New review
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A commonality of styles
My neighbourhood has a wide variety of sound styles. Some of them are "quality first" and want their equipment to perform above and beyond their level of quality, not so much for the so-called "flavour"; some of them have been immersed in the world of ACG for a long time and tend to choose their equipment in the Japanese pop style; some of them follow the trend of Some friends follow the trend of the European and American music scene and prefer thick, powerful sound ......
Choosing equipment is like choosing clothes. Different styles of sound are like the colours of clothes, either as bright as grass green, or as soft as light purple, or as passionate as vivid red. Individually, each of these colours is beautiful in its own way. But if you ask which colour has the widest audience and is chosen by the most people, the three classic colours of navy, grey and brown come to mind. On the other hand, these colours are also easier to match, either as a primary or secondary colour, to achieve visual harmony.
By the same token, in the world of HiFi, those styles of sound that are gentle and listenable have a relatively wide audience. There may be little individuality in such styles per se, but they are not arbitrary and often require a balance between a considerable amount of detail. How to turn this "commonality" into a characteristic of the equipment is more of a test of the HiFi brand's skills.
To be realistic, it's been 35 years since Shanling's desktop days, and the sound of its equipment has naturally been distinctive, but the warmth of its style is like a thread buried behind the equipment, especially in its portable player range.
The style is defined as "moist" by Mountain Spirit. For a long time, enthusiasts have had different interpretations of this "moistness". Some believe that this "moist" is a polishing of the shape of the junction, others interpret it as the addition of tonal colouration to the three frequencies, while others equate "moist" with "paste". ...... is a mixed bag of interpretations.
As the new flagship of the Shanling portable player sequence, the M9 Plus, comes out, I would like to take the opportunity of reviewing the equipment to talk about my own understanding of "Run".
A sense of ritual in the box
The M9 Plus comes in a similar wooden box to the M9, and the process of pulling out the cardboard box, opening the clasp and flipping open the lid is like examining a jewellery box. Of particular interest is the "35th Anniversary" plaque on the back of the box, which features the M9 Plus' 2-piece AK4191EQ plus 4-piece AK4499EX decoding architecture, which is quite hardcore.
The most significant difference between the M9 Plus and its predecessor, the M9, comes from the top - since last year's M7, Shanling has done away with the interchangeable sockets used on its flagship players, replacing them with a single 3.5mm port and a 4.4mm balanced port on either side of the top surface. Personally, I am more used to intuitive interaction and I like this change a lot.
Other than that, the M9 Plus is largely identical to the M9 in terms of looks and feel, with the M9 Plus measuring 147mm*82mm*22mm in three dimensions, which is 5mm shorter than the M9 and a slight improvement in portability. Although it has a long "bangs", the Sharp 2K screen on the M9 Plus is really sharp and the content is very detailed. If you have to compare this screen with the display of mainstream mobile phones, the main difference is that the refresh rate is not quite as high and there are some residual shadows when swiping. The power button/volume knob on the right hand side is gold in colour and is the finishing touch to the design of the body. The streamlined design of the sides is a continuation of the previous model. Overall, the M9 Plus is still quite expensive and durable.
The M9 Plus does not come with many accessories, but the official leather case is a significant improvement. The official leather case for the previous M9 was a bit of a case, and the way it was fitted was by nesting the case into the body, which made it feel a bit unprotected. This time around, the official M9 Plus case itself comes in a black + gold wiring design, which fits the M9 Plus quite well in terms of colour; it adopts a mainstream design approach that requires the entire body to be tucked into the case and then magnetically fastened at the top, which is much more visually appealing and feels better in the hand.
The Android 10 system on the M9 Plus is largely optimised and mature, and the Snapdragon 665 and 8GB of memory are more than enough to support the smooth running of the system. In practice, the response to various apps and the optimisation of system animations are also satisfactory. The battery is 8350mAh and lasts for 16 hours at one end and 9 hours at the other, which is more than enough.
In terms of objectivity, the silky smooth experience can also be interpreted as a kind of "moistening" to some extent.
A triple interpretation of "Run"
To test the sound of the M9 Plus, I used three relatively neutral-sounding earbuds, the Shanling ME900, the Sennheiser IE 900 and the qdc V14 (tuning switch all the way off). The first thing I listened to was the balanced end.
The quality of the "R&R": strong and without shortcomings
The M9 Plus uses the AK4191EQ*2+AK4499EX*4 DAC architecture, a combination of the AK4191EQ and AK4499EX, AKM's new generation of flagship DACs, which has the advantage of providing more design space for separate processing of digital and analogue signals. The six DAC chips working simultaneously, together with the classic Shanling OP+BUF architecture of the headphone amplifiers, give the M9 Plus an overall quality that can stand up to the ranks of today's top players, with an extremely well rounded performance.
I was particularly impressed by the M9 Plus in a couple of areas: firstly, the clean sound base, with the M9 Plus sounding very dark in the background to one ear and excellent transparency. For example, in the performance of Jani's "Nightingale", in addition to the high and clear bamboo flute in the main part, the M9 Plus presents the details of the cello group, violin group, vocal group, etc. in different parts of the piece with In addition, the M9 Plus presents the details of the cello, violin and vocal groups in different weightings, with a high degree of complexity but without overwhelming the audience. In addition, the M9 Plus's sense of space is also quite impressive, with a regular soundstage that is not overly marginal and dynamic enough to reflect the momentum of the piece. The orchestra's interpretation of 'Moment of Glory', for example, is a powerful and powerful piece.
Stylistic "Rundown": round and smooth
The sound of the M9 Plus is not overtly tonal, but it does not sound dry either, maintaining a smooth listening experience. It has also been carefully polished to produce a sound that is smooth around the edges, with little noticeable burr, but at the same time retaining the sound characteristics of the musical elements.
In terms of the three frequencies, the M9 Plus further dampens down the irritation of the individual parts on the basis of a largely even distribution of energy. The most impressive part of the sound is the mid-range, which is kept loose and not overly stacked in thickness, with the vocals in the middle of the stage and slightly forward, intimate but not ear-licking; the superfluous droning is removed, but the flow of the breath when exhaling is retained, making the singer's mouth shape quite clear and the singing technique clearly displayed to the listener's ears. For example, when listening to the works of artists such as Liang Jingru and Faye Wong, the breath between the singer's lips and teeth is still present, and some of the tooth sounds are still present, but they are generally much more pleasant to the ear.
In addition, the M9 Plus has a fairly good low-frequency texture, cohesive and deep, with a certain restraint in volume; the high frequencies are bright but not harsh, with clear but not harsh detail. The entire structure of the three frequencies makes it difficult to find a single abrupt part, and there is no mutual overshadowing or interference between the three frequencies.
The "moistness" of the match: a wider adaptation
On paper, the M9 Plus is even more powerful than the M9's already strong thrust, and there is no underdrive with mainstream earbuds.
Stylistically, the mild nature of the M9 Plus gives it a wide range of compatibility, with the exception of some headphones with a strong tendency towards warmth in their sound, which may produce a "warm fuzzy" effect, there are no obvious problems with other styles of headphones.
The ME900 is a multi-unit coil, the IE 900 is a single moving coil and the V14 is a moving iron electrostatic composite, all of which are driven by the machine to a very good standard. The ME900's clean, high-frequency background complements the M9 Plus. The M9 Plus has a strong thrust but also a good control, so that a plug like the V14 does not get fidgety due to over-pushing.
In addition to the low, medium and high gain levels, the M9 Plus also has a 'Big Ear Mode' for driving large headphones. The main change brought by the Big Ear mode is to increase the output voltage of the player to more fully drive the large diaphragm of the headphones. In this mode, the M9 Plus achieves an output of 520mW@32Ω single-ended and 1125mW@32Ω balanced, which is quite good in the portable player segment.
I paired the M9 Plus with the Sky Dragon D9200, a not particularly difficult headphone to work with, and an extra balanced cable. In big-ear mode, the M9 Plus held the D9200's sound frame intact, with good extension at both ends of the spectrum in all three frequencies. The quality of this pairing is not bad, with a regular soundstage and a noticeable depth especially in the vertical soundstage; the dynamics are fair; and the transient response is moderate. The D9200 with the M9 Plus is probably only slightly less full than when driven by a desktop player. But for a portable player driving big headphones, the M9 Plus does a pretty good job.
The single port is a little less powerful than the balanced port, but the overall style is the same, and the rounded feel is better maintained. The dynamic range, resolution and cohesion of the sound of the single port are slightly less than those of the balanced port, but otherwise the quality of the performance is not much worse than that of the balanced port.
Compared to its predecessor, the M9 Plus has improved in two ways, in my opinion, apart from its output power. The first is the quality. After replacing the DAC architecture and optimising the circuit design, the M9 Plus has gained higher specifications and is better in terms of dynamics and resolution. The second is the overall control of the sound. In fact the previous generation M9 was already quite good at this, and the M9 Plus has further erased the irritation from the sound.
If I had to be picky and ask what could be done to improve the sound of the M9 Plus, I would say that the machine is now a little vague when it comes to portraying some of the sound elements in the mid and high frequencies, and that the sound is not yet particularly solid. This is a bit of a nitpick, of course, but the actual listening experience is also somewhat dependent on the earbuds used.
The heritage of "Run"
The brand has been around for 35 years now, but in fact, many young audiophiles have the impression that the brand has not aged at all. I guess this is probably due to the fact that Shanling has always been proactive in its approach to change. In the days of the desktop, Shanling's traditional form factor equipment had a solid, atmospheric, rhythmic character; and since its foray into the portable world, Shanling has inherited the sound tuning philosophy of the past, while constantly incorporating new technology into its equipment design, leading the way. What we hear today is a dynamic and balanced style of tuning that takes into account both quality and listening experience, and a unique aesthetic that blends the aesthetic commonalities of audiophiles from different periods.
In addition, I was more impressed by how well the tuning "Run" has been mastered and the experience "Run" has been matured, and how rounded and comfortable Shanling has been in product planning and technology application. From the entry-level tail to the flagship product of nearly 20,000 RMB, Mountain Spirit has now launched competitive and marketable products in every price range. Although we often joke that Mountain Spirit is always talking about its "35th anniversary", this M9 Plus and the wide range of products behind it are probably the brand's best tribute to its 35-year history. The best gift of all.
It is not to replace the M17, though. Let's see how it will drive HPs like DCA Expanse and Stealth, as I don't use IEMs.
