Kii Three - my impressions and pro reviews

[Gastronaut]

Unplugging the Control used to help but not anymore. There is no pattern, sometimes it works normally and sometimes not. So I am fad a bit. Anyhow I am thinking to "upgrade" the digital part. I have tried Melco and it sounded really good. Batter than Mac with Roon player or Amarra for example. So just wondering is it possible to get that level of SQ with Roon Rock!

[ragwo]

13 hours ago, Gastronaut said:

HI,

Maybe I miss it, but does anyone use Roon Rock with the Kiis's? On Intel Nuc or any other hardware. I have a good old MacBookPro, but to often my Mac just cannot see the Kii's!? Then I have to disconnect USB, ethernet,..., and that usually works.

Looking to purchase Melco, but currently away from my budget. Even thinking to install Rock on my Mac for testing!

 

Thanks

Having trouble editing my previous post, I'll add some more info here. I use ROCK on an Intel NUC8i5, and have used both a Squeezebox Touch, Chromecast Audio, Bluesound 2 and 2i, laptop and a MicroRendu as endpoint to the Control. All of the endpoints I've tried sounds excellent on the Kii Threes, but I prefer the MicroRendu for its size and USB output. 

 

[Gastronaut]

Thanks ragwo, will look at it. 

[ragwo]

1 hour ago, Gastronaut said:

Unplugging the Control used to help but not anymore. There is no pattern, sometimes it works normally and sometimes not. So I am fad a bit.

Which firmware is the Control on? You could check with Kii customer service if there's a fix.

[Gastronaut]

Not sure is there a new firmware for Control. Will contact Kii. Thanks.

[phosphorein]

3 hours ago, Gastronaut said:

Unplugging the Control used to help but not anymore. There is no pattern, sometimes it works normally and sometimes not. So I am fad a bit. Anyhow I am thinking to "upgrade" the digital part. I have tried Melco and it sounded really good. Batter than Mac with Roon player or Amarra for example. So just wondering is it possible to get that level of SQ with Roon Rock!

The Mac USB implementation has long been known as having issues and I have had similar lapses of USB connectivity when I put the Mac into sleep mode. Recently with Mojave I’ve experienced no difficulties though, although I usually do not sleep the computer now.

[Rubysea]

On 12/1/2019 at 12:03 AM, Cazzesman said:

...

I have set some adjustments on the Kii's top end and mid bass.    I was thinking the 22D was a simple way test the room and set up some curves.   I have a fair amount of room treatment at 1st reflections and rear corners.   I left the treatment in when I got the Kii's because I think it actually helped in the room.

...

Regards Cazzesman 

Hello community!

@Cazzesman : "A simple way" to better and cheper adapt the Kiis to your room is using the Kiis themselves 🙂 With the current firmware (v1.0.7) you have control over a lot of recently introduced new filters (w. 1.0.5): Low Pass, High Pass, Low Shelf, High Shelf, Notch, Parametric EQ with a constant Q, Parametric EQ with a proportional Q in the range of +3db to -24db (and that per channel/ Kii Master - Kii Slave)

I've tried that myself and with a UMIK1 + the Kii Control directly linked into REW I have done a lot of measurements and immediate corrections and thus could completely tame a terrible room mode around 40Hz.

I guess you should get in contact with Kii (Tom Jansen) to get access to the updated FW (and change log). An Update-tool is available for Win and Mac in case you don't alreadyhave access to it. The FW also updates the DSP and Kii-Control (where on the Apple remote you now can also switch between presets instead of only sources previously 🙂)

BR Rubysea

[Yellowspider]

Hi Rubysea,

where did you get the new firmware from? Can´t find it on the Homepage...

 

Regards

Stephan

[Blade1001]

1 hour ago, Rubysea said:

Hello community!

@Cazzesman : "A simple way" to better and cheper adapt the Kiis to your room is using the Kiis themselves 🙂 With the current firmware (v1.0.7) you have control over a lot of recently introduced new filters (w. 1.0.5): Low Pass, High Pass, Low Shelf, High Shelf, Notch, Parametric EQ with a constant Q, Parametric EQ with a proportional Q in the range of +3db to -24db (and that per channel/ Kii Master - Kii Slave)

I've tried that myself and with a UMIK1 + the Kii Control directly linked into REW I have done a lot of measurements and immediate corrections and thus could completely tame a terrible room mode around 40Hz.

I guess you should get in contact with Kii (Tom Jansen) to get access to the updated FW (and change log). An Update-tool is available for Win and Mac in case you don't alreadyhave access to it. The FW also updates the DSP and Kii-Control (where on the Apple remote you now can also switch between presets instead of only sources previously 🙂)

BR Rubysea

 Wait! What? When did this happen? That's a major improvement of the interface if they've added per channel PEQ functionality? How many filters can be added per channel? I'm amazed they've not made a bigger song and dance about that, as it was the one thing the 8c's had that the Kii Three's didn't!

[Rubysea]

Hi Stephan,

no, it is not available on their homepage. As mentioned before: try to contact Tom from Kii. From him I got a link to the software/ firmware. I think they are planning on having it available enventually on their HP, but I don't know when that will be. I've done several update(s) using the MAC version and that works just fine. You install the SW-Tool, connect your Kii-Control to the laptop/computer and then you go. You'll find a confirmation screen at the end of the update.

Rubysea

[Blade1001]

Now all they need to do is make all this functionality accessible by connecting a laptop directly to the Kii Three's without the need for the Kii Control!

[Rubysea]

Quote from one of the recent change logs:

You can set up to 8 individual 2nd order filters per speaker in range of (Freq 20hz - 20kHz, Q 0.125 - 31.3, Gain +/- 6dB) to one of the following types:
Low Pass
High Pass
Low Shelf
High Shelf 
Notch
Parametric EQ with a constant Q
Parametric EQ with a proportional Q

R.

[Yellowspider]

Thx Rubysea

[Yellowspider]

OK folks,

I, ve contacted Tom just a few minutes ago. Here is the information I´ve got.

Please be patient. The firmwareupdate will be available soon on the Kii Homepage. Actually it is still beta. They are working hard on it and will inform the customers via newsletter.

 

So I suggest we let them work. The sooner it should be available 🙂

 

BR STephan

[Rubysea]

Thx Stephan for clarifying w/ Tom. Can't be too long then...

[firedog]

14 minutes ago, Rubysea said:

 Can't be too long then...

Famous last words....I wonder if this update finally activates the bluetooth.

[Rubysea]

Yes. Apparently it will.

Bluetooth APTx and AAC Audio support are supposed to become available.

[Yellowspider]

2 hours ago, firedog said:

Famous last words....I wonder if this update finally activates the bluetooth.

Bluetooth works already in the actual firmware with Kii Control.

[firedog]

19 minutes ago, Yellowspider said:

Bluetooth works already in the actual firmware with Kii Control.

Not in my firmware it doesn't. Maybe you have a newer version than I do. That's why we need some way of updating the Kii Control firmware. 

[Yellowspider]

Control FW 1 in my System

[Rubysea]

As you can see in the screenshot above, the most recent (beta) version of the Kii Control Firmware is version 1.8

[Ken Moran]

My Kii Control firmware is v0.3, and in the 2 years I’ve had my Kiis, I’ve never had any communication from them as to available upgrades.   Weird.  

[Gastronaut]

Until the beta version is not ready, how to update FW for Kii Control to latest one?

[firedog]

10 hours ago, Ken Moran said:

My Kii Control firmware is v0.3, and in the 2 years I’ve had my Kiis, I’ve never had any communication from them as to available upgrades.   Weird.  

When  I had an issue about a year ago I got updated by them to 0.4. That was using Team software and coordinating with them when to log onto my server. Until the software allowing us to initiate an update is released by them, I don't think there is a way a user can update on his own. 

[Ken Moran]

Thanks everyone, so it looks like there’s a few different firmware versions out there.  Hopefully, the upcoming Kii Updater will allow us all to upgrade to the latest version in one step, regardless of our current version.