Malevolint
500+ Head-Fier
Oh no, no judgment felt! I just like to give my sermon everytime this comes up lol.Apologies if I came off as judgemental. Wasn't my intention. And I completely appreciate the need for maximum mobility - that's ultimately why I moved away from desktop gear.
I also don't entirely disagree with you; unless you're getting one of the TOTL DAPs, a good dongle is more than good enough, especially for relatively sensitive IEMs like Fourte. If I had to choose between a mid-tier DAP and a dongle I'd probably go with a dongle. As long as the sound synergy is there it's all good. If you do want to upgrade there's probably 'better' dongles like EarMen Sparrow and PAW S1, but that's a small tweak and the FiiO has lots of great features.
IMO usability and portability are just as important as SQ. I said that in my R8 review and I'll stand by it. SQ is not the be all and end all when it comes to mobile gear. But everyone's priorities are different so as always YM1MV.
I appreciate the recs, but I'd prefer not to have anything that attaches to my phone. It becomes a huge encumbrance. You got me excited for a second though!
It really is different, though. I put the btr5 in my pocket and can use my phone freely. Having my phone in my pocket with a dongle sounds like trouble to me. The UTWS3 does sound promising, but I have too many Iems I'd have to buy it for lol. Maybe ill get it for my daily.I have a BTR5. It's a nice little device. Sounds decent, too. But, I never use mine anymore for 2 reasons.
1) If I am going to settle for bluetooth sound quality, the Fiio UTWS3 is a better solution since it is actually truly wireless.
2) The sound quality on a good dongle is so much better. Since you need a wire with a BTR5, it's really no different than using a Lotoo PAW S1 or L&P W2 and both of those dongles are huge improvements to sound quality over the BTR5.
In doing A/B testing, the L&P W2 sounds better than my Hiby R6 2020.
iPhone + LPW2 > Hiby R6 2020.