[ThomasHK]

   
Gibson also owns Teac and Philips. Which is why Onkyo collaborated with Philips to make the hybrid iem and headphones in OP, and why Onkyo and Teac collaborated to make P90SD and HA-300.

Small correction: Gibson does not own Philips. Read the full story here: http://www.gibsoninnovations.com/en/news/woox-innovations-becomes-gibson-innovations
 

Gibson Innovations today set out its ambition to drive growth in music lifestyle across its dynamic portfolio of consumer brands. Acquired by parent company Gibson Brands, Inc. in June 2014, the former Lifestyle Entertainment Business of Royal Philips is setting out a strategy focusing on a portfolio of brands that each represents the highest quality and value for consumers across a range of market segments.
 

Gibson Brands acquired the business from Royal Philips as part of its ambition to become the world's #1 music lifestyle company. The acquisition followed the company's investments in audio brands including Onkyo and TEAC. Gibson Brands is a privately held company with a portfolio of music and audio brands for both consumer and professionals, across the full journey of music: creation, performance and experience. Complementing Gibson Brands' musical instruments and professional audio divisions, Gibson Innovations is dedicated to bringing the finest experiences to consumers.
 

So the Lifestyle Entertainment Business (Audio, Home Cinema, Headphones, etc etc ...) of Philips is now part of Gibson brands as Gibson Innovations. 

 

[T.R.A.N.C.E.]

^ I know, but in the context of head-fi, aka audio gear, Gibson owns Philips, I felt no need to mention that Gibson doesn't own the house hold appliances division of Philips in the context of head-fi...
 

[color=rgb(33, 33, 33)] I am aware that no one heard the new players yet. You who have deep understanding surrounding the implementation of electronics do you want to speculate in how much difference sonically the balanced Onkyo makes when running unbalanced compared with Pioneers single setup. Right now I have no balanced headphone. By my understanding so far it seems that the general difference between the players is about the balanced to unbalanced implementation when it comes to hardware. [/color]

 
I'm not going to speculate on the SQ of balanced as it is controversial, but in terms of power, Balanced DP-X1 will definitely be twice as powerful as Single ended XDP-100R, simply due to the two amplifiers running in parallel BTL in DP-X1 as opposed to the single amp of XDP-100R.
 
DP-X1 will also have a feature called ACG or Active Control Gound, I can't speculate on SQ as it is an industry first in the dap world that no one has experience with, but it does sound interesting, and XDP-100R will not have it as it requires two amplifiers, as present in DP-X1.

 

[Heartsmart]

^ I know, but in the context of head-fi, aka audio gear, Gibson owns Philips, I felt no need to mention that Gibson doesn't own the house hold appliances division of Philips in the context of head-fi...


I'm not going to speculate on the SQ of balanced as it is controversial, but in terms of power, Balanced DP-X1 will definitely be twice as powerful as Single ended XDP-100R, simply due to the two amplifiers running in parallel BTL in DP-X1 as opposed to the single amp of XDP-100R.

DP-X1 will also have a feature called ACG or Active Control Gound, I can't speculate on SQ as it is an industry first in the dap world that no one has experience with, but it does sound interesting, and XDP-100R will not have it as it requires two amplifiers, as present in DP-X1.

Thanks, I think I'll wait to order. right now it feels like I want the Onkyo. If it not becomes too costly.

 

[John Milton]

I have a question perhaps not only about this upcoming Onkyo (and Pioneer) DAP, but one that also applies on other rather expensive music players in the $500-1000 dollar range:

What is a reasonable 'life expectancy'? for a product like this, that might end up costing around a 1000 dollars? I think a 2 year warranty is standard, but what happens after that? I'm sure after some time the battery power wil start to lessen, can it be replaced in high end Daps (I know this information might not be available yet about the unreleased DAP's)? Or do most people simply buy new ones after a couple of years anyway? Similarly, when there's a defect after the warranty period has passed, is it customary/possible that high end DAP's can be repaired for a reasonable price, or is this a market where buying a new one is cheaper than having it repaired?

I guess I never had to worry about this with an iPod, even with the most expensive ones. If it breaks, tough luck, you buy a new one. But now I'm about to invest in something like this, that costs 4 times as much, I do kind of worry it might break down after 30 months.

Any experiences/thoughts in this area?

 

[musicday]

Invest in a Tera player if that's what you want,not only that you get 6 !!! Years warranty, but it will never break and there is no firmware upgrade needed.

 

[T.R.A.N.C.E.]

Are you joking? No one in their right mind would pay 7.5k for that garage project of a dap, who the hell cares if it has 6 year warranty, it should have a freaking lifetime warranty for 7.5K as it has less features than a bloody ant farm.
 

 

[derGabe]

  Are you joking? No one in their right mind would pay 7.5k for that garage project of a dap, who the hell cares if it has 6 year warranty, it should have a freaking lifetime warranty for 7.5K as it has less features than a bloody ant farm.
 

Musicday is an ultra Tera Player Fanboy. Don't be too hard on him. Allthough you are right. For 7.5k i expect this DAP to make me breakfast every day.

 

[x RELIC x]

Are you joking? No one in their right mind would pay 7.5k for that garage project of a dap, who the hell cares if it has 6 year warranty, it should have a freaking lifetime warranty for 7.5K as it has less features than a bloody ant farm.

Agree about the price, but it does have one feature, the only feature that really matters..... outstanding, natural and realistic sound reproduction that is supposed to trump any DSD complaint player. I was strongly considering the Tera player before the price skyrocketed.

 

[T.R.A.N.C.E.]

^ Imo Tera is just a very simple R2R dac player, the analog sound simply comes from the R2R dac and very simple implementation. It is unique in that there are no other daps like it, but there is nothing special about it in terms of design and tech. The only other daps with R2R dacs are HM801 and MA9, of which the HM801 had awful implementation, and MA9 was better but far from ideal. People rave about Tera simply because there is no other decent R2R dac devices around to compare with, hence Tera has a unique sound in the dap world.
 
Look at Tera's circuitry, there is like 3 things on there, Imo the reason for the Tera price hike was to prevent a Chinese company buying one to do a knock off version because it would be so damn easy...
 

 

[musicday]

What you are showing there in the photos is the first Tera prototype with a micro sd card support.
What you have forgotten to mention is the ARM coding programming that's inside the chip.
Similar to what's inside Hugo but different.
How you gona copy that without the code source?
Meanwhile Tera is leading in simplicity and SQ

 

[T.R.A.N.C.E.]

^ Someone with software knowledge can quite easily extract the firmware package from the chip, or directly dump the flash memory, especially from a well known simple chip like ARM V3 which has pre-defined memory addresses available to all. Basically any Chinese company could ripp-off the Tera, and imo Tera's price went from 1K to 7.5K because the creator realized this and didn't want his creation to become "ordinary". I still wouldn't even buy Tera for 1K...
.

 

[Hawaiibadboy]

Agree about the price, but it does have one feature, the only feature that really matters..... outstanding, natural and realistic sound reproduction that is supposed to trump any DSD complaint player. I was strongly considering the Tera player before the price skyrocketed.

I heard a Tera in Tokyo and was put off by the form factor then the price was related to me and well...I LOL'd and the owner did too but he owns like 14   7/11 locations and drives a pimped out Hummer...he's like 55 years old and can't spend money fast enough. Japan....it's a trip sometimes and the folks are unique.

 
BTW I downloaded the Android tools to mod/theme Poweramp and man...that is waaaay less fun than image editing

 

[Orky261]

Almost pulled my trigger for ZX100, holy crap this year has been crazy. Well as for the price mentioned I think $500-$600 for the pioneer version will be possible, considering how ZX100 is 500GBP in UK and in INDONESIA it's 500 USD, I could see Onkyo going for $800-1000. I really hope this brings a wind of change in DAP market, I'm tired of seeing people shoving AK products in front of me, the "upgrade" from each product line doesn't justify the $500-1000 step up.

 

[AUDIOBREEDER]

  Almost pulled my trigger for ZX100, holy crap this year has been crazy. Well as for the price mentioned I think $500-$600 for the pioneer version will be possible, considering how ZX100 is 500GBP in UK and in INDONESIA it's 500 USD, I could see Onkyo going for $800-1000. I really hope this brings a wind of change in DAP market, I'm tired of seeing people shoving AK products in front of me, the "upgrade" from each product line doesn't justify the $500-1000 step up.

Enter the 'silent ninjas' JVC / Panasonic into the DAP world and we will have a flood gate in our hands.
 
On topic, this dap is shaping up nicely. Its going to be close call with ZX100 or this one for me. If this is price under $800 I will be a happy camper!

 

[x RELIC x]

Spoiler: Warning: Spoiler!

^ Imo Tera is just a very simple R2R dac player, the analog sound simply comes from the R2R dac and very simple implementation. It is unique in that there are no other daps like it, but there is nothing special about it in terms of design and tech. The only other daps with R2R dacs are HM801 and MA9, of which the HM801 had awful implementation, and MA9 was better but far from ideal. People rave about Tera simply because there is no other decent R2R dac devices around to compare with, hence Tera has a unique sound in the dap world.

Look at Tera's circuitry, there is like 3 things on there, Imo the reason for the Tera price hike was to prevent a Chinese company buying one to do a knock off version because it would be so damn easy...

[COLOR=FF4400]
[/COLOR]

Yes, I'm well aware of the Tera's simplicity, nothing wrong with that. SQ is king IMO. You also forgot about the HM60x DAPs that are also R-2R using the Phillips TDA1543.

The new Pioneer and Onkyo DAPs look interesting. Would be neat to have direct comparisons with the X7 given the different chips chosen (desktop vs mobile) and their implementation. Wondering also about amp implementations. I'm not hung up on interface features.