Closer Examination

The moment you take the HiBy R5 (Gen 2) out of the box and peel off the protective plastic over the screen protectors, you'll realize this is very much like one of those thick Android phones that market a 10,000 mAh battery for long operating times before you need to recharge it. Measuring 123 x 71 x 16 mm and weighing ~220 g, the DAP feels extremely solid despite the glass everywhere, and anyone with a modern phone will feel a pang of nostalgia for the form factor from a few years ago. The player is black and sports a 4.7" IPS display in a 16:9 aspect ratio. Bezels are relatively thin on the top and sides, with most of the business on the bottom, where we see HiBy branding as well. The left side has four tactile buttons—power, track next, pause/play, and track back—to allow for dedicated media playback controls which work irrespective of whether the display is on or the phone unlocked. There is a small indicator LED next to the power button, and everything is placed symmetrically around the central line that has slightly beveled edges to help hold the DAP in the hands.


The matte finish continues on the other side, where we see volume control buttons. This is where I was left underwhelmed since I would have much rather seen a volume wheel or even slider. These are wider than the buttons on the other side, but you need to step up to the HiBy R6 to get the wheel. Next to the volume up button is a microSD card slot, with the HiBy R5 (Gen 2) able to accept <2 TB storage cards. I did check with a 1 TB microSD card for fun, and the player had no problem recognizing it and the files. The top side is glass again, which helps place WiFi and Bluetooth antennas without disrupting signal strength much. The bottom is the business side, and we again get the smooth matte finish here. We get the I/O ports, beginning with a 3.5 mm TRS single-ended headphone out/line out port on the left, expected Type-C port in the middle for power and data connectivity, and popular balanced 2.5 mm and 4.4 mm TRRS ports for earphones. The 4.4 mm port future-proofs the HiBy R5 (Gen 2) since portable audio is heading that way, but it also costs a pretty penny to incorporate at this time, which is worth keeping in mind when we wrap up the review and talk about pricing. The back comes with the pre-installed protector over the glass, which is still smooth to the touch and keeps the branding and certification shining underneath. You now know that HiBy is a house brand from Dongguan SmartAction Technology Co., LTD, and that this DAP has been certified for Hi-Res Audio over both wired and wireless.


Using the provided case is as simple as aligning the buttons with the respective case indents and pushing the DAP in place. The case is a snug fit and quite good in the hands for a bundled offering, and there's no aftermarket option at this time, so you have the grand total of two options—naked or this case. The tactility of the buttons is slightly reduced, but what irked me more is that this first-party case made specifically for the R5 Gen 2 has the cutouts in the wrong place. Take that partially obstructed indicator LED, for example. The worse offender is the I/O ports, where someone didn't realize the wordings are placed above the ports and slightly covered by the case. This could have easily been solved by placing the text at the bottom instead, which would have made the HiBy R5 (Gen 2) a more polished product.


It's now time to turn on the HiBy R5 (Gen 2), which is as simple as pressing down on the power button for a few seconds. The screen lights up in all its 1280x720 glory, making this a ~320 PPI IPS display that gets plenty bright indoors and is more than usable outdoors. The HiBy logo shows up in white as the system boots up, and the blue indicator LED on the side further confirms the boot-up process even before you see the logo. Given my set shipped from HiFiGo in China, it defaulted to Mandarin, and I had to use my phone's live translate feature to select a language and confirm before entering the language settings and adding English. Funnily enough, that was not enough as I still had to move English above Mandarin in the languages list, and only then was the system set to work and respond in English. Seen above is a photo of the HiBy R5 (Gen 2) fully booted, and the standard booting time is on the order of 22–23 seconds, which is not bad at all, but certainly not class leading. The shared images will all be screenshots since I want to go over the software experience before coming back to the hardware.