[polandro]

With lack of info about answers I went with the Hidizs H2. It's a noticeable improvement over the cellphone volume and fidelity. It's the same company and similar price so I'm assuming it can't be much worse quality. The buttons work for volume and forward/backward. The BT range is the same as a Corsair gaming headset, I'm not sure how much of that is up to the device versus the router. The person I gave it to was pleasantly surprised because this tiny thing is much more convenient than carrying a second full size device for their purpose.

How's that going? Any strong opinion either way after having it for a while?
I'm just looking for something halfway decent (for that price) so that I can get an upgrade on my work mobile - none offered with headphone jack.

 

[yseviel]

How's that going? Any strong opinion either way after having it for a while?
I'm just looking for something halfway decent (for that price) so that I can get an upgrade on my work mobile - none offered with headphone jack.

My partner whom I bought it for is happy with it. He bought a cheap cell that sucks but with this device he can use it as his MP3 player. The battery life seems good. Now I can't say how discerning he is for sound quality since he listens at much higher than recommended volumes but he took it on vacation recently and was very glad he had it.

 

[polandro]

My partner whom I bought it for is happy with it. He bought a cheap cell that sucks but with this device he can use it as his MP3 player. The battery life seems good. Now I can't say how discerning he is for sound quality since he listens at much higher than recommended volumes but he took it on vacation recently and was very glad he had it.

Thanks for letting me know. Trying to justify a BTR5 or similar atm. Sigh.

 

[yseviel]

Thanks for letting me know. Trying to justify a BTR5 or similar atm. Sigh.

What are you using as earphones/headphones? I would think if you're on budget IEMs that such an expensive DAC might not get it's full benefit. I'm far from a source of expertise though. If you have some very nice headphones and would also use the DAC at home and don't have a bettter DAC/AMP setup there already then it might be worthwhile since you can get dual use out of the one product.

 

[REXNFX]

Dug this out of the cupboard recently, found it sounds great with my laptop but a bit weak with my android phone. Is this normal for phones to sound worse than laptops? I mainly use Tidal max.

 

[Mellowship]

What firmware are you using?

The handshake between the sonata and the usb port is somewhat tricky. My current phone is incompatible with it. After detecting, it disconnects. I guess different devices provide different information and thus different current to the chip, hence the difference in power/volume. Try fiddling with the 3 or 4 different firmware version to see if the differences persist.
Also, the sonata does not play well with low sensitivity headphones.

 

[REXNFX]

What firmware are you using?

The handshake between the sonata and the usb port is somewhat tricky. My current phone is incompatible with it. After detecting, it disconnects. I guess different devices provide different information and thus different current to the chip, hence the difference in power/volume. Try fiddling with the 3 or 4 different firmware version to see if the differences persist.
Also, the sonata does not play well with low sensitivity headphones.

Apparently an OTG cable should fix your incomparability issue, I use one but maybe that's the reason it doesn't sound so good.