Cowon Plenue D3

£279

The third-generation Plenue D player arrived with no boastful fanfare, despite both its previous iterations gaining five-star reviews and Awards.

There’s now a Cirrus Logic CS43131 dual DAC on board (the last gen used just one) and there’s also Bluetooth support, so you can pair your wireless headphones or speaker, and a new rotary volume wheel.

The PD3’S build is minimalist and chic, and the cracking new rotary wheel feels just as premium as its pricier competition, such as Astell &Kern’s players. The 2.8in wide-angle LCD (240 x 230) touchscreen makes for easy navigation and grouping of your music.

There’s battery life of up to 45 hours playing MP3 files or 30 hours listening to hi-res files; support for 24-bit/192khz WAV, FLAC, ALAC and AIFF files; 64GB of built-in storage (expandable via microsd card); plus native support for DSD128 files.

We cue up Queen’s Greatest Hits (16-bit/44.1khz FLAC) and there’s a glorious amount of separation on offer from the outset of Fat Bottomed Girls as the band sings the anthemic chorus. Freddie Mercury’s vocal is central, but the instruments shine too – a detailed drum fill towards the raucous end of the track, vocal trills, guitar ideas – proving there’s an extra level of detail on offer here that some players can’t access. The album continues to Bicycle Race and the character of the vocals and the playful bass completes an exciting, zealous and transparent listen.

This is a talented player that’s sonically similar in character to its older siblings, but there are small upgrades in terms of rhythm, timing, detail and musicality.

Wi-fi streaming is still off the menu, but if you have the files and like the idea of pairing your portable music player with a wireless speaker or headphones for one of the smallest wireless systems you’ve seen, there’s nothing better for the money.

The Plenue D3 keeps things simple: it plays hi-res music – very well indeed.