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Martin Beveridge
I have had my Volumio Rivo for nearly 1 month now so I am in a good position to review it. I bought Rivo after looking at many other options as it appeared to tick many of the boxes that I required to achieve excellent streaming sound quality. The unit was ordered via the Volumio site online and sent from Italy to the UK and it arrived within a week or so, it was shipped and packaged well and with no issues. Out of the box the instructions were clear and it was easy to set up and get working fairly quickly. I set up the Volumio Rivo with the software downloaded and the user interface appeared good. I installed a hardware software update during the set up process. Sound Quality : I have the Rivo in quite a demanding high end set up. Naim NAC 252, NAP 300, and with Rivo digital output in to a Chord DAC. On initial listening I was impressed, SQ was a lot better than streaming from my Yamaha WX-C50 streamer which I was upgrading from, so I fully expected this. I tried and tested tracks from Apple Music and Tidal and my home Network NAS and also tried the CD USB drive port, all these sources worked well and I was very happy with the sound quality. A few days later my linear 5v power supply arrived and this again was a big upgrade, by dramatically lifting he noise floor. I was now in the audio zone that I wanted to be in terms of the streaming sound quality. So well done Volumio for sound quality. As the initial days and weeks went on and after the honeymoon period , I started to understand the system interface more and to reveal a few 'non-sound' related issues. 1) The app keeps informing me there is a software update, I have tried installing this and it loads and reboots Rivo, but then it always has the same version after the software update and I continue to get the same messages. I informed the help desk and was told that another update was available, but I still cannot get the unit to update. Always has the same annoying App message. 2) The Volumio Ipad software to control the unit, although it is well designed display and access features, it is terribly slow and unresponsive. Speedwise you feel you are on an old Windows 7 computer, not good! and lets the experience down badly. With Tidal I had to switch directly to Tidal app as the Volumio app was just too slow betwen searching and changing tracks, and also If I wanted to change my sources, I often had to reboot the app. It is just too slow and unresponsive. I am very surprised at this and I believe it is the app not my hardware. I will delete this if it is fixed. I fed this issue by email back to the Tech support at Volumio but had no response. So again disappointing here. In summary - I love my Volumio Rivo, the sound is great. Just please change the colour options available as blue and orange doesn't always suit. Mainly please fix the terribly slow Ipad software app, it could be a much fuller experience if the integration of the app worked a lot better. Thanks
1 year ago
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