[ph58]

  Have you tried plugging out and back in? Maybe computer puts the usb in sleep mode? You could manage this in device management, on win10, by default some USB are turned off after a while. 

OK i will see that , thanks for the reply .

 

[ericpeters]

AT CES i have tested a couple of DAP's to ba able to decide which one I would buy to replace my Iphone or Ipod 5.5 with E12A combos. I tested A&K 120 and 240, Pioneer DP100R and the Onkyo version and a couple of Hifiman devices. The 2nd day my choice was down to the Pioneer and the FIIO X7, both sounded equally fine and as good as the more expensive options (to my ears) the way they were presented at the show and were a lot cheaper than the A&K players. Next to that both could also run Spottify and Tidal which would make my music listening experience much more convenient. My preferred device was the Pioneer because it seemed to be more mature than the FIIO
As a last test I tried my own UE5 Pro CIEM's on both devices and strangely the Pioneer completely failed this test, It really sounded bad, the amp was apparently not capable of controlling the balanced drivers where the FIIO had no problems at all controlling the UE5 pro. 
That combined with a CES last day discount made me buy the X7. 
 
Now that I have the X7 I am very happy with the sound (especially of well mastered hi res content) but the device is not without flaws, maybe I should say it is not ready yet. 
 
Compared what I expected reading the specs in the advertising:
- The music player works well with local music but I cannot get any DNLA/UPNP content to play, the button for this does not react al all.
- VU meters are completely missing.
- Custom mapping of buttons is not possible.
- Lyrics is very difficult to include with audio
- Firmware is not stable, crashes sometimes.
- If you are listening to Spotify and Tidal has been used before this than Tidal reacts to the hard buttons and not Spotify. (So pressing Pause in Spottify results in Tidal to start Playing
- Album art (Spottify and Tidal) is sometimes visible on the lock screen and sometimes not. It looks like the FIIO music software must be started and not used to show the Album art of the streaming devises.
- The name of the current playing song in the Lock screen only updates after pressing sleep 2 times. (Otherwise It will show the previous song)
 
All of these are minor glitches but I hope they will be fixed soon.
 
Next to that I also heard the noise when using WIFI but I only heard in a hotel sitting close to some kind of Airconditioning system, it sounds like an AM radio. At home I have not hear it at all.
 
Next to all these remarks I still think it is a very nice sounding player with a capable AMP and would buy it again without hesitation.

 

[JeremyLaurenson]

I have gone through a few daps in the last few years, and spent some significant time with them. I created an app for OSX that Syncs iTunes to DAPs and started actually with the the X5.
I moved from X5->AK100II->Sony NW-ZX2
I still own the X3,X5,Sony NW-ZX2.

In order to add support for the various DAPs to the App, I buy them from Amazon and in most cases, return them. In some cases I keep them and "upgrade" accordingly.... (All this being a business expense, mind you)
I have tried a bunch of them as a result... See https://www.map-pin.com/dapper/tested-daps.html

On the X7 vs my last favorite, the ZX2:

The sound signature is very good. Comparable in my mind to the higher end AK, Sony models.
Battery life is good, though not the Sony's claimed 33 hours. (33 hours is indeed realistic if you never look at the screen. If you do, you're down to 10)
The Android version is great, and unlike the NW-ZX2 it does 4.4 which means Apple Music will work (UI broken, however) It also means you get to see the internal storage and external storage at the same time on your computer, something the ZX2 does not do.
There is a balance control. My right ear needs a touch more oomph. ZX2 doesn't do this.
ZX2 is loaded up with the usual Sony crapware between the audio file and your ears. To get best results you have to disable built in sound enhancement apps, and redo this every time you turn it on again.
Speaking of which, it does a full index each time you turn it on. So you leave it on permanently as the cost of about 1% battery per hour...

In my time doing this FiiO and Joe specifically have been VERY helpful and engaged. They are by far the best company to work with here on head-if from a DAP perspective. Sony, and Astell&Kern as examples were total black holes for issues I raised.
This also makes me feel very good about the continued improvement of the UI.

Non-sony specific:
I have JHAudio 13Pros and have had Bass issues with countless DAPs. The FiiO series always seems to do a better job.
Interchangeable amp modules will be a big deal. Looking forward to going balanced.

Every dap has its quirks. Software. Features. Sound. Support for playlists. Support for multiple storage. Support for Mac etc etc.

The X7 is currently what I would "Recommend" to folks in the $500-$1000 range.

I'm selling an NW-ZX2 if you're interested

 

[Dobrescu George]

  AT CES i have tested a couple of DAP's to ba able to decide which one I would buy to replace my Iphone or Ipod 5.5 with E12A combos. I tested A&K 120 and 240, Pioneer DP100R and the Onkyo version and a couple of Hifiman devices. The 2nd day my choice was down to the Pioneer and the FIIO X7, both sounded equally fine and as good as the more expensive options (to my ears) the way they were presented at the show and were a lot cheaper than the A&K players. Next to that both could also run Spottify and Tidal which would make my music listening experience much more convenient. My preferred device was the Pioneer because it seemed to be more mature than the FIIO
As a last test I tried my own UE5 Pro CIEM's on both devices and strangely the Pioneer completely failed this test, It really sounded bad, the amp was apparently not capable of controlling the balanced drivers where the FIIO had no problems at all controlling the UE5 pro. 
That combined with a CES last day discount made me buy the X7. 
 
Now that I have the X7 I am very happy with the sound (especially of well mastered hi res content) but the device is not without flaws, maybe I should say it is not ready yet. 
 
Compared what I expected reading the specs in the advertising:
- The music player works well with local music but I cannot get any DNLA/UPNP content to play, the button for this does not react al all.
- VU meters are completely missing.
- Custom mapping of buttons is not possible.
- Lyrics is very difficult to include with audio
- Firmware is not stable, crashes sometimes.
- If you are listening to Spotify and Tidal has been used before this than Tidal reacts to the hard buttons and not Spotify. (So pressing Pause in Spottify results in Tidal to start Playing
- Album art (Spottify and Tidal) is sometimes visible on the lock screen and sometimes not. It looks like the FIIO music software must be started and not used to show the Album art of the streaming devises.
- The name of the current playing song in the Lock screen only updates after pressing sleep 2 times. (Otherwise It will show the previous song)
 
All of these are minor glitches but I hope they will be fixed soon.
 
Next to that I also heard the noise when using WIFI but I only heard in a hotel sitting close to some kind of Airconditioning system, it sounds like an AM radio. At home I have not hear it at all.
 
Next to all these remarks I still think it is a very nice sounding player with a capable AMP and would buy it again without hesitation.

- I observed that VU meters were not there, but I thought that I missed from where to activate them.
 
- I thought I had not observed from where to map custom controls. 
 
- For me, it only crashed if I chose to open it with fiio music as system. If I would boot to android, and open fiio music as music app, it would not crash. 
 
A but observed by me, is that a microsd card will only work after a minute or 2 after insertion (64gb, 80% full with flac+mp3+coverart), but this is not something very bad, and one normally does not pull microsd out often. 
 
In fact, the only part I found that really is urgent is USB DAC function, which I understood that is not final implemented yet (I might be wrong here). 

 

[Dobrescu George]

Okay, so I read what the IEM amp (the one we heard) is made of. 
 
Simply put, it is made of first generation X5 and first generation X3. (op-amps are from fg X5 and buffers from fg X3). Almost like all the other amp modules are bound to sound better. All data is taken off Fiio main site. 
 
Still what I heard was worlds better than either X5II or X3II, not to mention first gen X5 or first gen X3. I wonder how much better will the sound be with even better amp modules (I am not very interested in muses one, it is bound to be smooth, and I do not want that so my main interest point is in high power one, if it will be able to do it without any type of hiss. 

 

[ph58]

  Have you tried plugging out and back in? Maybe computer puts the usb in sleep mode? You could manage this in device management, on win10, by default some USB are turned off after a while. 

 Just make a test , i think that is not my computer (Win10) , because  my Ibasso DX100 plug to my computer , it don't move at all , the problem came from The X7 . Help !

 

[ClieOS]

  Okay, so I read what the IEM amp (the one we heard) is made of. 
 
Simply put, it is made of first generation X5 and first generation X3. (op-amps are from fg X5 and buffers from fg X3). Almost like all the other amp modules are bound to sound better. All data is taken off Fiio main site. 
 
Still what I heard was worlds better than either X5II or X3II, not to mention first gen X5 or first gen X3. I wonder how much better will the sound be with even better amp modules (I am not very interested in muses one, it is bound to be smooth, and I do not want that so my main interest point is in high power one, if it will be able to do it without any type of hiss. 

 
That will be a really silly way of describing electronics. OP1612 and AD8397 used on other amps as well, would it be just as adequate to describe X7 as having gene of those amp? Of course not, as that logic doesn't work in the electronic world. For an example, the new iBasso DX90 also uses OPA1611 (which is the single version of OPA1612) where AD8397 was used on HM901 1st gen stock amp module, so we could have concluded X7 is DX90 + HM901, which of course is not going to fly. As with all electronic design, the implementation is the key - or to say it in another way, the whole is larger than the sum of individual parts.
 
But one thing you are right about is that FiiO tends to keep using the parts they are familiar with, though I don't think it is purely for getting a particular sound they want but more importantly, making their life easier to design with parts they know that will behaves the way they want as well as keeping minimal number of stock. But that's not unique to FiiO, all large electronic manufacturer do that.

 

[Dobrescu George]

   
That will be a really silly way of describing electronics. OP1612 and AD8397 used on other amps as well, would it be just as adequate to describe X7 as having gene of those amp? Of course not, as that logic doesn't work in the electronic world. For an example, the new iBasso DX90 also uses OPA1611 (which is the single version of OPA1612) where AD8397 was used on HM901 1st gen stock amp module, so we could have concluded X7 is DX90 + HM901, which of course is not going to fly. As with all electronic design, the implementation is the key - or to say it in another way, the whole is larger than the sum of individual parts.
 
But one thing you are right about is that FiiO tends to keep using the parts they are familiar with, though I don't think it is purely for getting a particular sound they want but more importantly, making their life easier to design with parts they know that will behaves the way they want as well as keeping minimal number of stock. But that's not unique to FiiO, all large electronic manufacturer do that.

I am happy if they keep improving their implementations of the same parts, as long as in the end, it will all sound better. Thanks for the heads-up, I was not aware that other DAPs used the same op-amps and buffers. I am still ne to how electronics work, but I intended that as a joke, actually, sorry if it came wrong

. The sound is clearly not an X5+X3, it is like what would happen if you take an X5II and give it buffs on every possible characteristic of sound for 100 levels or so 

. (I highly doubt that my sense of humor will be caught the right way).
 
Though, my personal prefference would have been that they would had used OPA 1612 with BUF634U, due to this buffer having more soundstage in general, but I do trust that they made the best decision, and it does sound better this way (more like, given my lack of experience with electronic parts, the last sentence might have been wrong, and I might not have prefered that specific configuration, but like this one better) 
 
Anyways, for a dap which costs this much to be my next purchase and making me sell my X5II at less than 6 months from purchasing it, I cannot stop underlining, until I finish writing the review for it, how amazing it sounds.

 

[Mistyc]

I just tested X7 in depth with IEM module and a few IEMs+headphones. 

You will not belive your ears how great this thing is, and how great the operation of it is, UI is amazing. Not to mention usage and user experience. 

Welkome back George!

 

[Dobrescu George]

Welkome back George!

Hello!
 
Thanks!

 

[T.R.A.N.C.E.]

ESS have released a new flagship dac, the ES9038PRO, it is specified at 140dB DNR and -122dB THD+N. The Fiio X7 is using ES9018S, which is specified at 135dB DNR and -120bD THD+N. Not that it matters, but it's news.

 

[ClieOS]

ESS have released a new flagship dac, the ES9038PRO, it is specified at 140dB DNR and -122dB THD+N. The Fiio X7 is using ES9018S, which is specified at 135dB DNR and -120bD THD+N. Not that it matters, but it's news.

I wonder if it is even possible to pull anywhere near those number when you add in the analog circuit.

 

[Brooko]

Wouldn't matter anyway - both chips have distortion measuring well below human hearing capability. So the lower numbers are just lower numbers.  They don't translate to any audible difference at the end of the day.

 

[majo123]

i too had fiio x5 plus e12a stack and i totally agree doesnt need the e12a at all its that good! and like you mine are gonna be sold , x7 is doing what i need and some ...just cant wait to hear other amp modules .

 

[jynxed]

I miss my x7, sent it back at the weekend for replacment. Really wish it voild gave been sorted before I kived. I am guessing anither week brfore tge replacment arrives. Just hope it is not a hisser