FiiO M5 Hi-Res Portable Music Player

We have had another chance to test out one of the Hi-Res portable music player solutions from FiiO, a company with an impressive portfolio of products. Recently, we had spent a lot of time with their M9 player that turned a lot of heads around here, gaining it a solid score from us. A wonderful player with many features packed into a small space. However, the price tag wasn’t for everyone. So this is where the M5 Hi-Res Player comes into play. A smaller, simpler option, that meets the needs of a much larger niche of consumers. As well as a price tag of just a third of what the M9 would cost you.

Consider it the difference between the iPod and the iPod Nano/Shuffle, where this (M5) would be the Nano. Small like the Shuffle, but a fully functional touchscreen across the entire front side. What makes the M5 different from these other players though, is the fact that it supports much higher specs when it comes to Hi-Res file formats and playback. The iPod collection isn’t much better than a smartphone, because Apple focuses more on additional functionality vs music quality. They operate more like an iPhone instead of dedicating all of their attention to the quality of sound. They have cameras and can make calls and FaceTime discussion over WiFi. They have browsers and apps and so much more.

FiiO, on the other hand, scraps any thought of that and dedicates their attention to just sound. Both the quality of sound, as well as how it can be sent or received using a single device. That is the reason why you are buying into something like this in the first place, right?

Design

The design of the M5 is quite a bit smaller than the M9 that we had previously covered. Although it is a bit larger than Apple’s Shuffle and Nano players (as seen in the image above), it still maintains a small size that can easily hide away in both your pocket or clipped to your belt. It also contains a lot more on the inside than the mentioned Apple options (which we will cover in a moment).

Topside, it has a power button, volume toggle, and headphone output. The output supports both regular analog 3.5mm connections, as well as coaxial 3.5mm. On both sides of that volume toggle are two small holes that lead to microphones inside. This is used for recording your voice (memos and such), as well as noise cancelation.

Bottom-side, there is a USB Type-C port that is used for both charging the player (cable included), as well as connecting it to a computer so that you can use it as an external USB DAC. Next to it is a micro SD card slot for adding content to the player with (no internal memory).

It comes with a clear plastic holder with a clip on the back so that it can easily be clipped to your clothing while running around. This works to also protect the player from scratching, although only the back and sides. For the screen, they do provide protective film in the box.

Function

We couldn’t possibly compare this to the M9 fairly since the M9 is three times the price for a reason. You can’t download any apps to the M5. There is no WiFi or anything since you are only playing the music you have locally on the micro SD card. A simpler solution for listening to music files with. However, it is like a small Autobot Transformer in your pocket, as it is much more than just a file player.

When it comes to playing music, it offers support for up to 384kHz-32bit/DSD128, depending on how you are using it. You can connect a pair of regular wired headphones to it, or a 3.5mm to 3.5mm(or RCA) cable to run to an AVR/receiver, or a digital coax 3.5mm connection. It also supports Bluetooth out, so you can pair it to your favorite Bluetooth headphones or a stereo/receiver solution that supports Bluetooth. So you have both wired and wireless.

Also See: FiiO M9 Portable High-Resolution Audio Player

It doesn’t stop there though as you can also connect it wired to a stereo that doesn’t support Bluetooth natively, and use it as a receiver instead, allowing you to pair your other mobile devices to it and send music from them wirelessly to your stereo.

On top of that, you can connect it via USB to a computer or laptop, and use it as a USB DAC for improving your audio-output with.

Not a bad feature set for just $99. It of course also sounds good doing all of this. It does, of course, have its limitations.

It is small, and so is the battery. In order to provide the best battery life, it isn’t just going to drive anything you connect to it. Of course, it will drive most everything. It will just fall short when it comes to high-impedance headphones. It is best to keep the headphones you match it with to 80 ohms or less. This isn’t an issue since the majority of consumer headphones fall around 32 or less. However, if you have a fancy pair of reference headphones lying around within the 250 or 600 range, you might want to go with the M9 player. The M5 will drive these headphones, but it takes a lot of volume to pull it off, and with limited range (limited “umph”, as we like to say). This limitation passes on to the USB DAC performance of course. So no matter what, stick to 80 ohms or less (preferably around 32 if you want a lot of volume). For example, the Beyerdynamic Aventho headphones sound great paired with this. Even Sony’s Studio Monitor models sound pretty good.

When using it as a USB DAC, you do have to choose the mode within the settings screen before connecting it to your computer (same thing with the M9 model). Else, when you plug it in, it will simply access it as a storage device so that you can drag and drop files onto the SD card (by the way, that means no wizard/software like iTunes required to manage your files with). When you do have it enabled and plug it in, it will immediately display “USB DAC” across the screen, and displays under that the “kHz/bits” of the audio currently being played on the computer (you may have to adjust the device settings in your computer for higher resolution outputs). Seeing this on the screen though does help for both troubleshooting (knowing for sure what the computer is sending out) and quickly referencing what format the current file is without having to look it up.

Bluetooth audio sounds amazing and you can hear little difference in most cases, between wired and wireless. It might have been better to have Bluetooth 5.0 vs 4.2 depending on if it would have improved battery life or not (or at least balanced out), but for 4.2 it seems to be doing just fine at least.

Our Conclusion

So this player is all about resolution and ways audio can be sent or received. It can’t drive higher impedance headphones, but it will drive almost anything a normal consumer (or educated audiophile) plugs into it. Bluetooth goes both ways and sounds quite good, and the ability to use it as a USB DAC is always a plus if your computer doesn’t natively supply these higher resolutions (some computers/laptops do come with DACs embedded for their headphone/line-out ports, but these are usually the higher-end models). If you have the wiggle room for the budget, we do recommend the M9 of course, but if you prefer to stick within the $100 range, this seems to pull things off just fine for simpler situations (and headphones). Perfect for most consumers and some audiophiles looking for something to cover this range of specs. And of course, if we had to choose between the M5 and the Apple iPod Nano, the M5 would easily win.

*Average price is based on the time this article was published

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