So I'm going to try out a new review format - something that is much shorter than my earlier reviews and hopefully easier to read. Hope this gives people a better idea of what to expect from the M3K!
Just to be clear – I was given a M3K review unit to check out (not keep) in exchange for a brief review.
With all that out of the way, let's dive into the review.
Design, ergonomics and build quality
The M3K’s tiny size fits nicely into your hand, not being too tall or wide. The body is made of a nicely finished aluminum alloy with rounded (not sharp) corners, giving the player a much more premium feel than its price would suggest. It’s also not too slippery in the hand, but there is a silicone case included if you are concerned about that. The silicone case isn't anything special though, but it doesn't smell!
The capacitive buttons work well - they were quick and responsive, and their backlit nature makes a world of difference when trying to use the player in dark environments. The buttons aren't too dim or bright either.
Screen
This probably has one of the best screens I’ve seen from FiiO yet. The vivid IPS screen has decent viewing angles as well as nice colors and contrast. Also, it actually gets bright enough to use in moderate to strong sunlight – just don’t use it in extremely sunny conditions like on a hot day in Southern California.
UI and Fluidity
First impressions are positive when you boot up the M3K. The M3K boots up quickly, and navigating through the menus with the vertical touchpad is easy and intuitive. However, after a while I started to notice that the M3K puts priority on some operations over others, probably due to the X1000E processor’s limitations. For example, when selecting/moving onto a new track, the M3K starts playing the new song pretty quickly but there’s a pretty obvious delay in switching the album art. This is not necessarily a bad thing, and I’m not sure if most people will care enough about it.
Also, there currently is no good way to scroll through your music if you have tons of tracks. You either use the scroll wheel or use the skip forward/back buttons to do so, but either way takes a while to go through your music, and FiiO hasn't implemented any other quicker methods.
Recording
This could have been a more useful feature, but sadly I think Fiio may need to work on this more. Right now, the recording volume is simply too low – I literally have to crank the volume to near max to hear recordings of people talking at normal volumes. And I’m not sure if its just me, but when you crank the volume up that high, there seems to be some kind of high-pitched whine on the recordings.
USB DAC
It works well enough on both Mac and PC, with no noticeable bugs that I could catch.
Battery life
What Fiio advertises is true, the battery life is pretty long. I was basically hitting their advertised battery life for playing music. While I haven’t really had the chance to test their 38 day standby claim, I will say that I accidentally left it on for a week once (paused, not playing music) and the battery meter didn’t even go down 1 bar.
Sound
I think this is a mixed bag. Overall, the M3K has what I would call a neutral sound signature, maybe slightly leaning towards being bright. Basically, it has treble that’s very much present but somewhat grainy, while bass is good for the price point.
On the one hand, the M3K is obviously improved in sound over its predecessor the M3, especially in bass, soundstage size (deeper and wider) and imaging (clearer placement of instruments in the song). On the other hand, I thought the Fiio X1 (only $20 more) mostly sounded noticeably better than the M3K – it just sounds smoother yet with more details revealed and plus, the X1 has enough power to drive over-the-ear headphones in a pinch, which the M3K can’t really do.
To go into more detail – compared to the M3, the M3K has a wider and deeper soundstage as well as better imaging, mainly because it has a noticeably blacker (quiet) background compared to the older player. The M3K also seems to bring more of the sub-bass out and sounds more dynamic compared to the M3, and has noticeably more power (the M3K drove my ER4 noticeably better than the M3 did). However, the M3K’s mids and treble seem to be as grainy as the M3’s.
Compared to the X1, the M3K is mostly inferior in terms of sound. The one thing that the M3K does better than the X1 is that it sounds more dynamic – the X1 seems to be more “flat” in terms of capturing volume differences within the track. Soundstage size and imaging seem to be equal between the M3K and X1. However, the M3K sounds noticeably more grainy compared to the X1, while providing less details – and to me, this was not a minor difference. Also, bass quality is definitely a step up on the X1. The X1 also drove my higher impedance IEMs (100-ohm ER4) and more sensitive over-the-ear headphones (like Sennheiser HD598) better.
Overall
The M3K is a decently valued player if you are looking for something with decent sound quality, great battery life, and good ergonomics in a very portable package. Just don’t expect to really use the recording function.
However, for more discerning audiophiles who want just a basic player, if they are willing to spend just $20 more (at the time of writing, M3K is $70 vs X1 at $90 on Amazon) I would steer them towards the Fiio X1, which to me provides much improved sound quality - enough to outweigh the X1 being noticeably slower in usage (though it isn't what I would call unusable). With the X1, you don’t really give up many functions (and you get Bluetooth on it), and while battery life is noticeably less than the M3K, I think for many people 10 hours is enough.
Just to be clear – I was given a M3K review unit to check out (not keep) in exchange for a brief review.
With all that out of the way, let's dive into the review.
Design, ergonomics and build quality
The M3K’s tiny size fits nicely into your hand, not being too tall or wide. The body is made of a nicely finished aluminum alloy with rounded (not sharp) corners, giving the player a much more premium feel than its price would suggest. It’s also not too slippery in the hand, but there is a silicone case included if you are concerned about that. The silicone case isn't anything special though, but it doesn't smell!
The capacitive buttons work well - they were quick and responsive, and their backlit nature makes a world of difference when trying to use the player in dark environments. The buttons aren't too dim or bright either.
Screen
This probably has one of the best screens I’ve seen from FiiO yet. The vivid IPS screen has decent viewing angles as well as nice colors and contrast. Also, it actually gets bright enough to use in moderate to strong sunlight – just don’t use it in extremely sunny conditions like on a hot day in Southern California.
UI and Fluidity
First impressions are positive when you boot up the M3K. The M3K boots up quickly, and navigating through the menus with the vertical touchpad is easy and intuitive. However, after a while I started to notice that the M3K puts priority on some operations over others, probably due to the X1000E processor’s limitations. For example, when selecting/moving onto a new track, the M3K starts playing the new song pretty quickly but there’s a pretty obvious delay in switching the album art. This is not necessarily a bad thing, and I’m not sure if most people will care enough about it.
Also, there currently is no good way to scroll through your music if you have tons of tracks. You either use the scroll wheel or use the skip forward/back buttons to do so, but either way takes a while to go through your music, and FiiO hasn't implemented any other quicker methods.
Recording
This could have been a more useful feature, but sadly I think Fiio may need to work on this more. Right now, the recording volume is simply too low – I literally have to crank the volume to near max to hear recordings of people talking at normal volumes. And I’m not sure if its just me, but when you crank the volume up that high, there seems to be some kind of high-pitched whine on the recordings.
USB DAC
It works well enough on both Mac and PC, with no noticeable bugs that I could catch.
Battery life
What Fiio advertises is true, the battery life is pretty long. I was basically hitting their advertised battery life for playing music. While I haven’t really had the chance to test their 38 day standby claim, I will say that I accidentally left it on for a week once (paused, not playing music) and the battery meter didn’t even go down 1 bar.
Sound
I think this is a mixed bag. Overall, the M3K has what I would call a neutral sound signature, maybe slightly leaning towards being bright. Basically, it has treble that’s very much present but somewhat grainy, while bass is good for the price point.
On the one hand, the M3K is obviously improved in sound over its predecessor the M3, especially in bass, soundstage size (deeper and wider) and imaging (clearer placement of instruments in the song). On the other hand, I thought the Fiio X1 (only $20 more) mostly sounded noticeably better than the M3K – it just sounds smoother yet with more details revealed and plus, the X1 has enough power to drive over-the-ear headphones in a pinch, which the M3K can’t really do.
To go into more detail – compared to the M3, the M3K has a wider and deeper soundstage as well as better imaging, mainly because it has a noticeably blacker (quiet) background compared to the older player. The M3K also seems to bring more of the sub-bass out and sounds more dynamic compared to the M3, and has noticeably more power (the M3K drove my ER4 noticeably better than the M3 did). However, the M3K’s mids and treble seem to be as grainy as the M3’s.
Compared to the X1, the M3K is mostly inferior in terms of sound. The one thing that the M3K does better than the X1 is that it sounds more dynamic – the X1 seems to be more “flat” in terms of capturing volume differences within the track. Soundstage size and imaging seem to be equal between the M3K and X1. However, the M3K sounds noticeably more grainy compared to the X1, while providing less details – and to me, this was not a minor difference. Also, bass quality is definitely a step up on the X1. The X1 also drove my higher impedance IEMs (100-ohm ER4) and more sensitive over-the-ear headphones (like Sennheiser HD598) better.
Overall
The M3K is a decently valued player if you are looking for something with decent sound quality, great battery life, and good ergonomics in a very portable package. Just don’t expect to really use the recording function.
However, for more discerning audiophiles who want just a basic player, if they are willing to spend just $20 more (at the time of writing, M3K is $70 vs X1 at $90 on Amazon) I would steer them towards the Fiio X1, which to me provides much improved sound quality - enough to outweigh the X1 being noticeably slower in usage (though it isn't what I would call unusable). With the X1, you don’t really give up many functions (and you get Bluetooth on it), and while battery life is noticeably less than the M3K, I think for many people 10 hours is enough.