How to get the best sound quality from Hiby R4

Hi! It seems the Hiby R4 Eva isn’t Roon Ready yet.

I use Roon for most of my devices at home, but this may be the exception.

Unfortunately, Roon only streams at 24/48kHz (indicated by the green light in the signal path - AAudio), while the Qobuz app and the Hiby Player (with Qobuz integration) support up to 24/192kHz.

Such a bummer! Is there any workaround?

It’s a Roon client issue. I wouldn’t let your enjoyment of music be swayed by sampling rate though. So much matters so much more than the sampling and even bitrate to sound good…

I have a Hiby R4 on the way to replace my iPhone with Fiio BT11 dongle to Qudelix 5K. It’s fiddly and I’m annoyed by Roon dropping the ‘iPhone’ zone whenever the phone sleeps or even I pause the music for more than a minute or so. Probably an Apple restriction but still annoying.

While I’ll use Roon client on the R4 it certainly won’t be the only app I use for music. When I want the deep info during discovery with Roon, I’ll use it, when I want full sample and bitrate focused listening I’ll use the Hiby or native Qobuz apps.

Bit perfect isn’t really a thing I’m bothered with. I prefer to lightly shape the sound depending on mood or time of day or feeling, etc. in which case the options included in the R4 look fabulous!

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Makes perfect sense!

The R4 arrived this morning. It’s quite nice. I’ve listened continuously to Radio Paradise using their native Android app and have experienced zero dropouts…Roon typically drops at least once an hour on bad days.

Sounds just fine. Is it the very most resolving or high resolution, yes with tracks that are recorded and mastered very well. Likewise, not so much with tracks that are neither.

Class A does get a bit warm but the aluminum case dissipates it nicely. I do want to compare/contrast with the Fiio JM21. The R4 is a bit chunky and weighty for no good reason. Sure, it feels like it’s solid but I’d rather have lighter and smaller for the pocket.

Fiio work with Roon Ready on their M series DAPS not sure if they will bring it to others. Love my M11 Plus. Still have my Hiby R5 which was a good little DAP but useless as a USB DAC as it had constant dropouts.

I’ve used the Hiby R4 for a few days now. It’s very good for the $249. The hw/sw combo is better than very good. Qobuz, Radio Paradise, FluxFM and SomaFM native apps all work perfectly.

Roon client on the other hand is bad. It works but the system becomes effectively unresponsive. The processor seems to be spun up and doesn’t release until the unit is restarted. Closing Roon doesn’t change the symptom of severe system lag in UI responsiveness nor does the sound of a clipped signal stop when listening in other apps, again until a restart.

My goal as not to run Roon on this device, thankfully…

This little chunky guy plays well beyond its $. I know we say that all the time but the progress made with the OS and HW is truly great. The opamps are fully biased class A. Uses more power and more heat has to be dissipated but boy does it sound good with good recordings.

My comparisons are limited though. iPhone with Fiio BT11 using LDAC at 660kbps. Sounds good but emphasizes the upper ranges of glaring treble to my ears.

Ziigaat CincoTres and the Hiby R4 are a winning combo for my needs, wants and desires. Oh and I’ve never used Android before…took a few minutes to figure out the gestures, etc. but not bad coming from a life of iPhone. The customization is welcomed.

In short, the best way to get the best sound quality from the Hiby R4 is to NOT use Roon.

I’m also a new R4 owner! I didn’t have stability issues with Roon or Roon ARC, but I observed that both apps resample all their output to 48Khz, which is standard for any android OS. But since the R4 has an OS level workaround and actually plays music from Tidal and USB Audio Player Pro and other apps losslessly at their original sample rate, Roon can’t take advantage of that.

Honestly it’s broken the spell that Roon has placed on me. Now I’m doing a significant portion of my listening outside of Roon.

I wish there was an option to disable Roon’s resampling and just let the Android OS do its thing. In this case, I believe it would mean lossless playback on the R4 DAP. I know Roon’s signal chain GUI wouldn’t be able to accurately report what is happening to the audio, but I’d be happy with a green or a grey bubble because the OS reports the sample rate right at the top of the screen.