Fiitii HifiDots TWS Review – Rube Goldberg Strikes Again
In this Article
INTRO
Fiitii HifiDots challenge the user right from beginning. They come from the brain child of someone concerned with major ear juice intrusion, who must believe humidity is a major issue to be dealt with by multiple layers of protection.
The $200 Fiitii HifiDots have high ambitions, focusing on the art of storage, but fall short of dethroning mainstream players in terms of sound qualities. They have good Active Noise Cancellation and a strong midrange centric boost with mild bass lift complimented with a bright sizzling top end.
FIRST IMPRESSIONS
Sometimes building a better mousetrap makes sense, but the Fiitii HifiDots picked the wrong thing to focus on. Upon opening the box the first thing you see is directions on how to remove the earpieces from the case. Not a good sign. Puzzled, I completely ignored it and opened the spaceship styled pod with a satisfying button push to reveal the EarPods.
Trying to pluck them from the pod was the opposite of satisfying, and after fiddling with them I managed to extract them. Now I understood why there were directions just to get them out. For fun For fun, I handed it to my unsuspecting wife who thought the case was “cool” but quickly became frustrated when trying to pull the earpieces out. Fiitii should have stuck to inserting them stem first into the charging case like 99% of the earphones that have stems.
The Fiitii HifiDots come with a sleek charging pod, but heavy like a good lake skipping stone. Fidgeters will rejoice, those nearby will curse and swear them to eternity for messing with the space pod door.
Putting them back in is a chore as well if you do not put the stem in first, and even after doing it the right way does not just drop in place. No idea why they needed to make this difficult, the Fiitii Air 2 was fine.
Eartips have to go, there is some kind of concern about cleanliness of the earphones being gunked up that they are also causing sound from coming out. Perhaps those with surgical skills can cut out the protection portion of the eartip to remove at least one obstacle.
Anyone who has ever used a commercial grade industrial heat gun, the type that you open or close the veins to allow more air in or out to control the temperature…yeah that is what you have here except no control, just blockage.
I did manage to fit the Fiiti HifiDots in the charging pod with different eartips. The latching mechanism keeps the lid closed, but does put strain on eartips and the closing mechanism rubs on the shell when using third party ear tips.
SOUND
Overall the Fiitii HifiDots are midrange centric with presence with a delicate thinner bass profile from the 10mm DLC dynamic driver and a muffled treble from the dual BA driver. Bass notes are soft and gooey with male vocals sounding slim and nimble. Female vocals avoid chestiness and sound distant.
Brassy instruments are kept in check and sound unsteady in the higher registers where the treble is highly hampered by the multiple layers of ear tip and screen. I would recommend to cut out the ear tip screen to improve the treble and even give the bass room to breathe.
Cymbals, triangles, flutes etc all bear the brunt of sounding un-exciting and reminiscent of a worn out cassette tape. There is extra sizzle and crisp but it’s like burning a piece of meat- overcooked and lacking flavor no real definition.
Third party eartips do help, but there is still a coloration in the timbre. Vocals are forward with some lower midrange being pushed to the background. Sony WF-1000xm3 in comparison have an even stage with a softer treble and more grunt in the midbass to midrange transition that gives bass guitars more presence. The Drop Grell TWS also has a softer treble with a shallow stage, but good timbre. Bass is fuller again than the Fiitii HifiDots midbass to midrange region with a much mellowed out and relaxed diffuse field.
TECHNOLOGICAL PROWESS
Fitii Hifidots other claimed features include quick charge2/3 but no wireless charging, ANC and a control app. Aptx lossless is the top codec no LDAC. Multi-point connection did not work. Fiitii App that is supposed to allow the user to change button control, greeting, EQ, etc however does not work either at the time of this review.
Given these currently missing features and functionality, value takes a major hit. I would consider them over-valued at their $200 MSPR.
Charging time is 45min for the earbuds and 1 hour for the case. The case has a 460mAh battery and the earbuds 35mAh battery extending total runtime to 30 hours. Individual runtime is advertised at 6 hours or 4.5hours for heavy ANC use.
ANC was pretty good and worked well in both airplane use and my gas powered lawn mower test, the mild ANC is hard to tell if that means off or if it is still active. The Sony WF-1000XM3 is still my benchmark as the ANC is great and fully adjustable with the Sony app, but the Fiiti Hifidots held their own with only slight high frequency engine noise leaking through exhibited as a faint whistle.
WRAPPING THINGS UP
Fiitii Hifidots have several marks against them in terms of design, functionality, and with less than stellar treble resolution washout. ANC works well enough, IPX rated and alcohol wipe tested as well, they are trying very hard, but just squeak through a passing grade. At $200 for them competition is tough, and they do not have enough redeeming qualities to dethrone the big players.
Disclaimer: We gratefully received these free of charge direct from Fiitii and the opinions here are of my own thoughts.
MANUFACTURER PRODUCT PAGE
https://fiitii.com/product/true-wireless/hifidots/https://fiitii.com/product/true-wireless/hifidots/
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