FIIO A5 Portable Headphone Amplifier Black

A beautiful bit of kit that has made an already excellent audio player (HiFi Walker H2) even better. Using Sennheiser HD600 headphones pushed the H2 to its limits (though to its credit, it coped quite well): I hesitated whether to spend more money on the FiiO A5, but in the event this amplifier has raised things to a new level (from very high to stratospheric, IMHO). Recommended without hesitation. The only negative (not enough to reduce the 5-star rating) is, like others, I find the added bass button a bit underwhelming (though it can add a bit of life to any recordings that are less than hifi - taken from an old vinyl LP for instance). It adds bass OK, but it makes the whole sound stage rather woolly. No problem, just leave it switched off.. a bit of a wasted opportunity though.

A very nicely made amplifier which I used for a while with my Fidelio X2 headphones. I has 2 usability issues with this product. Firstly, the volume control - I found I had to lift this amplifier up slightly in order to turn the button when the amplifier was on my table, and secondly, the USB connection was on the side and not on the rear which I found a little odd. The product is really bargain basement however, but in the end I returned this item and bought a Chord Mojo.

I really wanted to like this little amp as the online reviews were sparkling. But for me it just didn't hit the mark. Doing direct comparisons listening to tracks with and without the amp I found the amp lacked musicality and was quite bright. I was using Audio Technica ATH-M50 X headphones, listening to Spotify through both my smartphone and laptop. Listening without the amp I felt my toes tapping and I was enjoying the music.. With the amp I was constantly fiddling with the volume level, adjusting the gain and hitting the bass on and off to tweak the best sound. But the amp made the music muddled and the highs were very false and bright and didn't sound like true instruments. The same with vocals. Without it, vocals through my Audio Technicas sounded natural and enjoyable and real, but with the amp the vocals sounded forced and unpleasant. Sorry to all those who gave this 5 stars. Its a nice attractive piece of kit with excellent build quality and it definitely does increase the volume, but the quality of the sound output from it just didn't justify the £109 price tag. I was hoping it would enhance the Audio Technicas, not make it worse.

The FiiO A5 really is a great piece of kit. I bought one because the volume on my Samsung Galaxy J5, listening to Spotify on my Sennheiser headphones was just way too quiet for me to enjoy it. This bit of kit boosts the volume a lot and the sound quality is fantastic. It provides HiFi quality sound just using your Smartphone. I don't use bass boost as it's so loud it could pop the headphones or even worse your ear drums.I think in the near future I'll be buying another as a backup.I'm a very happy customer.

I have had the FiiO A5 for over a week know. Sound and amplifier is very good, 5 stars, the 3 stars is for the battery life, for me it is 3.5 hours, high gain@ ½ to ¾ volume, from a Sony NW-A35 ruining (.flac) file to DT 990 PRO 250ohm or AKG 702 Headphones, wood have expected at list 8 hours with a knew unit. I have ordered some Philips Fidelio X2 Hi-Res Headphone impedance 30ohm to see if there is a improvement (wanted this anyway).Do not think I can return the unit because it has been in my pockets with tools and is slightly tarnished. Will update at a later date if the battery life improves ( my be a bad unit?).I am now getting over 8 hours on a full charge at the same settings, with the same cable and power point. Have no idea why it is working as it shod now. So 3 stars to 5 stars.

This is the first portable Amp I’ve bought and it looks great and is small and compact. However the sound boost is is only acceptable, not fantastic. I connect it to my iPad Pro which already drives my headphones but still have to turn the dial on this 75% of the way up to hear anything. You’d think it would pass the sound through as it comes out of the iPad and start boosting it from low down on the dial. But it doesn’t. So in essence you only get about 25% boost, which is far less than I expected and not great when using 48 ohm headphones

Waste of money, no discernible difference from the A3 apart from the extra £60

I bought the the A5 because I thought my FiiO MP3 player would struggle to drive my HD600 headphones. It turned out I didn't need it but the extra power certainly transformed the sound staging of my cheapo SanDisk MP3 player. Quality construction and decent performance for the money. It comes with a very useful short cable which keeps things very tidy. Minimal controls: volume/on-off and high or low gain selector. Protective plastic pads to prevent scratching. Rubber bands to attach to music-player. Beautifully presented.