Hidizs AP100 introduced USB-DAC support / Soundpal Blog

Just the other day, Hidizs posted an important firmware update for the AP100 player with the new USB-DAC feature.



Although the player is essentially obliged to play music only on the road, very often you want to listen to music at work in the office. It is often easier to play music from a computer, but the sound quality of the office computer is poor. An external sound card with high-quality sound is usually not worth buying for work, but the ability to connect the player as a sound card is an excellent way out of the situation.



The ability to connect the player via USB as a sound card is called “USB-DAC” support, where the device works as an external DAC, receiving an audio stream via USB.



After flashing the player (detailed steps for flashing at the end of the material), the item “Storage” or “Storage mode” appears in the menu. You must select "DAC".

After connecting to the AP100 computer, you must install the driver.

The driver for the AP100 is made from Thesycon version 1.61.0. The driver supports Windows, from XP to Win 8.1. Only Win XP 64 bit is not supported.

The driver fully supports ASIO without any additional bridge programs like ASIO4All.

In addition, there is support for the native DSD stream, but in the current version of the driver from under Foobar2000, the AP100 output only noise. Perhaps full support for DSD will appear a little later.

What is the best way to listen to the AP100 using Foobar2000 as an example

After a successful installation, for high-quality music playback, you need to select the sound output through Wasapi (Win7) or ASIO. These modes are the highest quality.



If during playback from under ASIO the sound will slow down or interrupt, then it is necessary to increase the buffer value in the driver settings. A small buffer value is only necessary for musicians when playing in real time on MIDI instruments.

When playing sound through USB from the player, you can only adjust the sound volume. The equalizer and resampler are not active.

RMAA Report

Device: TUSBAudio ASIO Driver
Features:
Input channels: 0
Output channels: 2
Input latency: 176
Output latency: 1411
Min buffer size: 2128
Max buffer size: 2128
Preferred buffer size: 2128
Granularity: 0
ASIOOutputReady - not supported
Sample rate:
8000 Hz - not supported
11025 Hz - not supported
16000 Hz - not supported
22050 Hz - not supported
32000 Hz - supported
44100 Hz - supported
48000 Hz - supported
88200 Hz - supported
96000 Hz - supported
176400 Hz - supported
192000 Hz - supported
352800 Hz - not supported
384000 Hz - not supported
Input channels:
Output channels:
channel: 0 (Master Channel) - Int32LSB
channel: 1 (Left Channel) - Int32LSB

The RMAA report demonstrates support for playback up to 192 kHz inclusive.

How to install new firmware on AP100

Firmware can be downloaded from of. source: dropbox or site soundpal.ru

Before updating the firmware, make sure the player is charged or make the firmware with the charger connected.

1. turn off the AP100
2. remove memory card
3. copy the file “AP100.fw” to the root directory of the memory card (the memory card must be formatted in FAT32)
4. insert memory card
5. press and hold the “Return” button, and then press the power button for 3 seconds
6. AP100 must enter update mode
7. after the update is completed, the screen will show “Update success” and the AP100 will reboot automatically (if the file is not located in the root directory of the memory card, the screen will display “update file not found”).
8. optional, but desirable: System Settings -> Restore Factory Settings -> Ok
9. turn off the AP100
10. remove memory card
11. delete file AP100.fw

Author Kuznetsov Roman romanrex