While plenty of folks are satisfied with the passable sound quality produced by their smartphone, the real flesh-and-bone audiophiles of the world have more discerning tastes. And it’s for these insightful folks that Astell & Kern has unveiled their Kann Cube portable hi-fi music player.
Anyone looking for a high-end portable music player may be subliminally swayed by the name of the Astell & Kern A&futura SE100. But a considered assessment would also point you there, for the SE100 is a portable pleasure that deserves to be pocketed.
At a rather pricey $1,699, it sits between the A&ultima SP1000M ($2,399) and What Hi-Fi? Award-winning Kann ($999) in Astell & Kern’s hi-res player portfolio, but justifies its position above the latter with a far better performance.
Promising unparalleled audio quality and clarity, this beastly-yet-pocketable music player hinges on a quad-core processor alongside a pair of ESS Sabre ES9038PRO DAC chips which, when paired with its 5-pin Mini XLR output, make for an extremely powerful player with an insanely low noise floor.
That means you get studio-quality sound with minimal distortion without the need for a separate amplifier. It also boasts 128 gigs of onboard memory, a 5″ full-color HD touchscreen display, USB Type-C quick charging (with nine hours of playback per charge), and 32bit/384kHz Native DSD256 support. The price is set at $1,499 and it will be available at select retailers by the end of May.
Astell&Kern KANN –
