Five-star Fyne speakers, new Dolby Atmos soundbars, retro “Walkman” headphones and more

As Rick Clarke once smoothly told us, Time Keeps Moving On and as a result, despite the What Hi-Fi? team’s best efforts to 'A-Team' an old amplifier into a time machine, it is once again Monday.

And while that means schlepping back to work for most of us, there is a silver lining – a fresh entry into our weekly Rewind hi-fi and home cinema news digest.

As always, it was a busy time at What Hi-Fi? towers with everything from new Dolby Atmos soundbars bespoke-designed to take on Sonos to an affordable DAC from an established player in the field and word of Apple’s latest AirPods launch event breaking.

Here’s everything you need to know.

iFi launched another tiny, portable DAC

Adding to its growing pile of portable DACs, which already includes the iFi Go Link and ultra-portable iFi Go Bar Kensei, last week iFi unveiled its new Go Blu Air unit.

What makes it different from the others? It’s smaller for starters, measuring in at an outright dinky 5cm tall and weighing just 30g. It’s also fairly cheap, retailing for £129 $129 / €149 / AU$229 – that’s 70 quid / bucks less in the UK and US than the full fat iFi Go Blu from 2021.

Under the hood it features competitive specifications for the money, being built on a Cirrus Logic MasterHIFI DAC chip and Qualcomm's QCC5144 chipset for Bluetooth.

Add to this its solid connectivity, which includes 4.4mm and 3.5mm balanced headphone outputs as well as Bluetooth 5.2 wireless connectivity and robust hi-res codec support, and it becomes fairly enticing, on paper at least.

But, as always, we’ll reserve judgement until we get one in for testing.

Read the full story: iFi's latest portable DAC is as light as air – but promises sound that will blow you away

Fyne’s on a hot streak

Fresh off the back of our five-star reviews of the Fyne Audio F501E in February and Fyne Audio F701SP in May, the Scottish audio house managed to capture lightning in a bottle a third time last week.

Specifically, our reviewers awarded the Fyne Audio F502S a five-star recommendation. Retailing for £2300 / $2800 / AU$3000, the F502S are so good they have already earned a place in our best speakers buying guide.

For your money you’ll get a robustly built, large set of floorstanding speakers packed with custom, patented Fyne hardware.

Highlights include a custom mid/bass driver with the IsoFlare point source tech design, which aims to widen the speakers’ sweet spot and improve stereo imaging. There’s also the brand’s ‘BassTrax’ diffuser system, which works to improve their low-end heft and make them less fussy with positioning.

Paired with price appropriate hardware, in our case a Naim Nait XS 3 amp, the Fynes sounded great, delivering a well-integrated, cohesive and balanced sound regardless of which genre we threw at them. Hence our score and verdict:

“Blending superb sonic integration with class-leading authority and musicality, the F502S continue Fyne Audio’s hot streak in some style.”

Read our full Fyne Audio F502S review

These new headphones plucked our nostalgia strings

Sound matters – you know that, we know that, otherwise we wouldn’t be sharing time and space on What Hi-Fi?.

But, there are undeniably some products that manage to transcend that and tug on our nostalgic heart strings. This week it was the new, unashamedly retro Gadhouse Wesley that did that to many members of the What Hi-Fi? Team.

Holding an uncanny resemblance to the iconic headphones that came with the original Walkman, the headphones brought many of us straight back to our teenage years – though we have yet to hear them,

Read the full story: These retro headphones resemble the original Walkman's, but pack USB-C for just £60

Apple’s unveiling some stuff

Last week tech giant Apple confirmed it will be hosting a launch event on Tuesday 9th September at 10AM Pacific Time (6PM BST / 3AM AEST the following day).

Set to be streamed at the Steve Jobs Theater at Apple Park in Cupertino, it’s still unknown what specific products will be unveiled, but given the firm’s past release strategies we’re expecting it to heavily focus on the fabled iPhone 17 series of smartphones.

Alongside them, pre-release rumours suggest we’ll also get some audio treats, including the AirPods Pro 3 and HomePod Mini 2.

Make sure to follow What Hi-Fi?’s coverage on the day as we’ll be covering the launch in real time.

Read the full story: Apple confirms “Awe dropping” September launch event: iPhone 17 and (potentially) AirPods Pro 3 expected

Bluesound unveiled two new Dolby Atmos soundbars

Last week Canadian audio firm Bluesound unveiled not one, but two, new Dolby Atmos soundbars – both of which look set to take on Sonos at both the upper and lower ends of the market.

The first is the firm’s new flagship Pulse Cinema, which aims to compete with the Sonos Arc Ultra currently sitting at the top of our best Dolby Atmos soundbar guide. Featuring 16 speaker drivers and being quoted as offering a total of 500 watts of power, Bluesound promises the unit will deliver a true dome-of-sound effect.

Below it, the new Pulse Cinema Mini lives up to its namesake and is a tiny unit designed to take on the Sonos Beam (Gen 2). Unlike its brother, the unit doesn’t have up-firing drivers. Instead it has an angled driver design that aims to provide Atmos 2.1-channel virtualisation.

Read the full story: Bluesound has released two Dolby Atmos soundbars to challenge Sonos’s five-star favourites

MORE:

These are the best soundbars we’ve tested

We rate the best floorstanding speakers

Our picks of the best DACs