI please! The only acceptable ones that I can think of are the AK DAPs and Sony ZX2, all priced higher than the X7.

 

[waynes world]

No laggy Android UI please! The only acceptable ones that I can think of are the AK DAPs and Sony ZX2, all priced higher than the X7.

 
C'mon man. The OS ain't changing at this point.

 

[x RELIC x]

No laggy Android UI please! The only acceptable ones that I can think of are the AK DAPs and Sony ZX2, all priced higher than the X7.

And both brands mentioned are gouging consumers IMO.

 

[Gurashieruro]

Android 4.0+ is pretty much consists of almost no lag when run full stock with no overhead unlike those found on Samsung devices. The speed and fluidity is much nicer on 5.1, giving the system certain APIs that give the bonus to DAPs and audiophiles running USB DACs.
I don't expect lag on the device as there isn't or shouldn't be much going on since it is only meant to play music and nothing else.

 

[musicheaven]

How about the Wi-Fi hi-res streaming option, would there be any lag there?

 

[davidcotton]

I would rather have a smooth and bug free launch than the opposite, even at the expense of time. We see this problem happen currently in the gaming PC world where companies release unpolished games to consumers, like Battlefield 4 and Batman. The point I want to make is that waiting for a stable launch is, and should be, a necessity. This fact is even more true in a small market of DAPs.
As for chips, I feel implementation and general cohesiveness of the system UI is more important than the chipset alone. You have a killer DAC and if the Amp and its other components are up to par, then all that is left is to make it work. Knowing that it's FiiO making this, I don't worry to much.

Agreed look at all the fla(c)k that Ibasso got due to the poor implementation on the dx50 release (and doesn't that seem like a long time ago now).   Optimistic for the x7 and might be one that I get.  Do we know at this point if it does gapless ok?

 

[x RELIC x]

............................

Do we know at this point if it does gapless ok?

Who knows except for FiiO.

 

[interpolate]

....[edit]....

 

[h1f1add1cted]

Who knows except for FiiO.

Since it is Android OS and should able to use good Music Apps (Neutron and others) there is no problem for gapless playback so far, it's not hardware limited, it's pure software, one of the reasons I use Rockbox instead of Mango on my iBasso players, because gapless works on all formats.

 

[x RELIC x]

Since it is Android OS and should able to use good Music Apps (Neutron and others) there is no problem for gapless playback so far, it's not hardware limited, it's pure software, one of the reasons I use Rockbox instead of Mango on my iBasso players, because gapless works on all formats.

Sure. I have no doubt the X7 will playback music with Gapless just fine. Just pointing out that people asking on a forum about performance is moot as nobody but FiiO has heard the X7.

 

[musicheaven]

If it wasn't I'd be very surprised even the X5 has gapless support so why not the X7!
 
Until one sees an X7 in the wild, it will be impossible to comment on anything.
 
Maybe James/Joe can start a world tour to sample the X7, it does not have to be a finished commercial product like he did with the X5.