Big and beautiful for under 1K is impressive. Good to see new equipment at a relatively reasonable price. Makes the competition keep up and keep prices down.
Fiio has officially hit the big leagues with a segment busting streamer that delivers on a larger form factor and screen at a price that other manufacturers put into their smaller streamer units. As a owner of many Fiio products, its good to see.
Fabulous review. Seen it five times and am so happy with this unit at this price point. The eArc is awesome and now my Xbox x and tv and pc are all routed through it. Fabulous integration with my topping dx9 dac through the IIS and I prefer the Topping DAC. Thanks Sandu! Such a welcome review. Thanks again.
Best review of the S15 yet (though their are not many yet) but with head to head with DMPA8 was talked about since both are Android DACs.Yes Eversolo has twice or close,price tag but native apps and analogue input does not seem to be worth it.Then again sound quality and EQ comparison would have been interesting deep dive.One thing you missed was that Fiio has 3(!) analogue outs.I m just getting into streaming so am crunching the Volumio vs Roon oprions but if I go with the latter this seems to best deal out there
Thank you! My system is fully balanced and for me, the other two pairs of RCA outputs were unusable, but yeah, it's a nice addition, especially for people with SET or SE amplifiers.
I’ve been enjoying my new FiiO S15 for a little over 2 weeks now and I really enjoyed your review. My experience with the FiiO Cast feature was different from yours. The S15 , after a firmware update to 1.0.1 , is able to cast a second screen to my iPad and Galaxy S23 Ultra with no problems. Something that I would like your opinion on, that you didn’t mention in your review, are the 6 digital filters. Which do you think sounds best?
About time Fiio picking up the challenge from Eversolo. Looks beautiful with that generous screen, perfect for streaming. Good DAC, good controls. Sadly...not perfect because lacking in software department. I hoped they could solve that!
Thanks for this! I have possibly the most inconsequential question about this unit: the LEDs around the knobs seem to change colour… can this be set by the user..?
Thank you for this review. However I'm getting sick seeing all these companies trying to shove down our throats all these "multi-purpose" devices at "amazing" prices. Please Fiio, Wiim, Eversolo and all of you out there, we need a STREAMER ONLY device with USB, I2S, coaxial and optical outputs, no need to add DACs headphone amplifier, pre-amp, nothing else, only a streamer with the connectivity required in today's variety of audio electronics. Simple, isn't it?
@@nc3419 Sure, but having pre-amp and headphone amp in the DAC and all that repeated in the streamer... That's why I plea, just give us a pure streamer! 😅
Hi thank you for your review. One stupid question from my side, as I would intend to integrate the S15 into my stereo setup. Can I connect my amplifier via the HDMI out and benefit from the 192/24 resolution or is the HDMI out only for ARC support with 48/24? Thank you.
Topping D90 iii discrete and a Bluesound Node Nano would be circa $300 more. No fancy screen. You also lose Android (and native Apple Music if that's your streamer of choice). But are the sound quality gains by focusing on a world class sub $1k dac and mvp streamer there to be had?
I would like to see a deep dive of the S15 as a Google Cast target device. In that scenario the casting app acts as a true controller and the content is streamed directly to the target device, as opposed to being relayed through the casting device. This is how I would use the S15 in a remote control scenario.
Hi, finally! A proper question. 1) S/PDIF is a horrendously poorly designed interface, because it combines the clock and audio coding onto the same signal (I2S has separate lanes for the signal and clock). The receiver is supposed to recover the clock from this signal as well as extract the audio data. This turns out to be a non-trivial task, and one that almost always leaves the recovered clock contaminated with signal correlated jitter artefacts. So any clock you transmit over an S/PDIF connection that is also carrying audio signals will probably be worse than any internal clock. You can reasonably (but not ideally) send a clock over an S/PDIF interface if the interface does not carry any audio signal, but even then the poor bandwidth of the interface does not lend itself to particularly accurate clock reticulation. Even proper word clock distribution systems are far from ideal, but S/PDIF is particularly flawed, and should have no role in any transmission that involves clock recovery. I2S has separate lanes for data and clock. 2) For S/PDIF data transmission, you need a digital sender that packs the data and then a digital receiver sitting on DAC end to receive S/PDIF data, decoding it and then sending it to MCU and then DAC chips. Via I2S we don't have a digital receiver on the DAC end, bypassing a chip and a conversion, plus I2S bandwidth is almost unlimited compared to S/PDIF. Hopefully, this clarifies everything.
@@Soundnews Wow! Thanks for the detailed response, I *just* learned from iiWiReviews that spdif and i2s uses the streamers clock and that usb is asynchronous, so all this info is great, I recent replaced my usb setup with and spdif and that sounded better to my ears, but now I might have to go down i2s...
It is a Android 12 device so the normal spotify app should work and you do not really need spotify connect ... not even for controlling it from any other spotify running device - or am I mistaken?
Hey, thanks for the content! May I ask you what headphone amp do you suggest to properly power an he6sev2? I'm using an xDuoo TA-22 which is loud but doesn't sound great and a old speaker amp with speaker taps adapter, which is punchy and fun but not very refined. Thanks 💪🏻
Test this morning the fiio s15 compare with dmpa6 master, both have different sound quality, for me the voice eversolo has more smoother transition and sound more natural, while the fiio produces strong mid range which for me sound a little harsher, instrument more detail on some other tracks, some acoustic music sound muddy and less transparent compared to eversolo., both have different sound signature and have there advantages.
Yes I understand but I am only talking about the steaming section sound quality compared to WiiM ultras streaming sound quality. Both will have external dacs connected
@@Soundnews - I might offer to differ with a WiiM Pro and external 5v power supply connected to a RME ADI-2. In addition, a fiber router going through two Cisco Meraki to the WiiM produces outstanding results. Too bad we can't test. Another excellent review though here.
Wiim Ultra has total transparency digital out. True to the source is the only relevant benchmark for hifi. There is no way anything can be more hifi than true to the source.
I'd like to see Fiio S15 VS Eversolo A8 head to head comparsion. Yes, A8 is almost twice more expensive, but they're build different! Just check PCB pictures! And why they make such wide frame around display? Looks meh in 2025!
Man alive, why the is there no sub out and ability for low and high pass cutoffs on yet another streamer. Some people want full range sound that they can only acheive by adding an active subwoofer. All I hear reviewers talking about is the sound quality but what about sound quantity because people will be missing out on some of the sound frequency if the can't add a subwoofer and tweak the PEQ of it I'll say that. Don't any of these companies learn anything from crappy sounding but more functional Wiim and Bluesound products? What makes them think people don't have active subwoofers? And further, I am not tech savy, like many others, so how in the heck am I supposed to incorporate this thing in a home stereo system with the pair of speakers I have plus an active sub. You reviewers do a great job of explaining the device but I bet you'd sell a lot more if you would include what other components are needed to make a complete home stereo system including what cables are needed and where to plug them in. I mean is the preamp in this thing good enough or do I need a preamp and amplifier to make the best sound? I don't have a clue about these things. Maybe there are many others in my position. How hard is it for them to add a sub output and bass management to these units for gods sake! Let me guess, it's because old audiophiles like me with their big full sized home stereo systems are a dying bread and the young generation is into their ear wax plugging ear buds without subwoofers, lol.
GM☕️🍩🥶 This looks very interesting. I’m primarily a headphone guy..but I’m looking for a decent wireless 🛜 streamer ..that’ll feed my DAC (Denafrips) . This fiio is interesting indeed 😎
I have had a very bad experience with Fiio products. All their products produce sounds but not music, because the music does not sound like music, but feels like a dead series of sounds with no life in them.
I hear you and I understand from where you are coming, I had a similar experience with some of their products. But they started to change and the biggest change already happened on the brand new K17 (finally, a fully discrete amp stage!) and with the unit I reviewed today.
What do you mean by no support? As mentioned several times in the video, I used exclusively Roon, Tidal, and Qobuz, all of which worked nicely, although Roon offered a better user experience.
Big and beautiful for under 1K is impressive. Good to see new equipment at a relatively reasonable price. Makes the competition keep up and keep prices down.
You are right on time!!!!!! I have had this on my mind for the last week. Thanks even prior to watching.
My pleasure, mate!
Fiio has officially hit the big leagues with a segment busting streamer that delivers on a larger form factor and screen at a price that other manufacturers put into their smaller streamer units. As a owner of many Fiio products, its good to see.
Fabulous review. Seen it five times and am so happy with this unit at this price point. The eArc is awesome and now my Xbox x and tv and pc are all routed through it. Fabulous integration with my topping dx9 dac through the IIS and I prefer the Topping DAC. Thanks Sandu! Such a welcome review. Thanks again.
My pleasure, mate! So you've heard my wacky Eastern European accent 5 times in a row 😆 Ouch!
Awesome review! Thank you!
Best review of the S15 yet (though their are not many yet) but with head to head with DMPA8 was talked about since both are Android DACs.Yes Eversolo has twice or close,price tag but native apps and analogue input does not seem to be worth it.Then again sound quality and EQ comparison would have been interesting deep dive.One thing you missed was that Fiio has 3(!) analogue outs.I m just getting into streaming so am crunching the Volumio vs Roon oprions but if I go with the latter this seems to best deal out there
Thank you! My system is fully balanced and for me, the other two pairs of RCA outputs were unusable, but yeah, it's a nice addition, especially for people with SET or SE amplifiers.
Nice looking unit. Hefty big boy right there
Yup, the bigger = the better (at least in terms of HiFi🙃)
Hello Sandu. Requesting a review on the Bluesound Node Icon please. Thanks for another great review.
I’ve been enjoying my new FiiO S15 for a little over 2 weeks now and I really enjoyed your review. My experience with the FiiO Cast feature was different from yours. The S15 , after a firmware update to 1.0.1 , is able to cast a second screen to my iPad and Galaxy S23 Ultra with no problems.
Something that I would like your opinion on, that you didn’t mention in your review, are the 6 digital filters. Which do you think sounds best?
About time Fiio picking up the challenge from Eversolo. Looks beautiful with that generous screen, perfect for streaming. Good DAC, good controls. Sadly...not perfect because lacking in software department. I hoped they could solve that!
Do you think the new EverSolo DMP-A6 Master Edition Gen 2, with the linear power supply, might compete as a streamer in sound quality?
streamers dont have any effect on sound quality.its 1's and 0's. either the signal gets there or it doesn't.
The USB C DAC input is located in the front of the S15 so that it's easier to connect a phone or tablet when it's in a rack or cabinet.
Why would you connect a phone to this
@psysword Perhaps a guest has music files on their phone that they want to play at a party. I can think of lots of reasons.
Thanks for this! I have possibly the most inconsequential question about this unit: the LEDs around the knobs seem to change colour… can this be set by the user..?
To turn it off would be my preferred option
Thank you for this review. However I'm getting sick seeing all these companies trying to shove down our throats all these "multi-purpose" devices at "amazing" prices. Please Fiio, Wiim, Eversolo and all of you out there, we need a STREAMER ONLY device with USB, I2S, coaxial and optical outputs, no need to add DACs headphone amplifier, pre-amp, nothing else, only a streamer with the connectivity required in today's variety of audio electronics. Simple, isn't it?
Simple streamer yes. A dac with a really good pre-amp would be nice to just hookup to a simple amp. Pre-amps can be expensive.
@@nc3419 Sure, but having pre-amp and headphone amp in the DAC and all that repeated in the streamer... That's why I plea, just give us a pure streamer! 😅
@@carlosalvarez7445 FiiO already has SR11 as a pure streamer. Sadly only for Roon, Airplay and bluetooth. Even for DLNA you need a separate firmware.
Great job, as always. I have a question: Does the PEQ have a Pre gain knob / slider?
Yes, it does, in the advanced tab. Thank you!
@Soundnews Nice. Maybe setting the Pre gain a lot lower would keep the eqed sound less degraded and distorsion free. It's a good feature.
Have you tried Holo Audio Red or Volumio Rivo Plus?? They are just transporters with I2S connection and good reviews, thank you.
So I’m guessing I can’t connect my iem’s for playback listening from my desktop and Mac mini?
Very cool piece of gear especially for the price
Hi thank you for your review. One stupid question from my side, as I would intend to integrate the S15 into my stereo setup. Can I connect my amplifier via the HDMI out and benefit from the 192/24 resolution or is the HDMI out only for ARC support with 48/24? Thank you.
Topping D90 iii discrete and a Bluesound Node Nano would be circa $300 more.
No fancy screen. You also lose Android (and native Apple Music if that's your streamer of choice).
But are the sound quality gains by focusing on a world class sub $1k dac and mvp streamer there to be had?
I would like to see a deep dive of the S15 as a Google Cast target device. In that scenario the casting app acts as a true controller and the content is streamed directly to the target device, as opposed to being relayed through the casting device. This is how I would use the S15 in a remote control scenario.
However, I think u can use spotify installed as an app but controlled from the panel or remote control
Hi, ive always wondered, is i2s really that much better then spdif? I believe spdif is better then usb, would you agree?
Hi, finally! A proper question.
1) S/PDIF is a horrendously poorly designed interface, because it combines the clock and audio coding onto the same signal (I2S has separate lanes for the signal and clock). The receiver is supposed to recover the clock from this signal as well as extract the audio data. This turns out to be a non-trivial task, and one that almost always leaves the recovered clock contaminated with signal correlated jitter artefacts. So any clock you transmit over an S/PDIF connection that is also carrying audio signals will probably be worse than any internal clock.
You can reasonably (but not ideally) send a clock over an S/PDIF interface if the interface does not carry any audio signal, but even then the poor bandwidth of the interface does not lend itself to particularly accurate clock reticulation.
Even proper word clock distribution systems are far from ideal, but S/PDIF is particularly flawed, and should have no role in any transmission that involves clock recovery. I2S has separate lanes for data and clock.
2) For S/PDIF data transmission, you need a digital sender that packs the data and then a digital receiver sitting on DAC end to receive S/PDIF data, decoding it and then sending it to MCU and then DAC chips. Via I2S we don't have a digital receiver on the DAC end, bypassing a chip and a conversion, plus I2S bandwidth is almost unlimited compared to S/PDIF.
Hopefully, this clarifies everything.
@@Soundnews Wow! Thanks for the detailed response, I *just* learned from iiWiReviews that spdif and i2s uses the streamers clock and that usb is asynchronous, so all this info is great, I recent replaced my usb setup with and spdif and that sounded better to my ears, but now I might have to go down i2s...
It is a Android 12 device so the normal spotify app should work and you do not really need spotify connect ... not even for controlling it from any other spotify running device - or am I mistaken?
That is correct, you can install and use the Spotify app, but controlling it from afar with your smartphone is not so convenient.
I know the EverSolo DMP-A8 is considerably more expensive, but would you say sound quality wise is it better than S15 as a Streamer and a DAC?
Thanks for the review. I'm looking to replace my RME ADI-2 FS DAC. Any idea if this is an upgrade or downgrade in terms of sound quality?
Why not use the RME as an external DAC for the S15?
I have the R7 and sound improved when connecting it to a Chord Qutest DAC.
Hey, thanks for the content! May I ask you what headphone amp do you suggest to properly power an he6sev2? I'm using an xDuoo TA-22 which is loud but doesn't sound great and a old speaker amp with speaker taps adapter, which is punchy and fun but not very refined. Thanks 💪🏻
Test this morning the fiio s15 compare with dmpa6 master, both have different sound quality, for me the voice eversolo has more smoother transition and sound more natural, while the fiio produces strong mid range which for me sound a little harsher, instrument more detail on some other tracks, some acoustic music sound muddy and less transparent compared to eversolo., both have different sound signature and have there advantages.
Would you use it only as streamer ? Its streamer is it better than WiiM ultra ?
You start with WiiM, it's affordable and works well, but WiiM is not about sound quality, only about the features. S15 is something else entirely.
Yes I understand but I am only talking about the steaming section sound quality compared to WiiM ultras streaming sound quality. Both will have external dacs connected
@@Soundnews - I might offer to differ with a WiiM Pro and external 5v power supply connected to a RME ADI-2.
In addition, a fiber router going through two Cisco Meraki to the WiiM produces outstanding results. Too bad we can't test.
Another excellent review though here.
It destroys the Wiim , this is a starting point to HiFi
Wiim Ultra has total transparency digital out. True to the source is the only relevant benchmark for hifi. There is no way anything can be more hifi than true to the source.
Can we install poweramp equalizer app so I can change its sound profile?
@@InDueTime25 having an open Android 12 platform, you can install even Doom 😳 (short answer: sure, mate)
@ Ooooooooo. This excites me.
Eversolo dmp-a8 is x2 the price but USB output is the deal breaker for me
I'd like to see Fiio S15 VS Eversolo A8 head to head comparsion. Yes, A8 is almost twice more expensive, but they're build different! Just check PCB pictures! And why they make such wide frame around display? Looks meh in 2025!
So if I am streaming Qobuz I can't use my phone to send music to the S15 remotely?
Man alive, why the is there no sub out and ability for low and high pass cutoffs on yet another streamer. Some people want full range sound that they can only acheive by adding an active subwoofer. All I hear reviewers talking about is the sound quality but what about sound quantity because people will be missing out on some of the sound frequency if the can't add a subwoofer and tweak the PEQ of it I'll say that. Don't any of these companies learn anything from crappy sounding but more functional Wiim and Bluesound products? What makes them think people don't have active subwoofers? And further, I am not tech savy, like many others, so how in the heck am I supposed to incorporate this thing in a home stereo system with the pair of speakers I have plus an active sub. You reviewers do a great job of explaining the device but I bet you'd sell a lot more if you would include what other components are needed to make a complete home stereo system including what cables are needed and where to plug them in. I mean is the preamp in this thing good enough or do I need a preamp and amplifier to make the best sound? I don't have a clue about these things. Maybe there are many others in my position. How hard is it for them to add a sub output and bass management to these units for gods sake! Let me guess, it's because old audiophiles like me with their big full sized home stereo systems are a dying bread and the young generation is into their ear wax plugging ear buds without subwoofers, lol.
Does it stream in bitperfect?
GM☕️🍩🥶
This looks very interesting.
I’m primarily a headphone guy..but I’m looking for a decent wireless 🛜 streamer ..that’ll feed my DAC (Denafrips) .
This fiio is interesting indeed 😎
I have had a very bad experience with Fiio products. All their products produce sounds but not music, because the music does not sound like music, but feels like a dead series of sounds with no life in them.
I hear you and I understand from where you are coming, I had a similar experience with some of their products. But they started to change and the biggest change already happened on the brand new K17 (finally, a fully discrete amp stage!) and with the unit I reviewed today.
Does it support SACD file iso?
So , no Spotify, no Tidal and no Qobuz? Fiio what were you smoking?
What do you mean by no support? As mentioned several times in the video, I used exclusively Roon, Tidal, and Qobuz, all of which worked nicely, although Roon offered a better user experience.
No Spotify connect, Tidal connect and Qobuz connect. Only Fiio cast.
Eversolo A8 first cousin in the looks department!
Not only in terms of looks...the innards are also quite similar.
Why is the audio in german?
@brainegg in a parallel universe I'm reviewing all kinds of beers, but especially Bavarian weiss 😅
Nu aveți din greșeală și o versiune în limba română?😊
Wish it would run Wiim OS.
I’m sending the music via IIS to my topping DX9 and feel the Dac is better there. The app is terrible and buggy.
zeros and ones into butterfly's
👍🏽 1:11
Could be a good choice for Spotify or Tidal subscribers but a paying Roon user can probably afford better. Seems like a misguided product.
eversolo streamer give more for the same price