When In Manila and you’re looking for a versatile portable amplifier and desktop DAC for your headphones. Or maybe even looking for a matching sound for your headphone to tame those hot highs or lacking bass? You’ve got FiiO’s latest portable amplifier and DAC the FiiO E17 Alpen which is another affordable roll from FiiO with a versatile EQ setting to boot!
Simple packaging but packs a complete package.
For the price of P6000.00, you already get a very versatile portable headphone amplifier and desktop DAC with the FiiO E17 Alpen, now where can you find an amp/DAC combo with this price point? FiiO churns out another amazingly priced product with the FiiO E17 Alpen, an upgrade from its former amp/DAC which is the E7. It may be a little more pricey than the older E7, but the upgrades are well worth beyond the price for sure.
Very lovable form factor for those on-the-go.
Build/Packaging: The FiiO E17 Alpen comes in a small, sturdy rectangular box and comes complete with a USB cable for the DAC capabilities, a 3.5mm interconnect for aux connections, coaxial and optical adapters, a rubber band for coupling with your portable audio player, as well as rubber feet to be attached to the FiiO E17 Alpen to your liking, and even a generous addition of a screen protector. Nice small, yet complete packaging.
Moving to the build of the FiiO E17 Alpen, reminds me of an iPod like build quality and durability. Strong, sturdy and won’t break at a drop. The shape of the old E7 is retained and redesigned better to match with portable players and iPods. I always adored the shape of the E7 and the FiiO E17 Alpen due to how easy they could be banded together on my iPod or iPhone and would still fit perfectly in my pocket. Definitely well thought of design. The FiiO E17 Alpen has a beautiful small LCD screen that is enough to toggle needed settings, output and input settings/display and for battery capacity knowledge. The screen fits nicely and is much more functional than toggles and switches. Oh and I love the brushed metal design by the way.
Lovin’ the brushed metal finish!
Sound Quality:
● Output Power: >250mW (16Ω Loaded ); >20mW (300Ω Loaded)
● Headphone Impedance Range: 16 Ω ~ 300 Ω
● SNR:≥109dB（A weight）[AMP];≥104dB（A weight）[DAC]
● Distortion: ● Support sampling rate(Max):96K/24bit [USB] ; 192K/24bit [SPDIF]
● Frequency response:10Hz~100KHz[AMP]; 10Hz~20KHz[DAC]
● Battery capacity, charging time and using time:1500Mah/3.5H/15H[AUX]; 1500Mah/3.5H/15H[SPDIF]
● Size: 96mm x 55mm x 15.2mm
● Weight: 112g
Plugging the FiiO E17 Alpen straight to my laptop via USB as a DAC/amp combo, I noticed right away how thick and engaging the mids on the FiiO E17 Alpen is. The vocals are thick and engaging. The old E7 had good mids, but the FiiO E17 Alpen just had this thicker and more engaging sound on the mids, making the vocals more pronounced and enticing. It is warm yet still a little neutral until you play around the treble and bass settings that lets you shape the sound to your liking and to your headphone. The Added treble EQ is awesome! Plus, the adjustments are both +10 and -10 on the treble and bass EQ settings of the FiiO E17 Alpen. Making the FiiO E17 Alpen very very versatile as I said earlier. You want less spikes on your treble? Pull down on the treble EQ settings. You need additional bass for that bass light headphone? Push some more on the bass EQ setting. I also noticed how the FiiO E17 Alpen has some sound stage and good sense of air into it. It’s not a huge sound stage like the Furutech ADL Cruise amp/DAC combo or the ALO audio RxMK3-B amp’s sound stage, but it does have a generous extension to the treble and has ample sound stage. Really a good hit for the price.
Non-obtrusive inputs and outputs at the top and bottom.
The FiiO E17 Alpen also has 2 gain settings which are 0db, 6db and 12db along with a balance setting for those with hearing imbalances. Just amazing how much versatility FiiO has put into this already good amp/DAC combo at such a good, non bank-breaking price point.
I should also point-out that the FiiO E17 Alpen retains the capability to dock with the FiiO E9 desktop headphone amplifier and also the recently release upgrade to the FiiO E9, the FiiO E09K. And another update to the newer FiiO E17 Alpen, is the lo bypass on the side of the FiiO E17 Alpen. It allows the EQ settings of the FiiO E17 Alpen to be toggled and used with the E9 or the newer E09K which was previously unavailable with the FiiO E7. Watch out for my review of the E09K coming up next.
Simply brilliant from FiiO once again.
Overall, FiiO definitely brought better and bigger upgrade to the FiiO E17 Alpen. It is noticeable that FiiO does listen to its customers opinions over previous products. Thumbs up to FiiO Philippines and XTCorporation for another amazing product! For P6000.00, you get more than what you paid for.
Follow XTCorporation on twitter: @XTChannel
and also FiiO Philippines on facebook: https://www.facebook.com/fiiophil
FiiO E17 Alpen portable headphone amplifier and DAC: affordable and versatile
