[991 Carrera 4S]

Shanling UA4, official slides in english, copied from their website:

 

[Fuelbass]

Shanling UA4 received yesterday.
A beautiful object, well made, beautiful screen, excellent sound, very clear, very dynamic, very musical and which changes from others, very many recent dongles with Cirrus Logic or AKM.
Does not work with older versions of Android.

I was about to buy iBasso DC04 Pro but now I'm confused between iBasso DC04 Pro and Shanling UA4. Which one would you recommend between these two?

 

[laleeee]

Hi , the Shanling UA4 works with Android 11 ?

 

[991 Carrera 4S]

I received my Shanling UA4 yesterday and am very disappointed.
Because in UA4, basic things are badly implemented, so that the sound itself doesn't even matter.
I personally do not recommend buying it, until the following issues are fixed:

1) UA4 noise floor is bad. Clearly audible even with my quite un-sensitive ER4SR. This is no issue with iBasso DC04 Pro.
[Update] Noise floor for 3.5mm is fine. Noise floor for 4.4mm is bad.

2) UA4 auto-mute regularly cuts off the first beat of certain tracks. This is also no issue with iBasso DC04 Pro.

To mask/hide the bad noise floor, UA4 has some kind of auto-mute, that automatically mutes output if there is no audio playing. Unfortunately, the response time is too slow and it regularly cuts off the first beat of certain tracks. When changing tracks, it first mutes between the two tracks, but then at the start of the next track un-mutes too slowly and cuts off maybe the first 0.1s of the track. If a track immediately starts e.g. with a kickdrum within the first 0.1s of the track, then the kickdrum (or whatever else is in these first 0.1s) gets cut off.

3) UA4 volume control is annoying, even with the latest firmware update. Again, this is no issue with iBasso DC04 Pro.

Let's say you want to change volume by 5 volume steps.

UA4 with original firmware:
Press volume button, wait for display animation, volume didn't change, press volume button again, wait for display animation, volume changed +1, press volume button again, wait for display animation, volume changed +1, press volume button again, wait for display animation, volume changed +1, press volume button again, wait for display animation, volume changed +1, press volume button again, wait for display animation, volume changed +1. Done.

UA4 with latest firmware (V1.0.2):
Press volume button, wait for display animation, volume didn't change, press volume button 5 times in quick succession, wait for display animation, volume changed +5. Done.

iBasso DC04 Pro:
Press volume button 5 times in quick succession. Done.

This issues need to be fixed as soon as possible and UA4 should never have been sold in this unfinished state.

 

[bavlf]

I was about to buy iBasso DC04 Pro but now I'm confused between iBasso DC04 Pro and Shanling UA4. Which one would you recommend between these two?

I actually have both. Two excellent dongles, it is very difficult for me to give an opinion because I have only had the Shanling for a few days and what's more I have just changed the cable for my iem...
This UA4 is a very beautiful object, well finished, well manufactured, the sound is very dynamic, excellent transients too, very crystalline highs, very tight and deep bass, superb stereo image.
I don't use the screen or the three buttons, which are useless with Android of course.
After several days of listening, I think it will be the one I would listen to most commonly, but I have always preferred the ESS to the AKM or Cirrus...

 

[bavlf]

Hi , the Shanling UA4 works with Android 11 ?

Unfortunately on my Android 11 devices it does not work even with UAC1. But very well with 12 and windows 11, Linux, old windows phone.

 

[HifiFrog]

One feature I would like to see is that the display is not switched on at all when the volume is changed. It would be nice to have a setting option for this, which could also be deactivated by default.
The Fiio KA5, for example, does not switch on the display when the volume is changed, which I really like.

 

[laleeee]

One feature I would like to see is that the display is not switched on at all when the volume is changed. It would be nice to have a setting option for this, which could also be deactivated by default.
The Fiio KA5, for example, does not switch on the display when the volume is changed, which I really like.

which android version are you using?

 

[HifiFrog]

I am referring to:

Press volume button, wait for display animation

The animation is triggered by the hardware buttons on the device.
You can see this in action here:

I'm using iOS and wonder how the volume buttons on an iPhone behave with the device.

 

[991 Carrera 4S]

I am referring to:

The animation is triggered by the hardware buttons on the device.
You can see this in action here:

I'm using iOS and wonder how the volume buttons on an iPhone behave with the device.

This video shows volume control behaviour with original firmware.
With firmware update v1.0.2 it is less annoying, but still annoying.

 

[XERO1]

I'm using iOS and wonder how the volume buttons on an iPhone behave with the device.

With an iPhone, the volume control on the UA4 and the volume control on the iPhone both work simultaneously. Since the volume control on the UA4 is pretty sluggish and annoying to use (at least with the original firmware), I just set it to 100 on the UA4 and use my iPhone's volume control instead. It's not an ideal solution, but it works well enough for me.

Sound wise, I think the UA4 sounds quite good from its 3.5mm output. But from its 4.4mm output, it just sounds too up-front and in-your-face for me (I have the same complaint about the iBasso DC04Pro as well), but YMMV of course.

 

[Shanling]

Hi , the Shanling UA4 works with Android 11 ?

As long as your phone can work with USB DAC dongles, it should work fine with UA4. Android 11 should normally be supported.

I received my Shanling UA4 yesterday and am very disappointed.
Because in UA4, basic things are badly implemented, so that the sound itself doesn't even matter.
I personally do not recommend buying it, until the following issues are fixed:

1) UA4 noise floor is bad. Clearly audible even with my quite un-sensitive ER4SR. This is no issue with iBasso DC04 Pro.

2) UA4 auto-mute regularly cuts off the first beat of certain tracks. This is also no issue with iBasso DC04 Pro.

To mask/hide the bad noise floor, UA4 has some kind of auto-mute, that automatically mutes output if there is no audio playing. Unfortunately, the response time is too slow and it regularly cuts off the first beat of certain tracks. When changing tracks, it first mutes between the two tracks, but then at the start of the next track un-mutes too slowly and cuts off maybe the first 0.1s of the track. If a track immediately starts e.g. with a kickdrum within the first 0.1s of the track, then the kickdrum (or whatever else is in these first 0.1s) gets cut off.

3) UA4 volume control is annoying, even with the latest firmware update. Again, this is no issue with iBasso DC04 Pro.

Let's say you want to change volume by 5 volume steps.

UA4 with original firmware:
Press volume button, wait for display animation, volume didn't change, press volume button again, wait for display animation, volume changed +1, press volume button again, wait for display animation, volume changed +1, press volume button again, wait for display animation, volume changed +1, press volume button again, wait for display animation, volume changed +1, press volume button again, wait for display animation, volume changed +1. Done.

UA4 with latest firmware (V1.0.2):
Press volume button, wait for display animation, volume didn't change, press volume button 5 times in quick succession, wait for display animation, volume changed +5. Done.

iBasso DC04 Pro:
Press volume button 5 times in quick succession. Done.

This issues need to be fixed as soon as possible and UA4 should never have been sold in this unfinished state.

1) Are you talking about hiss? Or some distortion or anything else?
What device and cable are you using for UA4?

2) Can you please try to adjust the "Idle Time" on your UA4 to Off? It should help in this situation, but it will have impact on power demand.

3) I'm personally also quite unhappy with it, we will discuss it further if it can be made more reactive (like on our UA5)

One feature I would like to see is that the display is not switched on at all when the volume is changed. It would be nice to have a setting option for this, which could also be deactivated by default.
The Fiio KA5, for example, does not switch on the display when the volume is changed, which I really like.

Will check on that with software team.

With an iPhone, the volume control on the UA4 and the volume control on the iPhone both work simultaneously. Since the volume control on the UA4 is pretty sluggish and annoying to use (at least with the original firmware), I just set it to 100 on the UA4 and use my iPhone's volume control instead. It's not an ideal solution, but it works well enough for me.

Sound wise, I think the UA4 sounds quite good from its 3.5mm output. But from its 4.4mm output, it just sounds too up-front and in-your-face for me (I have the same complaint about the iBasso DC04Pro as well), but YMMV of course.

Please try updating to the newer firmware, it adjusted how the volume control works.

 

[991 Carrera 4S]

@Shanling
Do any of UA1, UA1s, UA1 Plus, UA2, UA2 Plus, UA3, UA4, UA5 support in-line microphone (4-pole 3.5mm CTIA TRRS)?

No

Thank you very much.

 

[Fuelbass]

I actually have both. Two excellent dongles, it is very difficult for me to give an opinion because I have only had the Shanling for a few days and what's more I have just changed the cable for my iem...
This UA4 is a very beautiful object, well finished, well manufactured, the sound is very dynamic, excellent transients too, very crystalline highs, very tight and deep bass, superb stereo image.
I don't use the screen or the three buttons, which are useless with Android of course.
After several days of listening, I think it will be the one I would listen to most commonly, but I have always preferred the ESS to the AKM or Cirrus...

Thanks. I've Android and I'm really not confident buying UA4. iBasso works flawlessly with Android. I think I should wait for iBasso DC06 Pro and see how they implement ESS compared to UA4.

 

[bavlf]

As long as your phone can work with USB DAC dongles, it should work fine with UA4. Android 11 should normally be supported.

This is absolutely not the case.
For me the UA4 works very well (very well and with excellent musicality, thank you!) with a Redmi 9 with android 12 & tablet Samsung Tab S7 FE with android 13, but not recognized with my Xiaomi Note 10 (android 11) or my Lenovo tablet Lenovo Tab M10 FHD Plus (mk 2 with 11).