[Hifi59]

Well you guys do make a great fish and chips plate!
We still love our England friends!
Seriously though, Europe taxes are crazy high.

 

[nc8000]

One slot of memory card is good enough. People threw 200gb memory card on it and it works fine. Zx2 is a Good DAP, used one can be found for $600-700 range ? That is right where new DP-x1 would be. Would the Zx2 outperform DP-x1 ? I am not sure, I briefly compared to mojo and I like my zx2 better. I ordered DP-X1 and we shall see. However, the problem is that the DP-X1 is not friendly to 3rd party apps, where as Zx2 will welcome them any time.

According to this, I would suggest if you stream music a lot, get a zx2 ...

Unless Apple Music is required as that app will not work on Android 4.2 and I expect that other apps will follow that trend so new versions might no longer work on ZX2

 

[Daxterous]

Seems I got the ZX2 at a good time
Poweramp is one of the players I had already on my trusty Note 4, and the code works in whitigir  link.
Always have used Poweramp on the phone because it has the best interface, so that's just a bonus now that it marries the ZX2 so nicely.
 
Thanks for keeping us all up to date whitigir

 

[Nephorsis]

Not sure if anyone has made the comparisons in here before but was wondering if anyone had compared the Astell&Kerns with Sony DAPs before..?

 

[mcemce13]

Compared to an AK120ii I liked better the Sony. I did miss some features of the AK like the DAP acting as a DAC connected to the computer USB. I guess Sony want ppl to buy the PHA 3 for that.

 

[Nephorsis]

Did the non-expandable memory cause any issues for you?

 

[Whitigir]

Seems I got the ZX2 at a good time
Poweramp is one of the players I had already on my trusty Note 4, and the code works in whitigir  link.
Always have used Poweramp on the phone because it has the best interface, so that's just a bonus now that it marries the ZX2 so nicely.

Thanks for keeping us all up to date whitigir

You are very welcome I am always glad to help

 

[cjpinner]

Alright, since more than a couple of you guys is enjoying "power amp Alpha". I will go ahead and details what I have found.

Poweramp alpha solved 2 biggest problems within the Zx2: upper mid/lower trebles regions and slight background noises, these were not well played out in Stock player, disabled sound enhancement did bring them out to be better and more details. Onkyo Hf player app and Gonemad app also did bring these details out, but there would be some "background noises" for all of these above solutions. However, while we were stuck with it, Zx2 were still a good performer with TRRS anyways. Yet, I was still not quiet satisfied, and continue to seek for something better in these 2 reasons "lower-trebles energies, and background noises"

Voila, then I found Poweramp Alpha "this version is totally different than the one in the Google market place now" alpha is a test version but newest and being developed on. This alpha had new algorithms (audio engine). It captured my moments, attentions, right immediately, which none of the above apps did, and if you have notice...it took me a while to have found those solutions for the above "temporary fix". Yes, the lower-trebles energies were presenting, strongly, very defined, bold, and stand out....next up were the Insturments pace, each of the instruments now have an almost "perfect" pace, timing, and is well defined within each of their own space....next up were the soundstage, yes expansive and immersive, fully immerse me inside a "spherical scape" in a total 3rd dimensional of X-Y-Z and the flows of each effects running within this space is "fluid" and see no hesitation at all.

Better yet, I enabled my sound adjustment app, and turned on DSEE HX....my jaws dropped once again, this tiny, little, details of the lower-trebles energies and the instruments that dwell within this regions "pop" with "emotions" and "rhythm"...I am talking about those little hand shake devices, little hand held hi-hat and cymbals.....magically though, the "noises" that I heard before and was very ugly to me.....Gone! I told myself "what da fun ?" I thought these noises and slight "hiss" were from Zx2 "hardware" ? Perhap class D amp weakness ? but now it is gone !

In replacement of those noises were these beautiful "rhythm , details, clarity, tonal body, space" of these little instruments devices which lay within the lower treble spectrum and upper mid spectrum....these were messy before, and created these noises (were not properly decoded by the app). Luckily my Zx2 had no noises when plugged in headphones without playing anything, even if I open app, run apps on it....so I was very sure to myself that these were noises while playing music. Here I found the reason, and I found a solution for it.

Enjoy guys, this is the definitive solution to bring Zx2 into another level of musicality experiences: all the missing details you never heard before, or you thought it was lacking, the noises, the uses of DSEE HX technologies. Finally are all pieces and puzzled together. Again. Ironically....wasn't Sony who fixed it....but Poweramp team. I actually "smirked" as I realized how Sony had thought of this before about android, development of 3rd party apps, and they need not lifting a finger to improve their Zx2....lol...while other DAPs including Onkyo newest DP-X1 is not so friendly and welcome 3rd party app.

Check this post to get this app onto your Zx2, just over the air download and install it directly onto zx2...make sure to allow unknown sources by going to setting and check the box option

http://www.head-fi.org/t/742609/sony-nw-zx2-hi-end-dap/10080#post_12256619

Well said Witigir! This is exactly what I found, I kept feeling like something wasn't quite right with the stock player, I felt it had an overall darkness to the sound that lost some fine detail. It seemed like there was always a tiny bit of noise flattening the image too. As soon as I tried the power amp alpha I was stunned, it finally felt like "ahhhhh there's the sound I paid for". My only regret is waiting so long to try out different players, I pre ordered this unit so I had been living with the stock players limitations for a while.

 

[mcemce13]

Not really I believe that after certain price point (in which the Sony and AK are) is about sound signature preferences. Depending on the type of music you listen, you will like more one signature over another. IMO is not always about better or worse SQ.
 
As usual the best is to listen to both and decide, what makes tricky the Sony is the break in period, it REALLY changes after 150 hours. I also own the PHA3, and when new they both sounded very similar, with the PHA3 little more organic. However, after the break in period the NWX is simply much much better, huge sound stage and much more micro details than PHA3.

 

[Whitigir]

Well said Witigir! This is exactly what I found, I kept feeling like something wasn't quite right with the stock player, I felt it had an overall darkness to the sound that lost some fine detail. It seemed like there was always a tiny bit of noise flattening the image too. As soon as I tried the power amp alpha I was stunned, it finally felt like "ahhhhh there's the sound I paid for". My only regret is waiting so long to try out different players, I pre ordered this unit so I had been living with the stock players limitations for a while.

Thank you ! Glad that you have found it . No worry, the power amp alpha is still new and hot...not even released in the market place

 

[Caruryn]

Thank you ! Glad that you have found it

. No worry, the power amp alpha is still new and hot...not even released in the market place

Seriously man Sony should give you a ZX2 for free on promotion reasons alone.I bet one third of ZX2 posts are yours and eagerly awaiting your Onkyo DP-X1 comparizon,although i do feel a ZX2  verdict loss in sound coming.You are livening  the onkyo thread as well as i can see 

 
http://www.head-fi.org/t/780642/onkyo-dp-x1-dual-sabre-dacs-balanced-sabre-btl-amp-mqa-dsd-256-android-5/3675

 

[Whitigir]

Seriously man Sony should give you a ZX2 for free on promotion reasons alone.I bet one third of ZX2 posts are yours and eagerly awaiting your Onkyo DP-X1 comparizon,although i do feel a ZX2  verdict loss in sound coming.You are livening  the onkyo thread as well as i can see 

http://www.head-fi.org/t/780642/onkyo-dp-x1-dual-sabre-dacs-balanced-sabre-btl-amp-mqa-dsd-256-android-5/3675

Thank you for the kind words ! You should download the new Poweramp alpha

 

[cjpinner]

Has anyone figured out how to disable the stock player completely? I'm having an issue where the stock player plays when the screen is off and the physical play button is pushed. This gets pretty irritating when you're controlling the player from your pocket. I've disabled all the lockscreens and everything. 

 

[cjpinner]

  Has anyone figured out how to disable the stock player completely? I'm having an issue where the stock player plays when the screen is off and the physical play button is pushed. This gets pretty irritating when you're controlling the player from your pocket. I've disabled all the lockscreens and everything. 

I guess I should clarify that this is when I want to use Poweramp exclusively.

 

[Whitigir]

It is still in alpha stage