This portable Hi-Res Audio music player has a tube amp and Android, for a serious mix of the retro and modern | usagoldmines.com

• Shanling has announced a new portable Hi-Res music player
• It runs on Android 13 with support for major music streaming services
• It has vacuum tube amplification, if you like that sort of thing

If you want to enjoy Hi-Res Audio on the go, but would love to mix up the all-digital music world, then this new music player from Shanling may be one to check out, thanks to its inclusion of vacuum tubes.

The M8T is the new flagship of Shanling’s portable Hi-Res music player product line, featuring two AKM DACs (digital-to-analogue converters) and multiple amplification methods for varied, high-quality listening up to 32bit/768kHz. It retails for a notable $1,499 (around £1,190 / AU$2,360).

It’s technically an update to 2020’s M8 model, designed to play nicely with the latest headphone DACs from AKM, and make the most of Shanling’s technological improvements over the past few years.

It’s slightly larger, and heavier than the M8, measuring 147 x 82 x 22 mm with a 6-inch HD (1080 x 2160) touchscreen, and weighing 383g, with rounded edges and a sleek design available in either black or red.

One big change is the addition of two JAN6418 vacuum tubes, with the M8T featuring both a tube amp and a transistor-based headphone amplifier.

Tube amps are often sought-after for their ‘natural’ sound recreation, louder output per watt, and limited distortion compared to transistor amps – though listeners will be able to opt in or out on the fly, depending on their preferences and what they’re currently playing. It definitely makes the Shanling stand out compared to the wider competition among the best Hi-Res Audio players.

A word of warning – taking tube amps mobile can introduce interference into the sound through a microphonic effect, but if they’re well-isolated from the outside world touching them, this can be avoided. It looks like the Shanling has them well-secured, but we’d have to test to be sure.

In a blog post announcing the launch of the M8T, Shanling adds that “And because we understand that tubes might not be ideal for all types of headphones or music, we made sure that the M8T can switch quickly between its tube-enhanced output and the pure transistor mode.”

On-board storage has also been upgraded, doubling to 128GB with a MicroSD card slot that can accommodate a maximum of 2TB, meaning there’s plenty of room for all those massive Hi-Res Audio files.

And an improved 8,350mAh battery allows for 13-15.5 hours of Hi-Res audio output, and up to 96 hours over Bluetooth 5.0.

Tidal, Qobuz, and more

Whereas some Shanling products use its own in-house operating system, MTouch, the M8T runs on Android 13 in order to provide “many years of software updates and problem-free app compatibility” – meaning you can access any of the major music streaming services that support Hi-Res Audio, such as Apple Music, Qobuz, and Tidal.

With Hi-Res Audio expected to come to Spotify this year too, it’s a great time to start investing in Hi-Res audio hardware that really lets you benefit from the increased quality, detail, warmth and chutzpah available for audiophiles today.

If you like the look or the M8T, consider the excellent Shanling HW600, which made our list of the best over-ear headphones as an upmarket pair of wired, open-backed over-ear headphones with some genuine areas of sonic expertise”. Or you can check out this personally tested pairing of a Hi-Res player and headphones, recommended by TechRadar’s Audio Editor Becky Scarrott.

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