Quick Look At Cayin’s Upcoming N5ii DAP

Cayin’s i-line of devices have surely cemented their position within the portable audio world among hi-fi audio enthusiasts. They are well-known for their original i5 and N-series of DAPs as well as their C5 portable headphone amplifier. So it’ll be interesting to see what they’ve done with the refresh of the original N5. In fact, the N5ii more closely follows the i5 in terms of aesthetics.

Judging from the pictures alone, the N5ii actually seems like a more bulky and less-refined device than the i5. Ok, perhaps not “less-refined”, but certainly a bit more rugged and industrial.

But the N5ii is a stark departure from the original N5’s exceptionally retro-look.

Upgraded

However, perhaps the most important factors to consider are the upgrades and other functional changes that the 2nd iteration brings.

Where the i5 only has a single card-slot, the N5ii appears to sport dual slots. This will mean a total of around 512Gb of external storage when utilising 2 of the largest commercially available micro-SD cards currently available. But, just like the original, the new version also includes 32Gb of internal storage.

Under the hood Cayin’s new device receives other audio-related changes too. Most notably is the change from an AKM4490EQ DAC chip to an ESS9018K2M DAC chip.

Of course, one would expect these hardware changes to also affect not only the N5ii’s sound characteristic, but also it’s power delivery and measurable audio performance.
Compared to the original, the N5ii now outputs 130mW into the single-ended connection instead of 190mW. However, the N5ii now also has a balanced output, which is capable of outputting up to 250mW. The line-output level has also increased to 2.0Vrms from 1.2Vrms. THD+N figures have also dropped from 0.006% in the i5 to 0.002% in the N5ii, whereas the dynamic range figures have gone up to 116dB vs 108dB of the i5.

Battery

An interesting change comes in the form of the battery. Where the i5 had a 4800mAh battery, the newer model now only has a 3000mAh battery. However, despite this smaller size, Cayin claims that the N5ii can play continuously for up to 12 hours, whereas the i5 was rated at up to 11 hours. Also, partly due to the reduced battery size, the N5ii’s weight has also been reduced to 150g, compared to 196g of the original.

 

Release date

Cayin have indicated that they intend to launch the device internationally in December 2017

 

Check out the range of portable DAPs available in the Samma3a store!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *