I got my Centrance HiFi M8 yesterday and it made my wife and kids upset. (You know, first-day-with-a-new-toy-itis; "Dad, What's for dinner?)
I played it too loud and over-saturated my hearing. After about 30 minutes my ears were ringing but I played on; such OCD, real addiction, I was powerless.
The M8 is real good. How good, I do not yet know.
What I can tell you is that it works very very well with the iPod Classic 6 and 7. The first track was with Rickie Lee Jones "Easy Money" (stand up bass opening). (OK, jaw dropping). At this point it was well worth the price of admission and the 9 months and 30 days.
I got to try the M8 with the Forza Audio Works OTG with my Galaxy S4 using USB Audio Recorder Pro. Took some getting use to it and figuering out which thing to press on the screen, but it works great! Yes, it will play an entire album, I just needed to figure out how. I have some Mercury Living Presence classical FLAC files and they sounded real good.
I heard tape hiss at the end of a couple of songs on fade out, otherwise nothing but a silent black background between tracks. I assure you, the HiFi M8 is quiet. At this point I doubt I will send it in for the modification. And I am sorry M Goodman but, do not get the HiFi M8 close (less than one foot) to the cell phone (ATT SF Bay Area) unless it is in airplane mode, connected or not. This is a small price to pay. OK, Cell Phone in the left shirt pocket and HiFi M8 on the belt on the right side -- no problem in regular, non-airplane mode.
A friend at work attached his cheepo headphones to the combo jack. I can report with confidence that there was a lot of detail but the sound was not well balanced and the bass was almost non-existant. So, I can confirm that the Centrance HiFi M8 will not turn a "Sow's ear into a silk purse". (OK, I am spoiled) Like any piece of high end equipment, the HiFi M8 requires you to use "top shelf" associated equipment with it. That is how you get the great sound. Like my son's 14 y/o girlfriend says, "Duh".
I don't know if I will go out on a limb about it until I get to use it for a while but I like what I hear so far.