[jolivhires]

Today I received an A306 from Bic Camera (via buyee) which does not have the bass issue, confirmed via REW. It sounds dramatically better, and tests perfectly flat.

The only issue is that the screen has several stuck pixels that persist even through multiple reboots and runs of a pixel refresher. Sigh. I guess I'll be sending both of my units back to Japan until this whole mess is sorted out.

1000443: a306 | US | Best buy : issue
1000613: a306 | YY1301B1 | Black | US | sony.com | REW Graphed : issue
1001704: a307 | Japan | eBay | REW Graphed: no issue
10033xx: a306 | Japan | eBay | REW Graphed : no issue
1003647: a306 | YY1301B1 | Black | Japan | Amazon.jp | REW Graphed : no issue
1005860: a306 | YY1301B1 | Black | Japan | Amazon.jp | REW Graphed : issue
1006471: a306 | YY1301B1 | Black | Japan | Amazon.jp | REW Graphed : no issue
1100033: a306 | YY1301B1 | Black | UAE | Sony Store | Graphed: issue
2000246: a306 | YY1301B1 | Blue | Japan | eBay | REW Graphed : issue
20037XX: a306 | ? | Blue | Japan | ? | REW Graphed: no issue
3000045: a306 | HK | DMA Store | issue
3000108: ? | ? | ? : issue
3000840: a307 | YY1301B2 | Grey | Japan | Amazon.jp | REW Graphed : no issue
30039xx: a306 | YY1301B1 | Gray | Japan | eBay | REW Graphed: issue
5000078: a306 | YY1301B1 | Black | Singapore | REW Graphed : no issue
2001129: a306 | YY1301B1 | Blue | Japan | Bic Camera | REW Graphed : no issue

New comer: I haven’t seen any mention to devices sold in Europe: after spotting this forum I was much in doubt to buy it- but after reading user reviews from Amazon Germany I didn’t see any mention to the issue reported (or they don’t know how to detect it ?!?). Being almost out of stock I gave it a go and ordered from Amazon Germany-hope mine doesn’t have the issue-should have it on March 10-will report back with my findings.

 

[cliffjnr]

ive just realised the corrugated back is made of plastic and only the outer edge frame is aluminium

 

[Lyzar]

New comer: I haven’t seen any mention to devices sold in Europe: after spotting this forum I was much in doubt to buy it- but after reading user reviews from Amazon Germany I didn’t see any mention to the issue reported (or they don’t know how to detect it ?!?). Being almost out of stock I gave it a go and ordered from Amazon Germany-hope mine doesn’t have the issue-should have it on March 10-will report back with my findings.

Made quite a few posts in this thread , have a look I have a version from Amazon Germany and have none of the issues either. Am very pleased with it so far.

I do recommend measuring tho and returning if you have the bass issue

 

[bcarr112281]

New comer: I haven’t seen any mention to devices sold in Europe: after spotting this forum I was much in doubt to buy it- but after reading user reviews from Amazon Germany I didn’t see any mention to the issue reported (or they don’t know how to detect it ?!?). Being almost out of stock I gave it a go and ordered from Amazon Germany-hope mine doesn’t have the issue-should have it on March 10-will report back with my findings.

There’s a new post on Reddit that a buyer from the Netherlands is encountering the issue. As I recall, there are other such posts from Europe.

 

[jolivhires]

Question regarding MQA: looked "everywhere" and I couldn't find the level of MQA decode/unfold of the A306 - specs within many different sites just state "MQA supported".
Being a device that supports up to 32bit/384KHz (in some formats) as well as DSD256 can we assume it decodes / unfolds 8X ? (- that is up to 352.8KHz). Does anyone could find such a specification ?

 

[jolivhires]

There’s a new post on Reddit that a buyer from the Netherlands is encountering the issue. As I recall, there are other such posts from Europe.

Ok - question is did they bought from Europe source or eventually from HK / SGP / JP ?

 

[cliffjnr]

Ok - question is did they bought from Europe source or eventually from HK / SGP / JP ?

if it helps i bought the blue uk/eu version from amazon UK and it has no issues as far as i can tell.

 

[cliffjnr]

ok ive been favouring tracks in the walkman all which is a pain cos of the annoying pop up every time u press star.

is there a way to sav the data in case something was corrupted or i changed the walkman etc. id hate to have to do this again

cheers

 

[emilsoft]

anyone experiencing some issues in dac mode - sometimes signal cuts out, i tried two different cables (on macbook).. seems a bit iffy. Say in 5 minutes it cuts out 3 times.. also data transfer is flaky, cuts out from time to time and I have to retry.

 

[psikey]

ive just realised the corrugated back is made of plastic and only the outer edge frame is aluminium

Yep, have rubbish WiFi/BT if a metal back. Previous was same.

 

[psikey]

Question regarding MQA: looked "everywhere" and I couldn't find the level of MQA decode/unfold of the A306 - specs within many different sites just state "MQA supported".
Being a device that supports up to 32bit/384KHz (in some formats) as well as DSD256 can we assume it decodes / unfolds 8X ? (- that is up to 352.8KHz). Does anyone could find such a specification ?

I think most software only MQA unfolds are just the one (UAPP & Tidal app are). Its the Walkman software that does it, not a dedicated chip like in say the Hiby R5GII which is 8 times, but honestly I can't hear the difference of more than one unfold.

 

[psikey]

anyone experiencing some issues in dac mode - sometimes signal cuts out, i tried two different cables (on macbook).. seems a bit iffy. Say in 5 minutes it cuts out 3 times.. also data transfer is flaky, cuts out from time to time and I have to retry.

Only time I used DAC mode was for the REW Sweep test, so no experience actually using it. May give it a try with my SurfacePro9.

 

[jolivhires]

I think most software only MQA unfolds are just the one (UAPP & Tidal app are). Its the Walkman software that does it, not a dedicated chip like in say the Hiby R5GII which is 8 times, but honestly I can't hear the difference of more than one unfold.

Tidal app - or for example Audirvana (Win, MacOS), UAPP (android) - does the core (call it software) unfold (1st level) - resulting in a max 44.1 / 48KHz stream and that's what you get/hear depending on the source recording. Some DAC's render/unfold to 4. 8 or 16X. I have an ifi Zen Air desktop DAC - configured as MQA renderer (which in fact it is) on Audirvana - which informs on screen the bit depth / rate which the ifi DAC is reproducing - and always matches what is coming from Tidal - tested several Tidal Master tracks from 48 / 96 / 192 up to 352.8KHz. A full MQA decoder device (Fiio Q3 / Hiby R3 pro etc) also have the 1st level (core) implemented, so you can configure "MQA passthrough" in Tidal (releasing CPU load) or directly decode mqa.flac files from your storage library.

 

[jolivhires]

Made quite a few posts in this thread , have a look I have a version from Amazon Germany and have none of the issues either. Am very pleased with it so far.

I do recommend measuring tho and returning if you have the bass issue

Thank you - I hope to be as lucky as you being from same batch

 

[psikey]

Tidal app - or for example Audirvana (Win, MacOS), UAPP (android) - does the core (call it software) unfold (1st level) - resulting in a max 44.1 / 48KHz stream and that's what you get/hear depending on the source recording. Some DAC's render/unfold to 4. 8 or 16X. I have an ifi Zen Air desktop DAC - configured as MQA renderer (which in fact it is) on Audirvana - which informs on screen the bit depth / rate which the ifi DAC is reproducing - and always matches what is coming from Tidal - tested several Tidal Master tracks from 48 / 96 / 192 up to 352.8KHz. A full MQA decoder device (Fiio Q3 / Hiby R3 pro etc) also have the 1st level (core) implemented, so you can configure "MQA passthrough" in Tidal (releasing CPU load) or directly decode mqa.flac files from your storage library.

Well, I have some actual MQA files that do show as 24/192 in Walkman Music app which is good enough for me. I can't tell a 96 vs 192 track.