A Geek Goes Flying

Innioasis Y1 Ads popped up for The Classic MP3 Player (128GB) that tries to be a dupe of the OG Apple iPods. (No idea how close it comes, haven’t played with one personally.) The price as I type this is $179.99 $99.90 (and I suspect it never actually sells for $179.99), but I think  it was a bit more when I looked at it the first time. Just expensive enough to put it out of “impulse buy” territory for me (especially when I have a tragically underutilized Sony Walkman, and recently sold a Shanling M1s on eBay because I wasn’t using it enough.) Out of curiosity, I did a reverse image search and it’s apparently (also sold as?) the  Innioasis Y1 , and a bit cheaper on Amazon (which also has an even cheaper 64GB option , if you just want to try it out). It has a standard USB C port, doesn’t have a ton of storage but it’s not seriously hurting there (even using FLAC, 128GB will fit thousands of songs and hundreds of albums), claims 25 hours of music playback on a battery, has Bl...

Shelf over the Schiit Jotunheim amplifier Bedside. I got a great price on an older Jotunheim (not the Jotunheim 2) with the AK4490 DAC card installed, that I couldn’t pass up. This is for more casual listening; music while reading before bed, maybe the occasional TV show or online lecture series or whatever before bed. (I know I maybe shouldn’t , but, here we are.) But my bedside table is getting a little crowded. At first I put this shelf over the amp, but that put my Belkin charger a bit too high for my iPhone in ___ mode to be effective, so I returned to the well and picked up another 10" square aluminum plate to build another small aluminum shelf to put over the amp. This time I used 4" legs for air flow ( 2/7 x 4 inch Sign Standoff Screws ), since the Schiit is passively cooled and the vents are on the top (the mac mini has a fan and vents out the back, so I wasn’t as worried about leaving space above it). Drill bits to poke holes in the aluminum. It’s a little wobb...

My cheap XDP-30R came with no case, no clip, nothing but the player itself. It’s kind of old and junky (as one redditor accurately described it: “Volume wheel, one click, volume goes up +30 or -40” 🤣), but it’s my DAP for the moment, and I don’t have any desire to kill it prematurely, so ... 5127 Phone Holster CLC Custom Leathercraft 5127 Large Cell Phone Holster , Black , $11.90. It’s the perfect size horizontally and in thickness, and the pocket is deep enough, and the Velcro flap flexible enough, the player can be inserted with the Youkamoo 2.5mm Balanced Headphone Cable without conflicting or putting any pressure on the 2.5mm end or the cable coming out of it. There’s a belt clip and a ring on the back for hanging it off a lanyard if that’s how you want to roll. It’s a bit on the clunky side, since it wasn’t meant for this application, but it protects the player and keeps your hands free to do other things. Obviously, you can’t access the controls with the player in the holster, ...

(With apologies to Thanos. Cute idea for a headphone stand !) Thanos bust headphone holder I recently picked up the Drop 2.5mm to Sennheiser headphone cable (for $19, I wouldn’t have at $50) (the 3.5mm single-ended cable that comes with the Sennheiser HD58x Jubilee headphones is hilariously long; the balanced cable is only slightly awkward in comparison). I’m using it with my EarStudio ES100 MK2 portable Bluetooth DAC/Amp, and it does seem to make a difference - the headphones seem “punchier” with the balanced connection, and can be set at a lower volume for an equivalent sonic experience. Liking it. So of course that set me down the rabbit hole of DAPs with balanced outputs. The least expensive seems to be the $130 SHANLING M0 Pro , but to use a 2.5mm connection with that you’ll need their $14 3.5mm to 4.4mm adapter , plus another $10+ 4.4mm to 2.5mm adapter like this , and now you’re at like $160 for the audio player, and you have something akin to a Rube Goldberg machine sticking...