1 00:00:00,560 --> 00:00:07,359 So, you have an extra $1,300 kicking around that you were going to 2 00:00:04,880 --> 00:00:11,920 allocate to a new Galaxy Note or some other overpriced phone. But instead, no, 3 00:00:10,160 --> 00:00:17,600 you're going back in time to the days when you used to just have an iPod or a 4 00:00:14,639 --> 00:00:21,119 other Zoom or some like portable music player device. And that's what this is. 5 00:00:19,520 --> 00:00:26,080 Except it's not going back in time. This is the latest and greatest flagship from 6 00:00:22,960 --> 00:00:28,960 FO. This thing's balling. And it's 7 00:00:26,080 --> 00:00:32,320 pretty kick-ass. Honestly, it's sweet. $1,300 is a lot of money. Fio has never 8 00:00:30,800 --> 00:00:36,640 made a device that cost that much money. They are actually moving up market into 9 00:00:34,719 --> 00:00:39,920 areas of other expensive devices made by like Astel and Kern and other 10 00:00:38,320 --> 00:00:44,399 established players. So, let's see if they can do it. This is a cool box. Look 11 00:00:42,399 --> 00:00:50,160 at that rainbow. That's pretty badass. Inside this box is another box. And 12 00:00:47,920 --> 00:00:56,239 inside that box, yet another box. 13 00:00:53,199 --> 00:00:58,879 Very fragrant. It's wooden. I don't need 14 00:00:56,239 --> 00:01:04,559 this box. There's a box inside here. I swear to God. 15 00:01:00,800 --> 00:01:06,960 Okay, it's a device finally. 16 00:01:04,559 --> 00:01:13,040 This thing is kind of a chunk. It's kind of a brick. Dual AK-4499 17 00:01:10,080 --> 00:01:16,960 EQ. Uh, that's the DACK that's in here made by AKM. They're really good at 18 00:01:15,040 --> 00:01:21,360 making DAXs. They put two in here. The reason you would have two DAXs, I guess, 19 00:01:18,960 --> 00:01:24,880 less um like switching noise because you're going to have one DACK per 20 00:01:23,439 --> 00:01:31,840 channel, like for the left ear and the right ear. This actually each of these decks has four channels on badass DAXs. 21 00:01:29,439 --> 00:01:36,240 Boom. That's a big screen. Mikey, I think he likes it. Uh, before we turn 22 00:01:34,079 --> 00:01:40,400 that on, let's see if there's any more crap in here. There is. It looks like a 23 00:01:38,560 --> 00:01:44,880 SIM card removal tool, but again, this is not a phone. It costs as much as a 24 00:01:42,400 --> 00:01:50,880 phone. A nice phone, but no. This is for opening up your micro SD card slot. You 25 00:01:48,799 --> 00:01:56,960 can expand the storage of this thing from the internal 64 GB up to 2 TB. 26 00:01:54,560 --> 00:02:01,040 However, I'm noticing that even though there's like this tiny little stamp, 27 00:01:59,119 --> 00:02:06,079 like there's going to be a second SD card slot there, but instead they've 28 00:02:03,520 --> 00:02:09,440 just written dual AK4499, like they're just advertising the DAX 29 00:02:07,520 --> 00:02:14,879 again on it. Are they using this part from another skew like one like their 30 00:02:12,319 --> 00:02:19,040 M11 or something? I don't know why they have that stamped out just a tease. And 31 00:02:16,879 --> 00:02:23,840 the reason it's a tease is because it's really nice to have multiple expansion 32 00:02:21,760 --> 00:02:28,879 ports because otherwise they're making me buy like a terabyte or a 2 TB SD 33 00:02:26,879 --> 00:02:31,920 card, which is expensive. Like you're going to spend 300 bucks on that, but I 34 00:02:30,560 --> 00:02:36,480 guess they think you can afford it if you already bought a $1,300 music 35 00:02:34,160 --> 00:02:42,080 player, so screw you. So, you got the tool for that. 36 00:02:39,040 --> 00:02:45,599 Finally, I can get rid of this box. Uh, 37 00:02:42,080 --> 00:02:49,120 we have a charging cable. It's USB type 38 00:02:45,599 --> 00:02:51,200 C to type A. It seems like pretty 39 00:02:49,120 --> 00:02:54,080 quality. I guess there's no wall wart. That's okay. You probably have a lot of 40 00:02:52,640 --> 00:02:59,360 these kicking around by now. I should say that it has quick charge 2.0. So, 41 00:02:56,800 --> 00:03:03,200 this thing will charge from depleted to full in about 3 and 1/2 hours. And that 42 00:03:01,680 --> 00:03:06,560 should get you about 15 hours of battery life cuz this thing's battery is huge. 43 00:03:04,879 --> 00:03:12,239 That's probably why this thing's so big. This thing has a 7,490 mAh battery. It's 44 00:03:10,080 --> 00:03:18,000 basically like a battery bank with just some ports on top. It's That's insane. 45 00:03:15,840 --> 00:03:24,000 Uh you've also got a little tiny baggie with a little adapter in it. This is 46 00:03:19,760 --> 00:03:27,040 from 3.5 uh mm to coax 47 00:03:24,000 --> 00:03:29,680 the yellow. And hello, quick start 48 00:03:27,040 --> 00:03:34,080 guide. Lots of languages. And what is this? 49 00:03:31,680 --> 00:03:38,400 Uh this is a screen protector. It's like quite a bit more narrow than the screen 50 00:03:36,560 --> 00:03:43,280 itself. This screen is actually kind of nice the way that it really kind it's 51 00:03:41,920 --> 00:03:49,200 slightly curved and then it kind of disappears into the chamfer here versus 52 00:03:46,000 --> 00:03:50,799 the chamfer the edge the bezel the bevel 53 00:03:49,200 --> 00:03:54,239 whatever. So I don't know if I would put this on and if I did put it on I don't 54 00:03:52,879 --> 00:03:58,080 know that it would protect the whole screen. All right let's turn this puppy 55 00:03:56,239 --> 00:04:01,879 on. All the buttons are on the side. I'm going to hold down the power button. 56 00:04:04,239 --> 00:04:09,760 Nothing on this side at all. On this side, you've got power. So, I guess 57 00:04:08,000 --> 00:04:13,599 that's like the screen lock button, and you hold it down to reboot. Track 58 00:04:11,680 --> 00:04:16,720 backwards, track forward, play, pause, and then this one's not labeled at all. 59 00:04:15,200 --> 00:04:19,919 That is like a multi-function button that you can actually specify what it 60 00:04:18,400 --> 00:04:24,400 does. More on that in a bit. There's also a hold button, which is a toggle, 61 00:04:22,639 --> 00:04:28,000 which is pretty cool. It makes it so the buttons don't do anything, but it also 62 00:04:26,400 --> 00:04:31,600 it doesn't make it so the screen stays totally off. When I hit the power 63 00:04:29,520 --> 00:04:37,759 button, the screen does still illuminate partially, but you can't do anything to 64 00:04:34,560 --> 00:04:40,560 it. Then you've got a knob. 65 00:04:37,759 --> 00:04:44,639 This is an okay knob. It is a analog digital knob. It has a top and a bottom. 66 00:04:42,560 --> 00:04:47,520 You can't spin it freely infinitely. And it has a blue LED on it that you can 67 00:04:46,160 --> 00:04:51,759 actually program. There's a couple different settings for that. Why don't we look at those now? All right. But 68 00:04:50,160 --> 00:04:56,080 before we check out these cool settings, here's a message from our sponsor, War 69 00:04:53,680 --> 00:05:00,000 Thunder, the free-to-play online military vehicle combat game. It's 70 00:04:57,759 --> 00:05:04,240 available for Windows, Mac, Linux, PS4, Xbox One. All that with crossplay. War 71 00:05:02,720 --> 00:05:08,400 Thunder features an incredible arsenal of more than500 historically accurate 72 00:05:06,479 --> 00:05:13,120 playable tanks, aircraft, helicopters, and ships from the 1930s up to the 1990s 73 00:05:11,199 --> 00:05:17,039 before some of you were born. Massive combined arms battles on over 80 major 74 00:05:15,280 --> 00:05:21,039 battlefields from World War II to the end of the Cold War. So, head to link 75 00:05:19,039 --> 00:05:24,880 below and start playing now and you'll also get an exclusive bonus. All right, 76 00:05:23,440 --> 00:05:30,320 I got to get into the settings to do that. I actually need to unlock it again. Thank you. Yes, it's Android, so 77 00:05:29,199 --> 00:05:35,039 you can actually just go into the Play Store and download whatever apps you want. Uh, there's also some applications 78 00:05:33,440 --> 00:05:38,639 that are baked in here. I should say baked in, but they're not baked in. 79 00:05:36,560 --> 00:05:41,520 They're here, so you can easily download them with one click. I don't know why 80 00:05:39,919 --> 00:05:46,880 they're not just on there by default. I guess they don't want you to take up more space than you have to. 64 GB 81 00:05:44,800 --> 00:05:49,919 actually isn't that much. Anyway, it's Android. I go to the Android settings. 82 00:05:48,560 --> 00:05:55,520 Now, the fact that it's Android settings actually kind of makes it harder to navigate than it would be if it was just 83 00:05:52,400 --> 00:05:56,720 a proprietary music player focused OS. 84 00:05:55,520 --> 00:06:00,240 So, the settings are kind of all over the place. I want to talk about the LED 85 00:05:58,800 --> 00:06:06,800 light thing. I believe that's actually in display, which is a little weird. 86 00:06:03,919 --> 00:06:11,680 Indicator light control. Sweet. So, when it's charging, you can select it to be 87 00:06:08,560 --> 00:06:13,919 constantly on, pulsing or breathing, or 88 00:06:11,680 --> 00:06:19,440 just off. And when it's working like it is now, again, constantly on, pulsing, 89 00:06:16,400 --> 00:06:22,160 or off. We go into general and we see 90 00:06:19,440 --> 00:06:25,520 that navigation control on the device in the uh like the software control. You 91 00:06:23,919 --> 00:06:29,039 can it's Android so you can set it to have the back button or you can use the 92 00:06:27,680 --> 00:06:33,199 gesture control which is what I do on my phone. So that's how I set it up now. So it's a swipe to go back and swipe up to 93 00:06:32,240 --> 00:06:39,600 go to the home screen and everything like that. Now here's where it gets cool. The hold switch setting. So that 94 00:06:37,520 --> 00:06:43,680 hold button that we have here by default all it does is it deactivates all the 95 00:06:41,680 --> 00:06:48,639 buttons and allows you to not be able to touch the screen. Okay. But that's just 96 00:06:46,080 --> 00:06:53,360 by default. You can actually toggle all this crap on it. So basically, you can 97 00:06:50,639 --> 00:06:57,919 say which buttons you want to still work when the hold button is on. So you can 98 00:06:55,520 --> 00:07:00,800 have it so that only the next track button works. So you can still reach 99 00:06:59,199 --> 00:07:04,160 into your pocket and hit next or whatever. You can you can turn them all 100 00:07:02,240 --> 00:07:07,120 on. I like this level of control. It's pretty sweet. The only thing that you 101 00:07:05,280 --> 00:07:10,160 can't adjust is the power button because that kind of obviousates what the whole 102 00:07:08,800 --> 00:07:14,400 switch is about. The whole switch is about making it so the screen doesn't turn on. So I I mean they could have 103 00:07:13,120 --> 00:07:18,479 given us that option, but they didn't. Now this is where it gets even sweeter. 104 00:07:16,319 --> 00:07:22,240 the multi-function button, which is that bottom one that has no identifiable 105 00:07:20,560 --> 00:07:26,800 marks. It can be programmed with this little list of uh special features. So, 106 00:07:24,639 --> 00:07:31,919 you can make it say, "Add this song to my favorites," which is okay. Play next 107 00:07:29,599 --> 00:07:35,199 randomly. This is so sweet. It's basically it's like a shuffle button. 108 00:07:33,520 --> 00:07:39,919 Just play a random song. I don't like what I'm at. Shuffle. But the song that 109 00:07:37,680 --> 00:07:44,000 it goes to next is determined by what kind of uh folder you're in at that 110 00:07:42,160 --> 00:07:48,240 time. So, if you happen to be in an album, like you're listening to just 111 00:07:46,160 --> 00:07:50,880 Britney Spears greatest hits. Holy crap, her Instagram is insane. If you haven't 112 00:07:49,599 --> 00:07:55,120 seen it, you're listening to Britney Spears, you hit shuffle, it's going to 113 00:07:52,880 --> 00:07:59,919 go to a just different random track on that album. But if you were listening to 114 00:07:57,120 --> 00:08:04,639 all artists and you hit next, it'll just go to any random song from any artist. 115 00:08:03,039 --> 00:08:08,240 So, the reason that this can be really cool is depending on how you have it set 116 00:08:06,240 --> 00:08:13,360 up at that moment, you can be listening to like a soundtrack, just Han Zimmer 117 00:08:11,280 --> 00:08:16,319 Bladeunner 2049 soundtrack, and then you're kind of like, you know what? I'm 118 00:08:14,319 --> 00:08:21,440 sick of this vibe. I hit my shuffle button and boom, suddenly now I'm 119 00:08:18,639 --> 00:08:26,000 listening to Tulle or 9in Nails or Radio Head or other 2000s band that James 120 00:08:24,160 --> 00:08:29,680 likes. And you can just switch vibes easily, which is that's pretty badass. 121 00:08:27,759 --> 00:08:34,880 Okay, then there's some really weird stuff in here, like delete the currently 122 00:08:32,560 --> 00:08:40,240 playing song. And I checked this. There's no like, are you sure you want 123 00:08:37,440 --> 00:08:43,519 to delete this? It just deletes it. I think this is really reckless. Some 124 00:08:41,760 --> 00:08:46,880 people will never ever use this. But I actually kind of like it because 125 00:08:44,880 --> 00:08:49,920 sometimes you really only care about like three songs on an album or 126 00:08:48,480 --> 00:08:54,560 sometimes you're listening to like a hip-hop album like um Dr. Dre, The 127 00:08:52,080 --> 00:08:58,720 Chronic 2001. Amazing album. has a bunch of skits in it that I never want to 128 00:08:56,800 --> 00:09:04,160 listen to. So, I could just be sitting there in line for schwarma and when like 129 00:09:01,600 --> 00:09:08,160 uh pause for porno comes on, I can just like boom, it's gone off my device 130 00:09:06,560 --> 00:09:12,560 forever and that could be very satisfying and and a pretty quick way to 131 00:09:10,560 --> 00:09:15,440 like organically clean up your library without having to sit down and clean up 132 00:09:14,160 --> 00:09:19,680 your library. So, that's cool. Then here's another interesting one. Enter Bluetooth receiving mode. So, you can 133 00:09:18,320 --> 00:09:24,160 imagine a scenario where you're primarily using this, but suddenly you 134 00:09:21,839 --> 00:09:28,959 want to get a song or track or whatever off your phone and use your phone as a 135 00:09:26,240 --> 00:09:33,360 source while still using the DAX from this. So, what you can do is enter 136 00:09:30,959 --> 00:09:36,800 Bluetooth receiving mode and then this thing will just turn into a Bluetooth 137 00:09:35,360 --> 00:09:41,600 receiver. Your headphones will still be connected to here and uh your phone will 138 00:09:38,959 --> 00:09:45,440 be sending the file via Bluetooth to here. And it, by the way, it sends it 139 00:09:43,680 --> 00:09:48,560 really good with a really good Bluetooth chipset. And then you're still getting 140 00:09:47,040 --> 00:09:53,360 high quality audio to the headphones. That's pretty cool. This isn't the only 141 00:09:50,800 --> 00:09:58,640 mode, though. We were on Android mode. There's also pure music mode. Pure music 142 00:09:55,760 --> 00:10:04,160 mode brings this into kind of like iPod mode in a way, like iPod classic. Like 143 00:10:01,120 --> 00:10:05,920 you're in a music app now. That is all. 144 00:10:04,160 --> 00:10:09,279 All your antennas are off. I think you can turn the Bluetooth antenna back on, 145 00:10:07,519 --> 00:10:13,200 but by default, it's off. Your Wi-Fi is off. So there's just as little cross 146 00:10:11,839 --> 00:10:19,600 talk and other signals coming to the device as possible. The circuits are just empty. So that's pretty cool, too. 147 00:10:17,600 --> 00:10:24,000 Oh, USB DAC mode. So you can hook this up to your computer then use it as a USB 148 00:10:21,839 --> 00:10:27,519 DACK instead of having to buy a separate uh desktop one. I never talked about the 149 00:10:26,000 --> 00:10:30,399 jacks yet. So you can see there's actually three ports. Ha, your phone 150 00:10:29,200 --> 00:10:37,519 doesn't even have a headphone jack. We've got three here. You've got your regular 3.5 mm uh jack, which you could 151 00:10:34,959 --> 00:10:44,399 also call a single-ended uh line. Then you've got two balanced ports. One's 4.4 152 00:10:41,040 --> 00:10:46,320 mm, the other's 2.5. A balanced cable is 153 00:10:44,399 --> 00:10:49,200 the same as XLR. If you've seen that plug that has like three prongs and you 154 00:10:48,000 --> 00:10:54,800 use it to plug in cameras and microphones and stuff like that. So, what the heck is balanced? And why is it 155 00:10:52,640 --> 00:10:58,800 that when I did this Grado headphones review, we found out during that review 156 00:10:56,480 --> 00:11:02,720 that it was like $200 to have the cable uh terminate with XLR balanced output. 157 00:11:01,360 --> 00:11:07,440 When you have a cable like this, the whole audio signal is on this one line. 158 00:11:04,560 --> 00:11:12,640 So if you brought this cable close to a fluctuating magnetic field like a DC 159 00:11:10,000 --> 00:11:17,680 power cable for example then that DC power cable could induce noise onto this 160 00:11:15,200 --> 00:11:21,200 cable and then that noise would be audible if you have golden ears or 161 00:11:19,360 --> 00:11:26,240 whatever uh to you listening to your music. However, if you use a balanced 162 00:11:23,200 --> 00:11:28,240 output in one of these ports then that 163 00:11:26,240 --> 00:11:33,600 that three-prongong cable it actually has the audio signal on there twice. One 164 00:11:31,519 --> 00:11:37,680 prong is a ground. The other two prongs are audio signal, but it's not the exact 165 00:11:35,440 --> 00:11:41,440 same. They're out of phase, completely flipped. So the audio signal on one when 166 00:11:39,839 --> 00:11:47,360 it hits a peak, the other signal is hitting a trough. And what this does is 167 00:11:44,079 --> 00:11:50,000 it makes it impervious to noise coming 168 00:11:47,360 --> 00:11:54,320 in because all you hear is the difference between those two waves. So 169 00:11:52,160 --> 00:11:58,079 if both those waves have the same noise on them, that noise is going to get 170 00:11:55,920 --> 00:12:01,680 canceled out. This is called common mode rejection. You can look that up. That's 171 00:12:00,079 --> 00:12:06,320 why it's so awesome to have balanced outputs and why it's so expensive and 172 00:12:04,640 --> 00:12:10,800 why I don't have an example here. So, why don't I plug in these Grado 173 00:12:08,240 --> 00:12:13,959 headphones now and actually listen to this thing. 174 00:12:16,320 --> 00:12:22,639 Oh, this is clean. All right, the final thing I want to tell you about with this 175 00:12:20,480 --> 00:12:26,399 that makes it so awesome to listen to is something they call active servo power. 176 00:12:24,480 --> 00:12:30,560 So basically on the final stage of the built-in amp in this thing, they have 177 00:12:28,480 --> 00:12:35,200 some intelligence to detect what kind of impedance your headphones you're 178 00:12:32,160 --> 00:12:37,040 plugging in has and will step up the 179 00:12:35,200 --> 00:12:42,079 current accordingly. So if you're using like IM earphones that go in your ear, 180 00:12:40,000 --> 00:12:44,880 you don't need that much power. So you you don't want to ruin the headphones. 181 00:12:43,440 --> 00:12:50,000 You don't want to ruin your ears. So you can actually switch the mode here. Uh 182 00:12:47,200 --> 00:12:53,920 right now I'm in overear headphone mode. And so if you have really high impedance 183 00:12:52,079 --> 00:12:58,240 headphones that take a lot of power, this thing will see that and crank it up 184 00:12:56,079 --> 00:13:01,839 and that's when it sounds way better having that on. There's also a low gain 185 00:13:00,320 --> 00:13:05,839 and high gain modes. You can just leave it in low gain. It'll be less noisy with 186 00:13:03,760 --> 00:13:12,000 this overear headphone mode on that ramps up like the high current mode. And 187 00:13:07,839 --> 00:13:14,560 it's it's wicked. Oh man, I don't even 188 00:13:12,000 --> 00:13:18,959 want to talk anymore. You guys just just leave just leave me with the headphones. 189 00:13:17,040 --> 00:13:24,160 So yeah, this thing is pretty sweet. I don't think it looks as cool as some of 190 00:13:21,440 --> 00:13:27,519 the other uh things in this price range. It does look pretty nice, but it's some 191 00:13:26,480 --> 00:13:32,320 of the other things in this price range are like really badass. And also, it's hard to tell what button you're 192 00:13:30,800 --> 00:13:37,200 pressing. If this is in your pocket, you really can't tell. These buttons are all 193 00:13:35,120 --> 00:13:40,480 basically the same shape and size except for this one's a little bigger. Um but 194 00:13:39,519 --> 00:13:45,760 that would wouldn't really be detectable, I don't think, in my pocket. So, it' be nice if they were raised or 195 00:13:44,079 --> 00:13:48,880 of different shapes. That's kind of a flaw. Um other than that, pretty cool. 196 00:13:47,839 --> 00:13:53,040 Cool. I should actually just take this off because it's kind of fingerprinty, 197 00:13:50,880 --> 00:13:57,680 kind of glossy carbon fiber look. This thing is pretty versatile and pretty 198 00:13:55,360 --> 00:14:02,800 cool, and I think it's worth uh a close look if you're the type of person who 199 00:13:59,920 --> 00:14:05,680 wants to spend $1,300 on a portable media player. So, thanks for watching 200 00:14:04,320 --> 00:14:10,079 ShortCircuit today. If you like this video, hit subscribe, hit like, check 201 00:14:07,760 --> 00:14:16,399 out our a other audio things, other audio videos. They usually have me and I 202 00:14:13,839 --> 00:14:18,160 uh I don't know. I'm fun. You're if you've watched this far, then you'd like 203 00:14:17,600 --> 00:14:23,360 me. So, watch Carpool Critics. Okay, David's here to tell us to watch 204 00:14:21,199 --> 00:14:26,560 Carpool Critics, the movie podcast. Hey, you know what would sound great through 205 00:14:24,480 --> 00:14:31,040 these headphones? My voice and David's voice. And maybe even Riley. Maybe 206 00:14:29,760 --> 00:14:33,600 on a good day, Riley. Yeah.