Fiio offers the "LC-Q1M7" case that is advertised as the perfect solution to pair the Q1 MKIi with the M7. I fail to see the point for that, if you pair the 2 via USB you circumvent the ESS Sabre DAC inside the M7. The only advantage is "more power" from the Q1 and Bluetooth Features from the M7? How does the 9018Q2C compare with the AK4452?
Lots of questions...
Edit...
after some reasearch, aptxHD and LDAC alone make it worth the price compared to a smartphone with those features, and that will be missing the Q1 amping power. I see where that goes now.
Edit Edit...
It seems that
LDAC is baked into Android 8.0 and for example all
Xiaomi devices that come with Oreo will support it. That changes things again since a Redmi 6 pro can be had for much less than 250€ and is arguably more modular (Camera, apps, can run viper4android for BT and the Q1 MKII for balanced output, etc).