Hippo Biscuit Music Player Review
Apr 23, 2015 at 5:49 AM Post #32 of 45
Well my Hippos Biscuit + arrived today. It has a metal clasp/clip on the back and looks as tho there is a slider for shuffle on/off. Anyone else's biscuit have this?


Not mine... How does it sound though? I didnt even know a new version like that came out
 
Apr 23, 2015 at 5:15 PM Post #33 of 45
I haven't actually had the chance to test yet. Yesterday I was v.busy, flat out, all I had time for was a charge, which by the way I have no manual at all... what happens when yer charging yer hippo? Mine goes solid green, stays solid green during charge, been hours now, doesn't change colour or go off :S
 
Apr 23, 2015 at 6:52 PM Post #34 of 45
Mine has a red/green light go on at the same time when charging. Press middle button once to play(flashing green) or pause.  Or if no light (off), hold a few seconds to turn on or hold a few seconds for off. Sort of makes me want to try the hippo + if its any good. 
 
Apr 26, 2015 at 5:46 PM Post #35 of 45
I haven't actually had the chance to test yet. Yesterday I was v.busy, flat out, all I had time for was a charge, which by the way I have no manual at all... what happens when yer charging yer hippo? Mine goes solid green, stays solid green during charge, been hours now, doesn't change colour or go off :S


Did you end up keeping it? Or get the original one?
 
Apr 26, 2015 at 5:54 PM Post #36 of 45
Oh I do have it, will be keeping it :)

I have today off, I aim to do some A/B testing and pics to follow. Stay tuned :)
 
So managed to sit down today and do a little bit of sound testing. As promised here are some pics;
 
 

 
As you can see, the headphone jack is placed on the bottom, this would be my first gripe. It means when it's clasped on yer hip (via it's clasp) the headphone jack faces the floor, and the controls don't make much sense from this angle either.
I personally prefer using my magnetic clasp to attach my DAPs to clothing, which basically involves just a magnetic name badge stuck on the rear of the DAP and then the opposing magnet placed under clothing on the other side. A dap weighing 40g like this one can easily stay in place, even running. You also get the choice of which way it faces and where to place the DAP also.
Meh... I'll trial it out for a bit before attempting to remove the clip.
 

 
Some A/B testing. Pretty tricky with two screenless daps, I had to try and get volume on par and then get them both to play the same song at same time (which is harder than it looks). I did get pretty close however so that flicking the switch left to right was hard to notice a difference (timing wise).
 
 

 
There is an additional button here, I believe it to be shuffle on/off. But the curious thing is that I loaded two microsdcards (one for each player) with the EXACT same songs, same files, same filenames etc, but they were playing in a different order to one another. I'm pretty sure the Shozy was playing them the right way, it seems as tho the Hippo was shuffling somewhat, even tho i never changed that button, and as u can see I think its in normal mode and not shuffle :/
More experimenting required. Could be the Hippo reads tags and was playing songs in the alphabetical order (thereby omitting the 01, 02 etc of file names).
 
 

 
The Metal Clasp.


This is not a review, I did a 30min sit down and tried to get it closely volume matched with the Shozy, but first impressions are very good indeed.
- The Shozy is much louder, and I had to be careful to bring the volume down to match the Hippo's full volume otherwise you can be fooled into thinking 'louder is better'.
- The controls are much better on the Hippo, better spaced out, easier to push blindly.
- It might be my imagination, but I think the Hippo resume plays and does a 'search/skipping' through a song if you push and hold down 'next' or 'previous' buttons. It also resumes previous volume used (i think). Again i need much more play time with this thing.
- During A/B testing, I could easily tell which device was which at certain times, but it's very song dependent. During hectic heavy metal moments where lots of thrashing and multiple instruments is happening I don't think I could tell them apart blinded. But on quieter moments, intros and other genres there is a significant difference. To me they both have V shaped signatures, very similar and alike, the Shozy perhaps smoother and more detailed, the Hippo slightly duller. But to be honest I haven't decided which I like better yet, 'dull' suggests worse, but I don't mean it in that way.
- Both are hiss free, tho the Hippo + makes more strange noises when changing track and going on/off/pause etc.
- Gapless? I dunno yet, will find out.
- The hippo's 'next track' button is quite a bit more recessed than the rest, meh.

All in all I'm thinking it's perhaps gonna be a 'poor mans Shozy' but it might actually be better, also far more Gym friendly (which is why I initially bought it).

I'll keep u posted as I use it more throughout the week.
 
Apr 28, 2015 at 5:51 AM Post #37 of 45
Oh dear... there seems to be a large prolonged static noise between tracks, it's extremely intolerable. My unit is getting sent back for further investigation and testing to see if all Biscuit +'s do this.
 
Apr 28, 2015 at 11:54 AM Post #38 of 45
Oh dear... there seems to be a large prolonged static noise between tracks, it's extremely intolerable. My unit is getting sent back for further investigation and testing to see if all Biscuit +'s do this.

Maybe its time to try the original?
 
Jun 3, 2015 at 11:39 PM Post #40 of 45
I finally did a review of the Hippo Biscuit+, it's here if anyone cares to read, unfortunately it's a thumbs down from me...
 
http://www.head-fi.org/products/hippo-biscuit/reviews/13280
 
Apr 13, 2016 at 11:24 PM Post #41 of 45
Can this biscuit play the format of m4a downloaded from iTunes? 
confused_face(1).gif

 
Mar 17, 2017 at 5:09 AM Post #44 of 45
Came across this player on the cheap about 1 year ago, but hardly ever used it .. I wanted to attache to some portable speakers, but always would get a mean crackling when I started up the device, or dared touching any buttons ... 
 
Now I tried again, wanting to use it to feed a 10h white noise mp3 to my bed speakers .. and it just stopped playing after 15 minutes ... my guess would be that the battery is like 5 years old (even if barely used), but that middle green button thing still keeps working .. 
 
Maybe I don't fully understand the functionality of that MCB, long press to turn on / off? 
 
Anyone still having fun with this? I never understood the hype, but then I saw just how old this thread is and back then this thing must have been the bees knees  :) 
 
Mar 17, 2017 at 8:50 AM Post #45 of 45
  Came across this player on the cheap about 1 year ago, but hardly ever used it .. I wanted to attache to some portable speakers, but always would get a mean crackling when I started up the device, or dared touching any buttons ... 
 
Now I tried again, wanting to use it to feed a 10h white noise mp3 to my bed speakers .. and it just stopped playing after 15 minutes ... my guess would be that the battery is like 5 years old (even if barely used), but that middle green button thing still keeps working .. 
 
Maybe I don't fully understand the functionality of that MCB, long press to turn on / off? 
 
Anyone still having fun with this? I never understood the hype, but then I saw just how old this thread is and back then this thing must have been the bees knees  :) 

nah, it sits in my drawer looking nice. I think mine is bugged, the shuffle switch placed on or off, doesn't matter, but 50 files thrown in and it gets 'stuck' bouncing between two files back and forth. Skipping doesn't help. Shame, I liked the design but its useful literally for me to play just one track at a time.
 

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