The single-ended output is good, but the balanced circuit is the star providing superb clarity and headroom…and a truly impressive listening experience. Staging is wide with good depth resulting in a decent headroom even with the single-ended circuit. Nothing is boosted, which results in great midrange clarity. The presentation is neutral without being analytical or edgy. It will sound very similar to other devices using the same all-in-one chip. The AP80 Pro-X has its sound dictated by its prefabricated SoC. In other words, the sound is entirely made by ESS and not by Hidizs or whoever put their name on the dap. In fact, there should not be any major difference between any model using these SoCs, as the engineer cannot manipulate the software (in contrast to a dedicated DAC chip). In summary, although I have not auditioned the AP80 Pro, I do not expect any (significant) sonic differences between the two. Not changed between models have operating system, buttons/potentiometer, and Samsung touchscreen. I speculate both models’ channel separation are identical.įunctional difference is a lack of radio and protective case, and a different shape in the AP80 Pro-X (the AP80 Pro’s case does not fit). But even the AP80 Pro’s “worse number” is still very good. Upon further inspection, the AP80 Pro-X’s better value stems from a measurement at no load, whereas the AP80 Pro’s number was generated under load.Īnd since channel separation decreases with load, these two numbers cannot be compared. Hidizs lists a much improved channel separation for the AP80 Pro-X model. This results in essentially the same performance specifications between AP80 Pro and AP80 Pro-X with channel separation as apparent exemption. The AP80 deploys two ESS ES9218P SoCs (introduced in late 2016 “System on Chip”), and the AP80 Pro-X features two ESS ES9219C SoCs (introduced in late 2019).īoth all-in-one DAC/amp chips have effectively the same specs, but the ES2919C features hardware-level MQA decoding and it has a lower battery consumption at standby/no load. The main tech difference between the two is the chipset. The AP80 Pro-X is the update of the AP80 Pro. Differences between Hidizs AP80 Pro and Pro-XĬompared with AP80 PRO using the final unfold (4X) of an MQA file, AP80 PRO X will use MQA technology for the final unfold (8X) of an MQA file.
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