iFi Audio - hip-dac

This is surely a worthy product. Sound is nearly neutral with little warm. First I've tried this with my 1more dual driver earphones. The sound quality was really amazing but I was overwhelmed when I tried this with my newly bought headphone beyerdynamic dt990 edition 250 ohms. But whenever you play any high impedance headphone like this you have to switch on powermatch button. This is the first and only dac-amp combo I bought. I don't have any idea about other dacs or amplifiers but this thing is a pure happiness for me. This thing has enough amòunt of power but I am not sure that it can drive a extreme power hungry headphones like the beyerdynamic 600 ohms one with full potential. This is my first purchase of any costly audio equipment (yes u heard it correctly that it's a costly product for me) but this product didn't give any chance to regret. And one important thing u will get all the necessary connectors (for charging, and connecting with smartphone using type-c and also with laptop or desktop) within the box.

After coming from a disaster experience with the mojo(I like the sound but unreliable), I was looking for something with a warm sound signature to use while on the move. And the hip dac fits right in with its burr brown warm sounding dac and super portable size. The sound is incredible if you wanna rock out but not very analytical. But then that's not its purpose. I can't believe I am getting chord mojo sound (I think, I havent used it for a few months) at 1/3rd thr price. My first ifi audio gear and definitely many. Also they give you all the necessary connection peripherals in the box( I am looking at you chord😒) Would recommend it blindly at this price. Punches well above its weight

I am an ifi fan boy and this is my 3rd ifi product, I had owned ifi micro idsd and currently own the ifi micro idsd BL. If I already own the BL then why the hip DAC again, I wanted a pocket sized DAC that can bring in the ifi SQ. Does the hip DAC deliver for me?

TLDR rating :)

SQ: 5
Build: 5+
Battery: 3.5
Value for Money: 5
Overall: 4.5

Hip DAC lives up to the brand name when it comes to SQ, it offers a satisfactory punch with Hifiman Sundara (I am yet to try the 4.4mm balanced) and the rendition is smooth, you don't feel like wanting more unless you are spoiled by having a ifi micro idsd BL handy for comparison. It drives the Sennheiser HD650 to ear splitting volumes (both 3.5SE & balanced) and hip DAC has a neutral to warm signature for perfect synergy. I am sure everyone knows how well HD650 can scale with amps, so don’t come complaining about my statement here :)

To me the perfect pairing comes in the form of Yamaha MT-5 which is my recent find for a budget closed back! Smooth rendering of the ifi hip DAC without compromising on the speed and attack added with sufficient bottom end on tap when needed (Xbass) makes it a perfect compact DAC/Amp on the go for revealing monitoring cans like the Yamaha MT-5. Yamaha MT-5 also has a brilliant staging for a closed back and the combo makes every song & genre enjoyable, with MT-5 pairing I never felt anything lacking compared to ifi BL.

I am not an IEM fan and just have the Venture electronics BIE which did very well with the hip DAC with excellent staging and dynamics. Honestly I cannot understand some of the negative reviews about hip DAC, whilst my hip DAC was still on order I happened to stumble upon one famous reviewer’s comments about hip DAC, he mentioned the hip DAC as being warm and loose and has a rolled off high end, he in fact claimed hip DAC to be warmer than the Chord Mojo. Having owned the Chord Mojo I can confirm this is not the case with the hip DAC, the amp has been tuned for linear & smooth delivery throughout the frequency range while exhibiting proper attack on the transducers (ifi special IMHO) combining it with a perfect high end which delivers lot of details.
With such a brilliant package the caveat comes in the form of battery life and the way circuit has been designed, the data port and the charging port has been separated and there is no way hip DAC can work on USB power from a PC (as claimed by the supplied manual which now has been corrected in the online version) and it solely depends on battery power unlike ifi BL. This was a major disappointment for me, I was able to squeeze somewhere between 4 to 6 hours only when running on high gain (power match) and balanced with a combination of Sundara and HD 650, probably with an IEM you should be able to do more than 8 hours. The battery charge indicator is handy and it has three colours to show battery charge, though I wish it had four colours like Mojo

Red - less than 25%
Green - 25 to 75%
White - 75 to 100%

To sum it up except for battery life and battery circuit design hip DAC scores very high in terms of SQ and build quality at a very affordable price and it deserves a place in your back pack if you cannot afford or if you are not a fan of the entry level Android based DAPs in the market like me.

It looks great and works as expected. It's a quality portable DAC/AMP for its price. I usually like to listen to my music without much EQ tweaks. But once you listen to music with XBass on, you won't like to turn it off. Per my use, I can say that this product will drive the Sennheiser HD 58X and Hifiman HE4XX very well. But with the 400mW power it might not drive more inefficient headphones like fostex T50rp and T60rp.

Got mine two days ago. Used it extensively for the past two days with different headphones and this is my review of the Hip Dac.
Unless paired with the right headphone, the Hip Dac is not at all neutral, atleast to my ears. With warm sounding headphones, they sound boomy and at times muddy. They make even the Audio Technica Ath R70X sound too warm, atleast to my ears. They make Shures 215 sound summery warm. This is not necessary a bad thing if you are a bass head. To my ears, they are amazing with bright sounding headphones like the Dt 770. So, it is very important to pair the Hip Dac with the right headphone. If paired with the right headphone, the Hip dac is very enjoyable. If you have a bright sounding headphone or if you are a bass head, you should consider getting the Hip Dac.
They do look really nice and hip with a solid build quality. One negative, the battery does not last very long.

This is my first portable DAC/Amp and I finalized this after a lot of research. I wanted a warm sounding DAC for my brighter IEMs. I got what I wanted. The build quality is top-notch and included accessories are a bonus. I'd surely recommend this to anyone who is looking to upgrade their sound output, whether from a phone or a PC/Laptop. Wishing for an Apple CCK would be just egregious, I guess.
For people on the fence; go for it.