Our favourite high-resolution portable music player is back to its lowest-ever price in this Black Friday deal

(Image credit: Astell & Kern)

Guess who’s back, back again? This Astell & Kern deal, tell a friend. While you might be able to do without Eminem’s Without Me, rest assured, if you’re looking for a high-resolution portable audio player, you will not want to be without this early Black Friday deal.

The multiple Award-winning Astell & Kern A&norma SR35 is back to its lowest price of £599 at Richer Sounds. That’s a significant £200 less than its original launch price, plus this deal even comes with a free case. Despite having a name that we struggle to pronounce, we are big fans of this portable music player, and, especially at this discount price, we’re confident you will be too.

The Astell & Kern A&norma SR35 is all you could want from a portable music player at this level. It’s got a smart, compact design, is littered with features, and sounds fantastic with any genre of music you play through it in high resolution. This deal includes a free charcoal case worth £69.

<p><strong>Deal also available at <a href="https://www.awin1.com/awclick.php?awinmid=3586&awinaffid=103504&clickref=hawk-custom-tracking&p=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.av.com%2FHi-Fi%2FAstellandKern-Aandnorma-SR35-Digital-Audio-Player-Charcoal-Grey%2F5JYG%3Fsource%3Daw%26utm_source%3Daffiliate-window%26sv1%3Daffiliate%26sv_campaign_id%3D103504%26awc%3D3586_1763544888_360ae703bc83ce562a36de1b2224b148" target="_blank"><strong>AV.com

The SR35 is the entry-level model in Astell & Kern’s range of portable high-resolution music players. Such a term is relative, however: its original price of £799 is not exactly affordable; but its multiple What Hi-Fi? Award wins over the years prove that its performance-per-pound is exceptional.

Unlike its similarly five-star predecessors, the SR35 is the first to feature Astell & Kern’s New Generation AMP technology and a quad-DAC arrangement, which allows all four of its Cirrus Logic CS43198 DAC chips to be engaged for an even more involving sound.

This move appears to have paid dividends. During testing, we noted that it “has the punch and rhythmic drive to keep you tapping along to upbeat tracks, and the insight to draw you into the details of those calmer ones.”

You may not get the full 20-hour battery life if playing hi-res music in Quad DAC mode, but the SR35 also doubles up as a performance-enhancing DAC between your wired headphones and another device, such as a laptop.

Elsewhere, it’s got 3.5mm, 4.4mm and 2.5mm headphone outputs, 64GB of built-in storage, and allows for native playback of hi-res files including MQA, DSD256 and up to 32-bit/384kHz PCM. For those with larger music libraries, you can expand upon its built-in storage thanks to a microSD card slot supporting up to 1TB.

The SR35 has been around for a while, but we have yet to come across another hi-res portable player that offers such a winning combination of compact design, extensive file compatibility and superbly detailed, precise and dynamic sound.

So if you’ve been hunting for a premium hi-res portable music player that ticks all the boxes and have the budget to spend, then this SR35 deal of £599 at Richer Sounds is worth considering.

MORE:

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What are the best portable MP3 players?

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James Cook is a staff writer at What Hi-Fi?. He spent several years writing for various business publications, before completing a National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ) Diploma in Journalism. Outside of work, James spends his time playing bass guitar, watching TV and motivating himself to keep fit, often unsuccessfully.

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