Can WiiM hit the budget jackpot again?
Music streamer| £319| whf.cm/WiiM_Amp
The arrival ofthe WiiM Pro Plus music streamer felt like something of a moment. Very rarely have we seen a budget streamer cost so little yet still sound so good. Like the popular caffeine supplement with which it shares its name, the Pro Plus has proven capable of giving your music a real shot in the arm.
The next WiiM product has been much anticipated, and it is here in the form of the simply named WiiM Amp. That rather functional moniker belies this box’s versatile nature; not only does it feature streaming built in as standard, but this just-add-speakers unit also provides your system with amplification, making it one of the most affordable streaming systems we have ever seen. Thanks to its impressively titchy price, we could be looking at a seriously disruptive player in the world of affordable, democratised hi-fi.
The WiiM Amp will currently set you back £319, making it one of the most affordable and accessible streaming amplifiers anywhere on the market today. There are virtually no “just add speakers” alternatives around at this price, and you will have to spend more on something such as the Bluesound Powernode Edge (tested at £599) or the Technics SA-C600 (£899) to get a similar package that does it all from a single box.
Simple but classy
Design-wise, the WiiM Amp keeps things simple, compact and surprisingly classy. Available in a choice of two colours – silver or a darker space-grey – the dinky box boasts dimensions of just 63 x 190 x 190mm, making for a compact solution that will nestle nicely within any budding hi-fi set-up without taking up buckets of space.
For the price paid, we are genuinely impressed by what is on offer. If you told us that the WiiM Amp retailed at a far higher price, we would have no problem in believing you. It is clean, solid and strikingly well-constructed, with a smooth, tactile exterior of a quality that we simply don’t expect to find at this level. Run your hand over the exterior shell or flip the unit around to see the back terminals and you will struggle to convince yourself that you are handling one of the cheapest products of its type anywhere in the hi-fi world.
Multi-function control
Things are admittedly a little simpler in terms of on-unit buttons and controls, but that’s no bad thing. The WiiM Amp offers a large volume knob which can be pressed in to play or pause the current track, or held down to put the unit into pairing mode – a proces
