WEBVTT 00:00:00.560 --> 00:00:07.359 So, you have an extra $1,300 kicking around that you were going to 00:00:04.880 --> 00:00:11.920 allocate to a new Galaxy Note or some other overpriced phone. But instead, no, 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 00:00:14.639 --> 00:00:21.119 other Zoom or some like portable music player device. And that's what this is. 00:00:19.520 --> 00:00:26.080 Except it's not going back in time. This is the latest and greatest flagship from 00:00:22.960 --> 00:00:28.960 FO. This thing's balling. And it's 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 00:00:30.800 --> 00:00:36.640 made a device that cost that much money. They are actually moving up market into 00:00:34.719 --> 00:00:39.920 areas of other expensive devices made by like Astel and Kern and other 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 00:00:42.399 --> 00:00:50.160 at that rainbow. That's pretty badass. Inside this box is another box. And 00:00:47.920 --> 00:00:56.239 inside that box, yet another box. 00:00:53.199 --> 00:00:58.879 Very fragrant. It's wooden. I don't need 00:00:56.239 --> 00:01:04.559 this box. There's a box inside here. I swear to God. 00:01:00.800 --> 00:01:06.960 Okay, it's a device finally. 00:01:04.559 --> 00:01:13.040 This thing is kind of a chunk. It's kind of a brick. Dual AK-4499 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 00:01:15.040 --> 00:01:21.360 making DAXs. They put two in here. The reason you would have two DAXs, I guess, 00:01:18.960 --> 00:01:24.880 less um like switching noise because you're going to have one DACK per 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. 00:01:29.439 --> 00:01:36.240 Boom. That's a big screen. Mikey, I think he likes it. Uh, before we turn 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 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 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 00:01:48.799 --> 00:01:56.960 can expand the storage of this thing from the internal 64 GB up to 2 TB. 00:01:54.560 --> 00:02:01.040 However, I'm noticing that even though there's like this tiny little stamp, 00:01:59.119 --> 00:02:06.079 like there's going to be a second SD card slot there, but instead they've 00:02:03.520 --> 00:02:09.440 just written dual AK4499, like they're just advertising the DAX 00:02:07.520 --> 00:02:14.879 again on it. Are they using this part from another skew like one like their 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 00:02:16.879 --> 00:02:23.840 the reason it's a tease is because it's really nice to have multiple expansion 00:02:21.760 --> 00:02:28.879 ports because otherwise they're making me buy like a terabyte or a 2 TB SD 00:02:26.879 --> 00:02:31.920 card, which is expensive. Like you're going to spend 300 bucks on that, but I 00:02:30.560 --> 00:02:36.480 guess they think you can afford it if you already bought a $1,300 music 00:02:34.160 --> 00:02:42.080 player, so screw you. So, you got the tool for that. 00:02:39.040 --> 00:02:45.599 Finally, I can get rid of this box. Uh, 00:02:42.080 --> 00:02:49.120 we have a charging cable. It's USB type 00:02:45.599 --> 00:02:51.200 C to type A. It seems like pretty 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 00:02:52.640 --> 00:02:59.360 these kicking around by now. I should say that it has quick charge 2.0. So, 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 00:03:01.680 --> 00:03:06.560 should get you about 15 hours of battery life cuz this thing's battery is huge. 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 00:03:10.080 --> 00:03:18.000 basically like a battery bank with just some ports on top. It's That's insane. 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 00:03:19.760 --> 00:03:27.040 from 3.5 uh mm to coax 00:03:24.000 --> 00:03:29.680 the yellow. And hello, quick start 00:03:27.040 --> 00:03:34.080 guide. Lots of languages. And what is this? 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 00:03:36.560 --> 00:03:43.280 itself. This screen is actually kind of nice the way that it really kind it's 00:03:41.920 --> 00:03:49.200 slightly curved and then it kind of disappears into the chamfer here versus 00:03:46.000 --> 00:03:50.799 the chamfer the edge the bezel the bevel 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 00:03:52.879 --> 00:03:58.080 know that it would protect the whole screen. All right let's turn this puppy 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. 00:04:04.239 --> 00:04:09.760 Nothing on this side at all. On this side, you've got power. So, I guess 00:04:08.000 --> 00:04:13.599 that's like the screen lock button, and you hold it down to reboot. Track 00:04:11.680 --> 00:04:16.720 backwards, track forward, play, pause, and then this one's not labeled at all. 00:04:15.200 --> 00:04:19.919 That is like a multi-function button that you can actually specify what it 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, 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 00:04:26.400 --> 00:04:31.600 it doesn't make it so the screen stays totally off. When I hit the power 00:04:29.520 --> 00:04:37.759 button, the screen does still illuminate partially, but you can't do anything to 00:04:34.560 --> 00:04:40.560 it. Then you've got a knob. 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. 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 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 00:04:50.160 --> 00:04:56.080 before we check out these cool settings, here's a message from our sponsor, War 00:04:53.680 --> 00:05:00.000 Thunder, the free-to-play online military vehicle combat game. It's 00:04:57.759 --> 00:05:04.240 available for Windows, Mac, Linux, PS4, Xbox One. All that with crossplay. War 00:05:02.720 --> 00:05:08.400 Thunder features an incredible arsenal of more than500 historically accurate 00:05:06.479 --> 00:05:13.120 playable tanks, aircraft, helicopters, and ships from the 1930s up to the 1990s 00:05:11.199 --> 00:05:17.039 before some of you were born. Massive combined arms battles on over 80 major 00:05:15.280 --> 00:05:21.039 battlefields from World War II to the end of the Cold War. So, head to link 00:05:19.039 --> 00:05:24.880 below and start playing now and you'll also get an exclusive bonus. All right, 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 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 00:05:33.440 --> 00:05:38.639 that are baked in here. I should say baked in, but they're not baked in. 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 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 00:05:44.800 --> 00:05:49.919 actually isn't that much. Anyway, it's Android. I go to the Android settings. 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 00:05:52.400 --> 00:05:56.720 a proprietary music player focused OS. 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 00:05:58.800 --> 00:06:06.800 light thing. I believe that's actually in display, which is a little weird. 00:06:03.919 --> 00:06:11.680 Indicator light control. Sweet. So, when it's charging, you can select it to be 00:06:08.560 --> 00:06:13.919 constantly on, pulsing or breathing, or 00:06:11.680 --> 00:06:19.440 just off. And when it's working like it is now, again, constantly on, pulsing, 00:06:16.400 --> 00:06:22.160 or off. We go into general and we see 00:06:19.440 --> 00:06:25.520 that navigation control on the device in the uh like the software control. You 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 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 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 00:06:37.520 --> 00:06:43.680 hold button that we have here by default all it does is it deactivates all the 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 00:06:46.080 --> 00:06:53.360 by default. You can actually toggle all this crap on it. So basically, you can 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 00:06:55.520 --> 00:07:00.800 have it so that only the next track button works. So you can still reach 00:06:59.199 --> 00:07:04.160 into your pocket and hit next or whatever. You can you can turn them all 00:07:02.240 --> 00:07:07.120 on. I like this level of control. It's pretty sweet. The only thing that you 00:07:05.280 --> 00:07:10.160 can't adjust is the power button because that kind of obviousates what the whole 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 00:07:13.120 --> 00:07:18.479 given us that option, but they didn't. Now this is where it gets even sweeter. 00:07:16.319 --> 00:07:22.240 the multi-function button, which is that bottom one that has no identifiable 00:07:20.560 --> 00:07:26.800 marks. It can be programmed with this little list of uh special features. So, 00:07:24.639 --> 00:07:31.919 you can make it say, "Add this song to my favorites," which is okay. Play next 00:07:29.599 --> 00:07:35.199 randomly. This is so sweet. It's basically it's like a shuffle button. 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 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 00:07:42.160 --> 00:07:48.240 time. So, if you happen to be in an album, like you're listening to just 00:07:46.160 --> 00:07:50.880 Britney Spears greatest hits. Holy crap, her Instagram is insane. If you haven't 00:07:49.599 --> 00:07:55.120 seen it, you're listening to Britney Spears, you hit shuffle, it's going to 00:07:52.880 --> 00:07:59.919 go to a just different random track on that album. But if you were listening to 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. 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 00:08:06.240 --> 00:08:13.360 up at that moment, you can be listening to like a soundtrack, just Han Zimmer 00:08:11.280 --> 00:08:16.319 Bladeunner 2049 soundtrack, and then you're kind of like, you know what? I'm 00:08:14.319 --> 00:08:21.440 sick of this vibe. I hit my shuffle button and boom, suddenly now I'm 00:08:18.639 --> 00:08:26.000 listening to Tulle or 9in Nails or Radio Head or other 2000s band that James 00:08:24.160 --> 00:08:29.680 likes. And you can just switch vibes easily, which is that's pretty badass. 00:08:27.759 --> 00:08:34.880 Okay, then there's some really weird stuff in here, like delete the currently 00:08:32.560 --> 00:08:40.240 playing song. And I checked this. There's no like, are you sure you want 00:08:37.440 --> 00:08:43.519 to delete this? It just deletes it. I think this is really reckless. Some 00:08:41.760 --> 00:08:46.880 people will never ever use this. But I actually kind of like it because 00:08:44.880 --> 00:08:49.920 sometimes you really only care about like three songs on an album or 00:08:48.480 --> 00:08:54.560 sometimes you're listening to like a hip-hop album like um Dr. Dre, The 00:08:52.080 --> 00:08:58.720 Chronic 2001. Amazing album. has a bunch of skits in it that I never want to 00:08:56.800 --> 00:09:04.160 listen to. So, I could just be sitting there in line for schwarma and when like 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 00:09:06.560 --> 00:09:12.560 forever and that could be very satisfying and and a pretty quick way to 00:09:10.560 --> 00:09:15.440 like organically clean up your library without having to sit down and clean up 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 00:09:18.320 --> 00:09:24.160 imagine a scenario where you're primarily using this, but suddenly you 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 00:09:26.240 --> 00:09:33.360 source while still using the DAX from this. So, what you can do is enter 00:09:30.959 --> 00:09:36.800 Bluetooth receiving mode and then this thing will just turn into a Bluetooth 00:09:35.360 --> 00:09:41.600 receiver. Your headphones will still be connected to here and uh your phone will 00:09:38.959 --> 00:09:45.440 be sending the file via Bluetooth to here. And it, by the way, it sends it 00:09:43.680 --> 00:09:48.560 really good with a really good Bluetooth chipset. And then you're still getting 00:09:47.040 --> 00:09:53.360 high quality audio to the headphones. That's pretty cool. This isn't the only 00:09:50.800 --> 00:09:58.640 mode, though. We were on Android mode. There's also pure music mode. Pure music 00:09:55.760 --> 00:10:04.160 mode brings this into kind of like iPod mode in a way, like iPod classic. Like 00:10:01.120 --> 00:10:05.920 you're in a music app now. That is all. 00:10:04.160 --> 00:10:09.279 All your antennas are off. I think you can turn the Bluetooth antenna back on, 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 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. 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 00:10:21.839 --> 00:10:27.519 DACK instead of having to buy a separate uh desktop one. I never talked about the 00:10:26.000 --> 00:10:30.399 jacks yet. So you can see there's actually three ports. Ha, your phone 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 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 00:10:41.040 --> 00:10:46.320 mm, the other's 2.5. A balanced cable is 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 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 00:10:52.640 --> 00:10:58.800 that when I did this Grado headphones review, we found out during that review 00:10:56.480 --> 00:11:02.720 that it was like $200 to have the cable uh terminate with XLR balanced output. 00:11:01.360 --> 00:11:07.440 When you have a cable like this, the whole audio signal is on this one line. 00:11:04.560 --> 00:11:12.640 So if you brought this cable close to a fluctuating magnetic field like a DC 00:11:10.000 --> 00:11:17.680 power cable for example then that DC power cable could induce noise onto this 00:11:15.200 --> 00:11:21.200 cable and then that noise would be audible if you have golden ears or 00:11:19.360 --> 00:11:26.240 whatever uh to you listening to your music. However, if you use a balanced 00:11:23.200 --> 00:11:28.240 output in one of these ports then that 00:11:26.240 --> 00:11:33.600 that three-prongong cable it actually has the audio signal on there twice. One 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 00:11:35.440 --> 00:11:41.440 same. They're out of phase, completely flipped. So the audio signal on one when 00:11:39.839 --> 00:11:47.360 it hits a peak, the other signal is hitting a trough. And what this does is 00:11:44.079 --> 00:11:50.000 it makes it impervious to noise coming 00:11:47.360 --> 00:11:54.320 in because all you hear is the difference between those two waves. So 00:11:52.160 --> 00:11:58.079 if both those waves have the same noise on them, that noise is going to get 00:11:55.920 --> 00:12:01.680 canceled out. This is called common mode rejection. You can look that up. That's 00:12:00.079 --> 00:12:06.320 why it's so awesome to have balanced outputs and why it's so expensive and 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 00:12:08.240 --> 00:12:13.959 headphones now and actually listen to this thing. 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 00:12:20.480 --> 00:12:26.399 that makes it so awesome to listen to is something they call active servo power. 00:12:24.480 --> 00:12:30.560 So basically on the final stage of the built-in amp in this thing, they have 00:12:28.480 --> 00:12:35.200 some intelligence to detect what kind of impedance your headphones you're 00:12:32.160 --> 00:12:37.040 plugging in has and will step up the 00:12:35.200 --> 00:12:42.079 current accordingly. So if you're using like IM earphones that go in your ear, 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. 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 00:12:47.200 --> 00:12:53.920 right now I'm in overear headphone mode. And so if you have really high impedance 00:12:52.079 --> 00:12:58.240 headphones that take a lot of power, this thing will see that and crank it up 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 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 00:13:03.760 --> 00:13:12.000 this overear headphone mode on that ramps up like the high current mode. And 00:13:07.839 --> 00:13:14.560 it's it's wicked. Oh man, I don't even 00:13:12.000 --> 00:13:18.959 want to talk anymore. You guys just just leave just leave me with the headphones. 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 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 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 00:13:30.800 --> 00:13:37.200 pressing. If this is in your pocket, you really can't tell. These buttons are all 00:13:35.120 --> 00:13:40.480 basically the same shape and size except for this one's a little bigger. Um but 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 00:13:44.079 --> 00:13:48.880 of different shapes. That's kind of a flaw. Um other than that, pretty cool. 00:13:47.839 --> 00:13:53.040 Cool. I should actually just take this off because it's kind of fingerprinty, 00:13:50.880 --> 00:13:57.680 kind of glossy carbon fiber look. This thing is pretty versatile and pretty 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 00:13:59.920 --> 00:14:05.680 wants to spend $1,300 on a portable media player. So, thanks for watching 00:14:04.320 --> 00:14:10.079 ShortCircuit today. If you like this video, hit subscribe, hit like, check 00:14:07.760 --> 00:14:16.399 out our a other audio things, other audio videos. They usually have me and I 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 00:14:17.600 --> 00:14:23.360 me. So, watch Carpool Critics. Okay, David's here to tell us to watch 00:14:21.199 --> 00:14:26.560 Carpool Critics, the movie podcast. Hey, you know what would sound great through 00:14:24.480 --> 00:14:31.040 these headphones? My voice and David's voice. And maybe even Riley. Maybe 00:14:29.760 --> 00:14:33.600 on a good day, Riley. Yeah.