FiiO unveils plans for new K7 DAC/amp

In the world of headphone amplifiers, it’s undeniable that amplifiers based on THX architecture have been doing very well, with the Drop THX AAA 789, SMSL SP200, and Monoprice Monolith all getting rave reviews from every corner of the Internet. And now it looks like FiiO, one of the most prominent DAC/amp manufacturers on the market, is following suit with the FiiO K7.

When it comes to affordable DAC/amps, there’s few if any names that come to mind before FiiO. I personally use their Q1/MkII portable DAC/amp for on-the-go listening, and I know one of my colleagues uses the Q5. And with the K5 now positioned as one of the go-to DAC/amps for desktop use, FiiO is in quite a good position within the market.

Now they’ve announced plans for a new desktop DAC/amp via a thread on Head-Fi, which can be found here. According to the post, the K7 will be one of the most feature-rich desktop DAC/amps on the market.

Features

The THX AAA architecture suggests that the K7 will offer an extremely clean signal with high output power, as other recently-released THX amps have done.

It’ll have 4-pin XLR and 4.4mm balanced outputs and a 1/4th-inch single-ended output for the amp. It’ll also have dual XLR and RCA outputs and inputs.

Also, with SPDIF, coaxial, and USB-C inputs, the K7 will be quite versatile when it comes to sources. And with support for 768k and DSD512 files, it’s also able to handle quite a variety of material. FiiO has also mentioned an LDAC Bluetooth receiver and a control app, which would be an exciting feature, although the K7 will still likely not be suitable for portable listening.

In Conclusion

All in all, the FiiO K7 looks like it’ll be an extremely feature-rich alternative to the current offerings from Drop, SMSL, Monoprice, etc. And FiiO have also specified that it won’t be too expensive, likely sitting in the same $300-$500 range as its closest competitors (although that’s pure speculation from yours truly).

In their Head-fi thread, FiiO is taking suggestions from potential users. If you’ve thought of any features you’d love to see in a high-power desktop DAC/amp, head on over there and tell FiiO!