HiBy R6 2020 User Impressions

[goodvibes]

I can hear EMI even with Dunu Zen so not ultra sensitive either 108dB and 16 ohms

Just tried and not hearing it but my natural old man noise floor is likely higher than yours. I suspect there's also some minor unit to unit variation on things like that.

 

[davidmolliere]

Just tried and not hearing it but my natural old man noise floor is likely higher than yours. I suspect there's also some minor unit to unit variation on things like that.

Yeah that could be. I was a bit farther away but I got a Google Wifi mesh in my apartment so signal is pretty strong.

 

[goodvibes]

The Hiby R6 2020 is my first DAP. Most of my listening experience is with DAC/Amps like the DragonFly Red, BTR5, Chord Mojo and Chord Hugo 2. I am still early in the listening process, but some trends are emerging for me.

1) The Hugo 2 is significantly better than the R6 2020 in sound quality. It has better detail, resolution and clarity. It can drive everything I own including the HD800S and ZMF Verite Closed. The R6 2020 can't. With the Hugo 2, all genres of music sound good. With the R6 2020, classical music and classic rock don't sound that great on the VC and the HD800s are unlistenable even with EQ.

2) The Lotoo PAW S1 is significantly better for classic rock and pop than the R6 2020 with my Blessing 2 Dusk IEMs. I put on Billy Joel Stanger on both the R6 2020 and the S1 and I am quite surprised how much clearer and balanced the S1 sounds. Actually, I was able to drive the VC with the S1 better than with the R6 2020. The relative performance of this dongle based AMP/DAC really surprised me.

I love the feature set of the R6 2020. It looks and feels like an Android device in every way. Easy to download apps and works with the same/similar user experience you would have it you owned a Samsung smart phone. Tidal connect works great so it can control my headphone desktop set up.

As I started down the path of evaluating DAPs, this was always my question. How do DAPs compare to DAC/AMPs. Each has it's use cases that it works best with. I would be interested in learning how the higher end and lower end DAPs perform relative to their DAC/AMP counter parts.

Get uapp, settings/ Internal Hi-Res audio/ Upsample/ On, use integer multiple... In hiby dap settings, set gain to mid and DAC low pass filter to min. phase slow roll. Play in Uapp app. and see if it's preferred for you.

 

[goodvibes]

Yeah that could be. I was a bit farther away but I got a Google Wifi mesh in my apartment so signal is pretty strong.

I was a room away from the nearest mesh because too much ambient noise in the wifi room so may be same.

 

[davidmolliere]

I was a room away from the nearest mesh because to much ambient noise in the wifi room so may be same.

I'll try the scenario where I am close to the WiFi but still I think EMI does exist on the R6 2020.
Not a showstopper though, pratically you can't really hear it with "normal" music playing just when you play quiet music.

 

[damintoell]

Get uapp, settings/ Internal Hi-Res audio/ Upsample/ On, use integer multiple... In hiby dap settings, set gain to mid and DAC low pass filter to min. phase slow roll. Play in Uapp app. and see if it's preferred for you.

Does upsampling actually affect the sound? My (probably limited) understanding is that the sound should be unchanged.

 

[goodvibes]

Does upsampling actually affect the sound? My (probably limited) understanding is that the sound should be unchanged.

It opens up UAPP here. Non of these things 'should' do much. It can affect the way the digital post filter behaves depending on what came before and where to upsampled... or could be a pleasant artifact of an added circuit. Up/oversampling can minimize filter issues if done correctly.

Hiby player app is very open but could be more tangible in character. Uapp is more tangible but not as open. The upsampling selection helps uapp open up a bit more.

 

[HiFiHawaii808]

Get uapp, settings/ Internal Hi-Res audio/ Upsample/ On, use integer multiple... In hiby dap settings, set gain to mid and DAC low pass filter to min. phase slow roll. Play in Uapp app. and see if it's preferred for you.

I'll try that. Thanks. I was planning on downloading UAPP and run it with Tone Boosters and Morphit anyway. I hope it integrates with Tidal okay.

 

[snowy8171]

I'll try that. Thanks. I was planning on downloading UAPP and run it with Tone Boosters and Morphit anyway. I hope it integrates with Tidal okay.

thats how i listen to tidal. i just use uapp instead of the tidal app. def like that a lot more

 

[HiFiHawaii808]

thats how i listen to tidal. i just use uapp instead of the tidal app. def like that a lot more

Can you download music?

 

[gLer]

Can you download music?

Not with UAPP, no. Online streaming only. But it takes full advantage of UAPP's high-res driver so sounds better than the native Tidal app to my ears.

 

[CANiSLAYu]

One thing of note : I hear a quite a bit of EMI with the R6 2020 on quiet sequences on some tracks compared to R8 by the way so I guess shielding is much better on the R8. Too bad as I hear a blacker background on R6 2020 than R8... Same story for DX300 and M8 that have zero EMI. I stream a lot so I might notice it more than most. If you're not streaming or playing offline sync content then it's a non issue.

I can hear EMI even with Dunu Zen so not ultra sensitive either 108dB and 16 ohms

Bummer, I just popped on to ask this same question. I haven't had much ear time with the R6 yet, but was listening today at low volume with the HYLA Sarda and picked up the EMI out of both BAL and SE. Switched to ODIN and same thing. I have an iPhone 12 (work) and an iPhone 12 Pro Max (personal). The 12 isn't terrible, it basically has to be on top of it and even then it's very mild, but it's horrible with the 12 Pro Max. They need to be like 4 feet apart. Quite unfortunate.

 

[Currawong]

Does upsampling actually affect the sound? My (probably limited) understanding is that the sound should be unchanged.

In excess summary, basically all DACs (and that includes DAPs) have some kind of oversampling, which is up-sampling essentially, as a digital filter is employed. That's what the "low pass filter" is in the audio settings. This filter is built into the DA chip used. The idea of using another app to do the up/oversampling first is that some apps have higher quality filters than what the chip makers include. It was quite noticeable with the older Sabre chips, like the ES9018, but less so now on the 9028/38 series. The only down side is CPU, and thus battery usage.

 

[gLer]

Bummer, I just popped on to ask this same question. I haven't had much ear time with the R6 yet, but was listening today at low volume with the HYLA Sarda and picked up the EMI out of both BAL and SE. Switched to ODIN and same thing. I have an iPhone 12 (work) and an iPhone 12 Pro Max (personal). The 12 isn't terrible, it basically has to be on top of it and even then it's very mild, but it's horrible with the 12 Pro Max. They need to be like 4 feet apart. Quite unfortunate.

R6 Pro had the same 'issue'. It's easily avoidable though - keep your phone away from the DAP! That said I get that better shielding is possible. I don't have any EMI with the R8 for example. But there's really no reason to keep your phone anywhere near the R6 when the R6 does all the streaming on its own.

 

[Joe Bloggs]

In excess summary, basically all DACs (and that includes DAPs) have some kind of oversampling, which is up-sampling essentially, as a digital filter is employed. That's what the "low pass filter" is in the audio settings. This filter is built into the DA chip used. The idea of using another app to do the up/oversampling first is that some apps have higher quality filters than what the chip makers include. It was quite noticeable with the older Sabre chips, like the ES9018, but less so now on the 9028/38 series. The only down side is CPU, and thus battery usage.

Regardless of what upsampler is used / not used on the software side, oversampling still needs to be done in the DAC, as that goes up to the MHz range and changes the bit depth as well. The low pass filter option in the audio settings affects how spurious frequencies outside of the "pass band" of the digital audio (e.g. up to 22.05kHz in the case of 44.1kHz sampled audio, 96kHz in the case of 192kHz audio, etc.) are filtered out. I have detailed the different behaviours of the different choices available in previous posts.

Since oversampling will always be performed in addition to upsampling technically I would prefer that only oversampling is performed. To reduce load on the CPU if nothing else.