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I use an LG V20 as my main phone and love the sound quality and user experience when running Neutron Player. It's got enough power for my full size cans yet remains quiet with my IEMs. Compared to every DAP I've tried, having a modern Android OS provides a much better user experience, and it's nice being able to consume streaming videos in addition to audio.
Unfortunately my LG V20 falls short of perfection in two critical ways:
1. I use EQ extensively for my headphones and would prefer to have system-wide parametric EQ available rather than being stuck with Neutron's in-app EQ
2. When doing focused listening in the evenings, I don't like having distractions available on my player. I lack the self control to avoid them.
Viper4Android FX provides a solution for system wide EQ, but it requires rooting which I'm not willing to do with my primary phone. Since V20s are so cheap nowadays, I decided to just buy a 2nd one to set up as a dedicated DAP and experiment with it. It turned out to be an even bigger pain than I expected, but ultimately proved successful. I've got system-wide parametric EQ that works with most apps (Spotify, YouTube, etc.).
In case anyone else wants to try this out, I'm sharing my notes on how to make it happen.
Disclaimers
Unfortunately my LG V20 falls short of perfection in two critical ways:
1. I use EQ extensively for my headphones and would prefer to have system-wide parametric EQ available rather than being stuck with Neutron's in-app EQ
2. When doing focused listening in the evenings, I don't like having distractions available on my player. I lack the self control to avoid them.
Viper4Android FX provides a solution for system wide EQ, but it requires rooting which I'm not willing to do with my primary phone. Since V20s are so cheap nowadays, I decided to just buy a 2nd one to set up as a dedicated DAP and experiment with it. It turned out to be an even bigger pain than I expected, but ultimately proved successful. I've got system-wide parametric EQ that works with most apps (Spotify, YouTube, etc.).
In case anyone else wants to try this out, I'm sharing my notes on how to make it happen.
Disclaimers
- This is a bit of a pain in the butt
- You run the risk of making your phone permanently inoperable
- My instructions are for the H910 (AT&T) variant of the V20. It's possible they could work with other versions, but I can't say for sure
- Buy a V20 H910 like this one on eBay. They're still available New in Sealed Box. I paid about $120 for mine
- These things are slippery, so you'll want at least a minimal case to make it easier to hold on and protect it if it drops. A case like this one is cheap at around $8, affords minimal protection, leaves enough clearance to plug in most 3.5mm jacks without a problem and can be taken on and off quickly which is important because you'll need to remove the back cover of the phone to swap out sd cards
- A stand like this $8 one makes for a nice little listening station
- You'll need a microsd card with at least 4GB of storage (maybe more). I have plenty lying around so I used one that I had on hand.
- Follow these instructions to prepare the V20 for rooting. This involves installing a "custom recovery" called TWRP which allows you to overwrite system files while in recovery mode. When you're done, you'll be running an AT&T build of Android 7.0 Nougat and TWRP custom recovery installed.
- Install Magisk Manager using these instructions. When you're done, you'll have a rooted phone, meaning that applications can request and obtain root access through Magisk. Magisk Manager also allows you to download and install various useful applications.
- Install and run ViPER4Android_FX_v2505_A7.x_Nougat_IO_test_fix.apk. Inside the Viper4Android app, choose to install the driver. This should prompt you for root permissions in MagiskManager, but I noticed that sometimes it's a bit slow so you might have to go into MagiskManager manually, grant root to Viper4Android, then restart Viper4Android and install the driver again.
- At this point, your system is in a weird state. Viper4Android will have failed to install the driver. That's okay, just ignore it for now.
- In Magisk Manager, install these three modules -- a) Audio Compatibility Patch v1.7.3, b) Audio Modification Library v2.4 and c) ViPER4Android FX Legacy Materialized v4.4. IIRC I just accepted all of the recommended options during installation. This Viper should replace the one you installed earlier.
- Open Viper again and install the driver and restart your phone
- At this point, Viper's driver should be successfully installed and you can start using it. I had a lot of trouble getting Viper4Android to work, but I stumbled on this sequence by accident and for whatever reason it works.
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