Edit: This review was written during firmware version 1.2. While many of my opinions remain the same, I have an update posted here with all the changes that later firmware updates.
Another Edit: Paul Rafferty had made a response to this review regarding points that I missed in the review including playlists, meta data and UI (this one in particular was corrected in the follow up article mentioned above.) Response can be found here.
There was a different article in the works coming up, but since I’ve received this in the mail recently I thought I’d give it a fair shake. I don’t intend to write a lot of reviews, but seeing that I wrote an article on how DAPs are great, it only made sense I write about one that arrived in the mail not long ago. Before we proceed, I would like to leave a disclaimer that I backed and ordered the Q1 with my own money on Kickstarter and that everything I write here are my own opinions based on my experiences with the device.
My daily driver DAP is the Sony Walkman NWZX300, while not a flagship device (even at the time of 2017) it has many features that makes it feel like one. It is also a $700 device, which is more than 7 times more than how much I spent on the Shanling Q1. It may not be fair to compare both devices because of this as they are of different price ranges, but there is a reason why I am comparing.
I’ll start off by saying I don’t recommend getting a 3 year old Walkman for any price, especially when there are newer, cheaper, and even better options out there (more on that later). The NWZX300 is an awesome device that is a very essential part of my carry, but I was curious to see what a new device has to offer in terms of features. I will not compare sound quality of the two devices here because it doesn’t matter, with my testing the difference in sound was very trivial with both sounding great on all accounts.
The Size and Physical Design
At a glance the Shanling Q1 is a gorgeous device, it’s a simple, rounded-edged square, colors that mimic fancy kitchen hardware, and decorated with chrome plated hardware buttons and a volume dial. I was surprised by its size, I was expecting it to be small but it was enough to fill my palm. The Q1 while it is smaller in size than the NWZX300 is a hefty device, it roughly weighs just as much (Q1 at 136.8g vs NWZX300 at 157g).
The Screen
The screen is 2.7" 360x400 touchscreen, while that may sound dated in 2020 for a DAP it’s more than adequate as you won’t be watching videos or viewing photos from it. You will however be viewing album art from it, and for that purpose the screen’s color, aspect ratio and size make it quite excellent. While the screen is great, there are quite a few things that make it less than perfect in the software department.
MTouch OS and the UI
There is a possibility of the software being more responsive with future updates down the line, but the MTouch OS leaves much to be desired. While it is fast and light, touchscreen inputs are a little finicky with swipes scrolling too far and sometimes not registering at all. It is also a very unrefined system in terms of UI design, icon designs look very outdated and use of screen real estate in some cases are very questionable.
MTouch OS isn’t exactly a new system that Shanling is experimenting with, they have had three generations to work with it and yet there are some very questionable decisions in its interface. When playing a track the main screen has the control buttons, track and artist name, play order (repeat, shuffle are the same button for some odd reason), a favorite button, and (available in version 1.2, the version available during the review) speed control that lets you speed up the music up to 1.25x and 1.5x. I’m not sure if you have notice but there is something important missing on that screen, the time bar for some reason is not on the main page of the playback screen but you have to swipe left to see it on the second page.
I kind of understand a screen of this size and resolution may have some constraints, but is fairly questionable to have a speed button on the main page take more priority than the time bar. The Sony while having more resolution to work with (800x480), has the important parts on display without paginating anything and still have room for settings, sound tuning and even peak meters and spectrum analyzers (things the Q1 sadly does not have). The iPod classic had a slighlty smaller resolution than the Q1 and had enough room to squeeze the timebar in, I understand that’s a device that isn’t dependant of touchscreen controls but the Q1 has physical controls too.
Depending on how many files you have, the device will refresh itself, updating the library with a loading screen. Generally it will not take long if you have hundreds of files, but in the thousands and depending on the formats you’re using the loading will take some time.
The Hardware Buttons and the Volume Dial
While the physical keys are a selling point of this device, I would have been fine without them. In my testing the only physical inputs I have used have been the power button and the volume dial, the play, next and previous buttons are so sensitive that I try to avoid them all together. If I would keep them I wished the physical buttons were on the same side as the power and volume dial like it is on the Sony, the ones on the Q1 feel flipped so it can get really confusing and trying to operate it with one hand (me being left-handed factors in this too) means more than one button is getting pressed. Having them on one side even if they are as sensitive as they are would at least make them bearable, thankfully there are options to lock the physical keys while they’re off in the settings.
The volume dial is a cute touch, but it feels cumbersome to use due to its size compared to the overall package. Looking at pictures on the internet the dial seems to be the same size as the one in the Shanling M0, it makes sense on a tiny device like that as the edges of the dial stick out from the device’s body and is easy to tune. On the Q1 however the dial is too tiny for fat fingers, it is islanded on one side of the device without sticking out of the edges.
The Power
Now you might think from the sound of things is that I hate the Q1, and you are very wrong. While it has problems, there is much to like here. It isn’t a perfect device, but it makes up for it in spades in everything else. For one it sounds excellent and it can hold its own against many DAPS double its size and price.
Let’s begin with its output, at first I was a little disappointed with its lack of a balanced headphone jack and in my tests I found out it didn’t need one. In my testing I have used various headphones including the Senheisser 6xx, the Hifiman HE4xx, Koss, KSC35, Koss KSC75, Koss ESP/95X, and the Sony WH-1000XM3 (both wired and wireless), I was very surprised that I didn’t need to increase the gain for even the most power hungry of my headphones. The Q1 just powered them adequately and sounded well without any compromise.
When I did a comparison test, the NWZX300 was struggling to be at the same volume as the Q1. The NWZX300 was a lot quieter compared to the q1, I looked up specs and realized that the Sony’s regular 3.5mm headphone jack was outputting at 50mW while the Q1's only headphone jack was at 80mW. It’s only sweetened more with the fact that the Q1 also supports both power out and line out modes, something I wished the NWZX300 was capable of without the need of accessories.
The USB-C Connectivity (DAC mode and connecting other amps)
I mentioned that the reason why I got the Q1 was to see what a modern DAP has to offer compared to my trusty NWZX300, I mainly meant the USB-C connectivity with that statement. Yes, a USB-C connector is much more convenient than the proprietary connector Sony uses on the NWZX300 (and many other Walkman devices both old and new, though they have opted for USBC in recent ones) for charging, but it is for a lot more than that.
In my previous article I talked about DAPs have DAC modes and both of these DAPs have them, and both work pretty much the same. You plug the DAP to the device via USB or Bluetooth and you can get better sound from your PC or mobile phone. This is where some of the differences come into play.
The NWZX300 while it requires its proprietary cable to plug via USB, there is no need for a driver to be installed. It works great if you’re only listening to music or spoken audio, but sadly it is not ideal for video as there is a slight latency in the audio. Sony commented saying that the mode was made exclusively for music listening, which is unfortunate when it can be used for so much more.
The Q1 on the other hand just uses any regular USB-C, you can use it to plug into more devices that way (getting it to run on iOS devices has been tricky in my testing and not all cables and devices seem to work for that). While it’s generally easier to connect physically, it requires installation of a driver on Shanling’s site if you plan to use the Q1 with a Windows PC (don’t have a Mac to test that out there). Driver is pretty much the only gripe I have with the Q1's USB DAC mode, no latency to report here so it works for games and video too.
Latency sadly is going to be common problem when it comes to Bluetooth, but I think that all falls down to what Bluetooth codec your other device is compatible with. You will most likely use bluetooth for audio only anyway as that there will always be latency and compression there. While we are talking about bluetooth, the Q1 does seem to have a stronger signal than the NWZX300 and like its Sony counterpart has support for LDAC and AptX.
USB-C support doesn’t end there, another thing the Q1 is capable of is connectivity with other amps via USB. You can take any of your other amps and plug the Q1 to is much easier and would likely be more compatible than its counterpart. The NWZX300 can run other amps via its WM port, but as I mentioned earlier requires accessories to make it work and I’ve gone through a lot of trouble to find them.
The Verdict
So the Q1 is a cheap, excellent-sounding and adaptable DAP for the modern age. If people are looking to get into playing their music off a DAP but don’t want to spend money on a more expensive unit, you can’t go wrong with this. Kickstarter (ended) supporters got the device for approximately US$89, I’m not sure when will the Q1 will hit the market but it’s supposed to be sometime in March for the approximate price of $120.
Where does this put my NWZX300 now? I’ll still be using it as I still prefer its. interface and some of the features it has over the Q1, The Q1 I will most likely use when I need higher powered headphones or plan to tinker with some of my other amps.
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