HiBy R3 Pro Saber, Hi-Res Music Player, Hi-Fi Lossless Audio Player, mp3 player with bluetooth and wifi/aptX/LDAC/MQA/DSD/FLAC/Dual ES9218P/Full Touch Screen - Grey

The sound quality is really great, the dual Cirrus Logic DAC is slightly on the warmer side of neutral, providing clear separation with good depth of soundstage. I tend not to use the MSEB or equaliser at all.Battery life is excellent, I'd guess on average I get about 16-18 hours per full cycle, but rarely drain it, charging it every couple of days or so.The user interface is excellent providing easy navigation and quick access to key functions and settings using an IOS style settings menu dragged up from the bottom. The screen is great, album art looks fantastic and viewing angles and brightness are excellent. It's the second player I've had which features Hibylink so you can control the device playback from your phone which is a fantastic feature. The physical buttons also make blind navigation in the pocket easy and I've not yet encountered an accidental press as they're nicely recessed in the supplied/aftermarket case and clicky.I listen to most of my music using wired earbuds, but have used the r3pro quite a lot as an LDAC receiver from my phone too. Tidal streaming works fine but not as good as using a smartphone app, using the LDAC as a Bluetooth receiver I get better audio quality than connecting my buds direct to my phone.The only real issue I have had was updating firmware, this is due to an issue with the original firmware installed, thankfully Hiby provide a fix which is fairly simple to do using a Windows PC and now it's updated to v1.4.One slight annoyance I have is that it takes a long time to index music after updating files on an SD card, I appreciate this is to build the library used on the device and with a phone via Hibylink but it's frustrating that it takes a good 5+ minutes to index about 200gb of audio.It's great you get a protective case and screen protectors with it, I bought the official leather case from Hiby to go with it.I normally buy low end players, so was genuinely skeptical whether a player double the price of what I normally spend would be worth it, wanting it mainly for sound alone. The fantastic audio quality, combined with excellent feature set, usability and battery life have left me well impressed, its a beautiful little player which is nice and portable providing awesome sound.

Works fine if use wired connection, but bluetooth is poor and can relate sound to like a cracked record, crackling & skipping all the time! I have tried all the installed codecs with Sony WH-1000XM4 headphones, Bluedio Turbines, and Skullcandy Hesh 2 to find the best results with the Bluedio. Also, HiBy support is very slow and still waiting to hear about this issue. Very disappointed!

Doesn't sound any better than my phone, or have any real extra features my phone doesn't have. Sent back.

I wasn't expecting too much given the price but this is a good player. The screen is very attractive and there is no lag when swiping etc and no waiting for the track to play. As it doesn't have an Android operating system it's not possible to download apps but it does have Tidal installed and I believe there are a few others it can handle but I don't use streaming apps. The internet radio side of things is great fun and I've installed several stations from around the world but unfortunately BBC stations use a format that the Hiby can't handle, the station has to end in .mp3 or .m3u8 or it will not work, although strangely I have been able to install BBC World Service through a Public Radio site in America who relay it as a .mp3 stream. The user instructions that comes with it only covers basic operation which is frustrating so you need to download the user manual from the Hiby site for the non pro R3 which is the same in most respects and gives a much more detailed guide. Great fun!

I mainly listen to music through wireless Sony LDAC Bluetooth headphones and I've owned a couple of sub £200 DAP's in my time (Sony NW-A35 and NW-A55) and although I was satisfied with the ease of using them, the sound quality for a top brand name, to me was just above average. Another let down was the ability to use the EQ mode when in bluetooth mode to get the sound signature I wanted. For some strange reason, its disabled.I read the reviews on the Hiby R3 Pro and it sounded just what I needed. Many ways to alter the EQ and sound shape along with excellent sound quality in a compact unit,...and boy I wasn't wrong.! The sound on this little thing is amazing! Wide and spacious with real depth and transparency. There is a fantastic setting, basically like an EQ on steroids that can shape the bass depth and thump, vocals, mids and treble to just how you want it, It really is a great setting to play with. What lets this unit down however, and is the reason for me returning, is the AWFUL experience when bluetooth is switched on. The sound stutters and crackles to the point of real annoyance and frustration. Even scrolling for your next track whilst listening to music stutters the sound and makes you switch off. This is nothing to do with bluetooth distance...The unit was right next to my headphones! It was eased by changing to the SBC codec from LDAC but you lose the quality in sound, Daft when you have LDAC supported headphones. Another bug I noticed was the fact that FLAC files are NOT gapless, even when the setting in the menu is switched on. Live music is spoiled by the gap between each song. Again this is remedied by changing the codec to SBC, but then you lose the sound quality from the drop in bitrate from LDAC. Finally, the unit lags too much. Scroll and your icons appear about half a second later. Doesn't sound much, but in todays day and age with faster, cheaper processors and RAM, this should not be so. Its really as slow as an old smartphone from the 90's...Very disappointing.I REALLY loved the sound from this player, but just couldn't put up with the buggy software and awful bluetooth experience. This was even with the latest 1.5 firmware installed to apparently iron out such defects, so sadly will be returned :(

Amazing little player and actually portable as it is palm sized. Wi-fi and Bluetooth,hi gain, balanced or not has everything you need and good UI. Very easy to use, partnered with Tin T2,s superb for the money