Stuff Jones
1000+ Head-Fier
- Joined
- Feb 6, 2011
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whats the battery life?
Do you even know the price? How on earth would you hate something you haven't used?
He said he hates the design, the screen and UI. All of these can be seen from the pictures without purchasing first
I'm not criticising you, nor saying he's right. Just offering some clarity
I have mixed feelings about it.
Funnily enough, I was actually thinking to buy an Alien Gold.
I've got a pair of Noble Katana and Trinity Audio PM6 on the way, and not enough money to buy (e.g.) an Onkyo DP-X1A or Fiio X5iii or similar mid/upper-mid tier DAPs.
I currently have an xDuoo X3 (Rockboxed), but it keeps freezing and crashing. So I was hoping to find something with mid-fi level sound at a bargain price, and the Alien Gold had all these glowing reviews (regarding the sound at least).
Also, I loved the unique appearence of the Alien Gold, and was actually quite comfortable with the screenless design, since my general modus operandi is to walk around with the DAP in my pocket and change tracks etc using the physical buttons. I figure I can just buy some cheap 2 or 4GB micro-SD cards and put individual playlists or artist discographies on each.
However, whilst reading up on the Alien Gold on Head-Fi, I came across this thread (via someone's review of the Alien+).
So it was quite frustrating to read that it seemed to offer significantly improved sound quality over the Alien Gold, especially as I was pretty much ready to pull the trigger on that lol.
Also, one thing I didn't like about the Alien Gold was that it didn't offer MP3 support, and this does!
I try to use FLAC exclusively, but some tracks are only available to me in MP3. So it would mean going into each of my existing playlists and folders and removing all MP3 tracks (and losing songs that I love).
But then, Alien+ has the higher price. At $300 (US Dollars), which I heard mentioned on here, it's just about within range, although still a bit too high ($200 better for me right now).
But then I checked the price in China using a currency converter and it's looking more like $400, so I'm really not sure what the final price of this is supposed to be?
For the record, I'm actually in the UK, so I'd be using British pounds anyway lol
I agree that the styling of this thing is a big step backwards.
The Alien lacked a screen, but otherwise looked pretty sleek, unique and advanced. Nearly all DAPs these days seem based around the same oblong shape (with optional bits added onto the sides or top to make it look slightly different).
One thing I'd have hoped is that Shozy could have brought out something like the Alien that looked markedly different from the rest of the field, since this seems to be a strength of theirs.
I know there are budget and manufacturing constraints, but you know..
Whilst of course I'd love a full sized touchscreen, I do appreciate the design ethos of Shozy here, which is that sound performance is the goal, and (within budget restraints), shiny tech can cannibalise that, and also create more things to go wrong.
I just feel that perhaps this player has neglected one of their strengths (cool and unique design), perhaps tried to compromise to much in terms of bells and whistles, and hence ended up at a price that is not an ideal fit for such a stripped-down DAP experience.
On the other hand, if they've improved the sound even more, that's hugely commendable. I'd be interested to hear comparisons between the Alien Gold, Alien+, and other mid-fi DAPs, especially the ones I mentioned in this post
So are most high end machine that got no good UI? It is not an excuse for us to input less on UI and keep yelling it is a highend direction. If you know how much it will be worsen, you will feel like it is more pathetic... test it and see if it is a wanna-be or a real deal
Do you even know the price? How on earth would you hate something you haven't used?
He said he hates the design, the screen and UI. All of these can be seen from the pictures without purchasing first
I'm not criticising you, nor saying he's right. Just offering some clarity
Yet he criticizes it based on a price that's not known. Also it's kind of his MO.
The price is shown on the website, $435 have a look:http://www.shozy-hk.com/alien/
Originally Posted by BruceBanner /img/forum/go_quote.gif
I'm not at all sure what yer trying to say here? I think yer saying that yer not alone in being an expensive high end machine with crap UI, and um.. yeh... they are overpriced garbage as well! You designers think you can ride on the back of presenting unbelievable sound quality at the expense of features and UI, where in reality yer just cost saving. Already you've gone back on yer original statement saying a 'screen brings in unwanted sound quality artifacts' by releasing a DAP with a screen! Like... adding m3u support, lyrics, favourties,
OTG playlist building, MP3 support all adds to a diminished sound quality experience LOL! Yer browsing by folder structure only oddly doesn't affect sound quality! ID3 tag database BAD! lmao... it's just unskilled coding and expense saving.
Let's get back on track shall we?
After all that's why we are here on this particular thread to find out more about this music player.
If you don't mind me asking : when can we have the full specifications and battery life?
Thank you Charles.
I think I will wait for the final build and test it then.
Most will probably just use 16/44 anyway which will increase battery life.
The sound was great, above the Alien Gold I thought and with a slightly different signature.