If you miss your old iPod this new Android music | Tech News

The days of most people shopping for and proudly owning bodily copies of music on CD, vinyl or cassette are nicely and really behind us. Streaming has taken over because the more reasonably priced solution to take heed to any music you like on demand, however a sure subset of music followers nonetheless wish to invest and assist artists by shopping for digital music, and for that you need a first rate bodily music participant.

Apple discontinued its iPod vary in 2022 however that hasn’t stopped different, smaller corporations from flying the digital music flag with MP3 gamers of their own. In reality, in contrast to iPods, many fashionable digital audio gamers (DAPs) can play many alternative file varieties for Hi-Res music playback.

The newest DAP on the scene is the FiiO M21, a gadget that guarantees “flagship spec hardware elements, rugged design and intuitive retro aesthetics,” according to FiiO, all for £279.

That might sound like a lot considering you can pick up an Android smartphone for less, but these devices are all about concentrating on a single use case, rather than the do-it-all approach of our phones.

The M21 actually runs Android too, so it can not only play your downloaded music files when transferred via USB-C, but can also download apps such as Spotify, Apple Music, Qobuz, and indeed any other music app – or any other app at all – from the Google Play Store.

This music participant has a 4.7-inch HD IPS screen and appears like a suped-up iPod Touch. But in 2025, FiiO, a Chinese model, will not be competing with Apple, however with rivals corresponding to Sony, which nonetheless produces music gamers beneath the Walkman title.

64GB inner storage isn’t a lot, sadly, however the M21 could be expanded utilizing micro-SD playing cards with assist for up to 2TB, which is enough to store hundreds upon hundreds of tracks, even in massive Hi-Res codecs.

You get the Qualcomm Snapdragon 680 chipset and Android 13, which is a barely ageing model (we’re on 16 now), so there’s a query mark above if and for how long FiiO will present security updates for the M21.

But the primary specs listed below are the audio ones, with DAC chips that drive the music to minimise crosstalk and noise from music information, in accordance with FiiO, and the system can be utilized in ‘desktop mode’ to drive high high quality music to specialist headphones. As a transportable standalone participant, it may possibly output up to fifteen hours of music through the three.5mm headphone jack, although it additionally has a balanced 4.4mm jack if you have headphones with that connector.

Bluetooth 5.0 is on board too, and even helps the Hi-Res LDAC, LHDC and aptX HD codecs, although output will probably be higher high quality from a wired connection.

It could be a little more area of interest than the once-mighty iPod, however for followers of Hi-Res music or those that would favor a devoted music enjoying system, the FiiO M21 may nicely be value a look. Its £279 price is definitely fairly cheap in comparison with another specialist DAPs.