I am a kickstarter supporter and I have the dash with me since last thursday. I have also been following the dash facebook group for quite some time and here's my 1st impressions and a summary of what the kickstarters have faced:
My impressions
Packaging is great as all the videos and online pictures would have shown you. I am lazy to post pictures so bear with my wall of text. I have shown the dash to 3 friends and let 2 of them tried. They commented that it was high end and about the coolest thing they ever tried.
SOUND QUALITY
I came from using custom molded UE-TF10. Before that, I had mi pistons 2.1, klipsch x10 which I lost, mi headphones which was barely used before it went into cold storage, ATH-ES10, ATH-ESW9, ATH-ES7, AKG some-budget-sub100-headphones.
Pros: To cut a long story short, the bass far exceeded my expectations. Once you get a good seal, it sounds incredible.
Users have unhappily reported that their ears were not able to get a good seal. However, there have been recommendations from other users on how to tackle that using silicon gel and the solutions work well. Custom sleeves such as comfy have also solved the problems of seals. However, changing sleeves will cause it to be unable to fit back into the charger. Silicon gel trick will not have the problem.
Cons: However, it does not sound as 'full' as my custom molded UE-TF10 and felt like some frequencies are cut off - this is just my impression and may not be true. Nevertheless, this does not affect my enjoyment while on the go. Connectivity on the left dash is also flaky at times, reported by some users.
USABILITY
How easy is it to use without taking out your phone?
1. Pair it via bluetooth for the 1st time by pressing the surface of the touch sensitive right earpiece and holding it for 5s. it will then appear to be visible. Connect it and a soothing female voice will inform you then it is connected.
2. Go to your music player and press play on the phone.
3. To stop, take it out from your ears and put it into the charger/case.
4. To continue, turn on bluetooth on your phone. put earpiece back into your ears and it AUTOCONNECTS back to your phone with the lady once again informing you that it has connected. Press once on the right dash to continue the music from where you stopped. Swipe right and left to adjust the volume.
Pros: This certainly beats unravelling the tangled wires of earpiece and keeping them again. Convenience served right up. You can also turn on and off audio transparency by swiping left and right on the left earpiece. No chance of forgetting to charge them as the moment they go into the charger, they get charged right away. Recharging the charger/case is also incredibly fast. I would say less than 1 hour or so.
Cons: Using it as a standalone 4GB music player allows only 4 playlists (shown as 4 folders when connected as usb drive via the charger/case/'hub to be connected to the computer with the dash acting like memory cards'") . You can dump files outside those 4 folders and it will be considered as unsorted but playable.
Choosing the playlist is also an acquired technique. Play and hold to enter the playlist mode. Double tap to go the next playlist - this is hard. Triple tap to go back. When a song is playing, double tap to go to the next song, triple tap to go back. Many a users have raged about their lack of skill. Oops.
FITNESS
I have yet to try it out. Swimmers have reported that swimming mimics the swiping motion resulting in volume increasing or decreasing against their will. One person had the audio transparency turned on and this likely resulted in a blown speaker as the feedback loop killed it. I wonder why his ears didn't die first from the feedback.
ANSWERING CALLS
How easy is it? Nod your head - answer a call. Shake your head - cancel the call.
I tested it against my will when my hands were occupied with an umbrella and stuff while in the rain. Nodded my head and answered the call. Music came back automatically after the call. Person on the other side later commented to me that i sounded a little echoey after I asked him.
Conclusion:
I have been incredibly happy with the dash. Indeed, the left dash instability at times causes me to cringe but that only happens like 5% of the time. The people at bragi have also been responsive on the facebook group even though they are swamped. Updates are happening and the latest update is out at 1.3.0. I would recommend this to people who wouldn't mind trading a bit of quality for a lot of convenience.