Shanling M2 by Shanling Audio - Introduction

The first I had heard of the Shanling Audio, a DAP manufacturer based out of Hong Kong, was when I stumbled across their booth at the back of an exhibition hall at the Munich High End 2015 Expo. I was coming straight from the car crash that was the Astell & Kern booth, just having demoed their new rip off DAP the AK380. At that point I was pretty down on the direction the DAP (Digital Audio Player) market was going. In recent years, some of the audiophile community have pretty lost touch with reality with regards to high end, dedicated, portable audio players. In most cases the juice (cash) is not worth the squeeze (performance). Take the AK380 player as an example, I have heard and tested with it a number of times since then and when looking objectively I just don't see the point. I see it as existing as something purely to squeeze every ounce of cash out of fans of high end audio, it sounds good but in very minimal degrees, if at all, over far cheaper competition.

However, that doesn't mean I am wholly opposed to the idea of owning a stand alone DAP. The convenience of having all your music loaded onto one device whose purpose is delivering you great sounding high res audio on the go is a good one. Smartphones are not yet at the level of audio that purpose built & selected components can provide. Of course with your smartphone you have the option of using external DAC & Amp units but to be honest it is a bit of a hassle remembering to bring mine along for the ride (not to mention how many times I have lost my OTG connection cables).

So that brings me here to the Shanling M2 by Shanling Audio. On paper it seems to fit my needs in almost every way. Shanling promise it sounds good, that it's well built, it's easy to use, capable of taking high capacity SD cards and, finally, the price seems very reasonable. With all that in mind lets get on with the full Shanling M2 review and see if this new dedicated audio player can give some of the big boys and established players a bit of a black eye.

*Note* - The Shanling M2 now comes in an updated colour option (gray) and is currently priced at under $200 on Amazon.

Packaging & Accessories

The Shanling Audio M2 comes in quite a nice box that would be perfect on its own but Shanling have chosen to wrap the presentation box in rather generic looking sleeve stuffed with blurbs, pictures and specifications. Im in two minds on this as on one hand I can see the benefit to the average consumer on the high street if the saw this in the store and wanted a little bit of information about what the Shanling M2 is. However, in this day and age, given the rise of the smartphone, those drawn to and willing to pay $250 for a dedicated music player (DAP) are more than likely going to know what they are buying in the first place. In that regard I wish they just left the sleeve of and stuck with the presentation box alone. There is a special feeling you get with the Ibasso DX50 or even the cheaper Colorfly C3 that you don't get with the M2 DAP. It's really not a big deal but its worth a mention. At the end of the day a box is a box and your probably going to toss it in the trash anyway.