Hidizs AP80 Pro Review – Compact Power
Hidizs AP80 Pro
$169.99
Pros
- Very compact and portable
- Musical natural sound signature
- Balanced and single ended ports supported. Powerful for it's size.
Cons
- Main UI icons feel a little dated.
- Volume dial difficult to use at times.
The AP80 PRo supports a comprehensive selection of audio formats.
Using a dedicated FPGA chip, the HBC3000 chip handles jitter and noise correction well and the players chipset can decode native DSD formats 64/128/256.
Switching the DSD from standard formats, the player transitions with ease and there is no player CPU or Component heating apparent.
Bidirectional Bluetooth 4.2 is supported to help with direct streaming as well as standard bluetooth headphone pairing.
Implementing Hiby’s UAT (Ultra Audio Transmission) very own developed codec format will ensure that 192kHz sample rate and 1.2Mbps bitrate are supported, this Bluetooth codec is apparently also optimised for different music genres.
Sony LDAC and APT-X is also supported, giving this little DAC/Dap quite a formidable repertoire, impressive!
I would recommend setting the player to gapless to make sure the default volume fade in/out does not impact the listening experience.
This player is powerful and produces a very detailed natural slightly neutral sound signature, its not warm but more clean with dark black background sound.
Using power hungry or sensitive headphones is not a problem and we didn’t identify hiss on the earphones we tried with it.
In addition to the EQ settings there is also gain settings to help with personal preference and drive-ability.
Surprisingly this little player can even drive full size headphones which I was not expecting, so that adds an extra positive reason for purchasing the AP80 Pro.
Balanced output volume is slightly higher and the dual DAC shines in this output mode, effortlessly delivering detailed musical articulate waves of audio.
All ports are solid and of all the earphones we tried they all remained securely connected with no crackle or interference.
Pairing with all the earphones and headphones we tried worked well and we did not find any poor synergies.
Audio black levels are clean and smooth with no hiss or unwanted artefacts present.
The general sound signature is very pleasant sounding with a natural detailed slightly neutral nature, I am impressed with the accessibility of the overall signature and it seems to work well with all manner of musical styles and audio formats we tried.
I can see myself revisiting this player time and time again.
Certainly we look forward to further firmware updates to see what extra magic can be added to this great value versatile audio player.
Conclusion
The Hidizs AP80 Pro digital audio player is a compact portable player with a natural sound signature that is powerful and detailed. It can handle many musical styles and is extremely powerful for its size. Pricing is fair and build quality is decent. The screen resolution is clean and the player supports many Hi Res and wireless protocols. Providing a great value package putting it in the league of mid to top tier Daps for a fraction of the price. We recommend this player and feel it will be a great addition for most users out there wanting a compacted versatile DAP.
