FiiO M3K and BTR3 At CanJam London 2018

There really doesn’t seem to be anything that’s gonna slow FiiO’s roll at this point. It seems that their product line is just continuously growing, almost on a fortnightly basis. Just a few days ago they announced their new HB3 leatherette case, but they took to CanJam London 2018 to unveil their 2 newest additions – the M3K and BTR3.

Meet The M3K

It’s going on 3 years ago now that FiiO first introduced their smallest portable player, the M3. What the aim of the M3 was was for FiiO to provide very good sound quality at a ridiculously affordable price.  For the most part, they succeeded in doing so. At an asking price of just $50, the M3 sounded really good and was very compact. It was very much intended to be used as an exercise companion due to the small size, very low weight, and the optional arm-band accessory. Unfortunately the M3 didn’t quite turn out the way FiiO wanted it to (which begs the question why they still sold it then) and they discontinued the product quite prematurely. The M3 suffered from some pretty severe software limitations, which made it a somewhat frustrating device to use when navigating through the menu system and other lists. It couldn’t display more than about two dozen characters on a single text line and there wasn’t a particularly intuitive structure to the menu system.
For what seems like ages, many of us wondered whether or not FiiO wold one day resurrect the M3 model-name with a product that’s better executed.
Well, we now have that answer in the form of the M3K, another conservatively-priced player which will hopefully provide an enormous bang-for-buck value.

Judging just by the looks, we can see that the M3K looks very similar to the X1 2nd Gen. there isn’t even the slightest hint of the old M3 in there. The most notable difference from the X1 2nd Gen, though, is a lack of a scroll-wheel. It’s appears as though the user would still interact with the device via a capacitive touch panel, similar in concept to what’s uses on the Hidizs AP60.

FiiO is yet to update their website with more in-depth details about the M3K, so unfortunately we don’t have any information at present time with regards to its physical dimensions, so it’s difficult to say how it compares to both the original M3 and the X1 2nd Gen as far as its footprint is concerned. 

What FiiO did mention are a few of the other key specifications and how they compare to the original M3.
One of the standout features of the M3 was its claimed maximum battery-life of 24-hours. Interestingly, up until the introduction of the M3K, the M3 still had the longest battery-life of all of FiiOs players. The M3K takes things up a notch by not only increasing the maximum playback time to 26-hours, but by also gaining a deep-sleep functionality that allows the player to sit in an ultra-low-power idle state for up to 38 days , nearly matching the 40 days standby capability of the Exynos-powered M7.Another improvement comes in the form of file-compatibility which now sees the M3K being able to handle ALAC and DSD files (limited to DSD64), as well as expanding the maximum sampling-rate and bit depth of PCM formats to 384kHz/32-bit (as opposed to the 96kHz/24-bit limitation of the M3).

However, perhaps the more important improvements to look at is the fact that the M3K can support up to 512Gb microSD cards, and the various improvements in terms of audio performance.
FiiO went ahead and used an AK4376A DAC chip, and this (in part) has lead to a major improvement in terms of the signal-to-noise ratio, upping it from 95dB to 117dB, which means a reduction in the noise floor from just under 10uV to less than 2uV. This is especially great for high-sensitivity IEMs which usually pick up on hiss (as was the case with the original M3). The M3 already had an impressively low harmonic distortion figure of 0.008%, but the M3K bests this figure yet again by dropping it to just 0.004%. FiiO have also given the M3K a recording function and a build-in microphone, making it a rather nifty voice-recorder. Exactly how good the ADC setup is isn’t something we know right now, but it’ll be interesting to see how it performs when we get a review unit in.

Unfortunately, being a super-budget-friendly device, the M3K offers absolutely no wireless functionality.

Check Out The BTR3

The other new product to debut at CanJam London 2018 from FiiO is their latest Bluetooth product – the BTR3.
The BTR3 follows on form the BTR1 and is stylistically more closely-related to the uBTR. However, as it turns out, the BTR3 is far more versatile than either of those 2 products.
Like the uBTR, the BTR3 offers easy one-touch NFC pairing to make things as simple as possible.
What the BTR3 does, though, is to take the list of supported Bluetooth codecs and overall functionality to a whole new level.

FiiO have given the device the ability to utilise all of the most desirable Bluetooth codecs out there, including AptX HD, AptX Low Latency, as well as Sony’s LDAC format. There’s even the inclusion of Huawei’s HWA format which is currently only supported by about a handful of Huawei’s own devices. 

Other improvements over the BTR1 come sin the form of a totally independent volume adjustment, a larger battery capacity, and a higher power-output. The lack of power was probably the most common criticism of the BTR1, so it’s great to see that FiiO improved upon this with the BTR3. No, it’s still not a great deal of power as it’s only just more than half of what the M7 can produce (which too often gets criticised for a lack of power), but then again, the BTR3 isn’t really intended for larger power-hungry cans.  This is a product designed for portability in mind, and so it’s more suitable for IEMs anyways. Put it this way, if it can adequately power the MEE Pinnacle P1, then it’ll have enough power the vast majority of IEMs out there.

The BTR3 uses the same DAC chip as the M3K, so it’ll be interesting to see how their respective measurable audio performance figures will compare with one another. 

One feature that came as a particular surprise was that the BTR3 is not just a Bluetooth product, and instead it can act as a perfectly capable external USB DAC device as well. The 24mW of available power from the BTR3 is almost up there with the K1. This means that, st least to some extent, the BTR3 could in essence be considered a replacement of both the BTR1 and K1 too.

When I reviewed the M7 I noted how impressed I was with the Bluetooth performance of the device, particularly with reference to its stability and range. Previously, Bluetooth stability and range was an extremely sore-spot for FiiO as it proved to be quite underwhelming in some of their past devices. In the case of the BTR3 we are seeing FiiO make a specific mention on the impressive Bluetooth range of the devices, quoted as being up to 20 meters in an open area. Of course this does not give us any indication on how stable the connection will be in reality, but it does give us hope yet.

Availability & Pricing of The M3K and BTR3

It has been indicated by FiiO in posts on their Facebook page that the price-tag for both the M3K and BTR3 in the US market is $69.99 each and they’re looking to get them released into the market some time in August.