Quote:
Originally Posted by CaptSnuffy
I've been reading reviews of this DAP, but I still feel like I don't have a solid impression of it. Does anyone who's owned it at any point have any opinions on this player?
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Hello there, I got the iAudio U3 (2GB in black) off of eBay about 2 weeks ago. So far so good, I'll try to break it down as good as I can, pardon my english, it's lacking a lot in the way of spelling, etc.
The UI is very intuitive and easy to learn and get used to (similar to that of the iAudio 5). Also, the LCD screen even though it's pretty small, it's got very good quality and crisp colors, I am confortable even when using it under sun light outdoors. You can set a wallpaper from your images when in Music mode, video plays well too, after and easy convertion process using jetAudio (which I don't really like much having to install, only use the conversion app) I just drag the file and drop it into the U3 as it mounts as a removable drive in XP, videos are 15fps xvid of some sort, the app has been able to convert everything I've thrown at it so far, and quite fast aswell.
You can set it to use it as Media Player device aswell (doesn't mount in XP as a drive but you can sync and whatnot with Win Media Player and other software).
I has a lot of options to tweak, EQ is OK it comes with the usual presets and a USR customizable one, the other digital audio enhancements such as BBE and MP are alright depending the type of music you listen to, some tunes sound better than other, I tend to leave these off when possible and only use some EQ. Overall the sound quality is quite good. I can't make many comparisons since my last unit was an iAudio 5 player, but compared to this one I think they are on par, the U3 doesn't make many digital noises that I could hear with the iAudio 5 (like when changing tracks, and other operations inside the menu).
I am using firmware 1.21 off the iAudio.com site, no crashes or unusual behaviour whatsoever, USB transfer speed is quite good, battery life is nice aswell to me, lasts over a week of daily commute and light use at home, it charges only via USB (although you can buy an AC to USB converter almost anywhere) the internal battery charges pretty fast too, in about one hour is about 80% charged.
Picture viewing is kinda weird with such a small PMP, pictures show rather fast under the explorer interface, you can zoom one level and i think you can't pan, or I haven't had enough interest to find out, I really don't have much use for the picture viewing feature, nor the text or lyric viewing, but it's there and it works.
It also has quite a lot of extra features, voice recording with internal or external mic (though I think theres a bug in the current firmware that when recording with an external mic both mics are active and a weird effect ocurrs), line in rec (limited to 128kbps mp3), radio rec (limited to 128kbps), radio reception could be improved but it's OK.
I have been playing all kinds of MP3s, be it VBR EAC encoded by me, downloads, etc, and they all play without a hitch, I tried the FLAC support and works, not much logic using FLAC in a 2GB portable player with all of the street noise and all, but it's there, have also tested WMA, have not tried
with OGG.
I've played the unit connecting it to my stereo, setting all audio enhancement off and eq to normal, volume to 38 and it doesn't seem to distort to my judgement, sounds pretty good.
The build quality is really good, sturdy and well built, the joystick thing doesn't look fragile at all.
I use the U3 coupled with Shure's E2Cs and I am really happy with the purchase, it's really very small and the screen is quite bright so I often get stared at when at the bus, pretty cool little unit.
I would advise you to get it, I think I payed about 180USD for it at some eBay auction, brand new.