FiiO’s latest portable DAC wants to be your next hi-fi Swiss Army Knife – but it has stiff competition

[What Hi-Fi?]

Need a compact, affordable Bluetooth DAC and headphone amp? FiiO may have you covered with its new BTR13 USB DAC.

FiiO’s latest portable DAC wants to be your next hi-fi Swiss Army Knife – but it has stiff competition : Read more

 

[Corpus_Chain]

I think I might invest in one of these as a preventative treatment for the day when I can no longer buy a phone with a headphone out. Seems like a cool product.
If you connect it via USB to a phone, can you switch it to PC mode and power it from the phone? This would be useful for in the car, where I can have my phone plugged into the power, and it would save having to try and recharge the DAC halfway through a journey.

...oh no... wait... if it connects to the USB on the phone, I can't charge the phone! Haha! Maybe phones need two USB ports, like in the old days when you had a specific power port and a separate data port (either USB or that weird Nokia type connection), or maybe a DAC that has a power passthrough?

 

[Jasonovich]

I find these dongle/portable DACs self defeating, why do you need these extra entrails dangling from your mobile, and the extra overheads, such as draining the power from your mobile.
Seriously? The mobile is a wonderful tool but do I want to be distracted by pop ups, phone calls and messaging when I listen to music?

Better to get a quality DAC, there's so many on the market to choose from, can't go wrong with FiiO, Cayin, TempoTec, Hiby, or if you if you wish to impress upon your peers, there's Astell & Kern, of course.