Astell&Kern SP3000 Review

Design & lay-out

According to Astell&Kern, it’s the first use ever of Stainless Steel 904L for a DAP’s body material. The SP3000 is available in black and silver, we have the latter in for our review.

Using this material has expanded its value from just a digital device to the realm of a luxury good. 904L stainless steel is harder and more difficult to process than general stainless steel requiring significantly more time and effort. However, due to its excellent durability and corrosion resistance, it has a characteristic that does not lose its beauty and is why it is used in expensive luxury watches where perfection in all materials and parts must be pursued with an irreplaceable and wonderful luster.

The SP3000 measures 3.24” (82.4 mm) x 5.48” (139.4 mm) x 0.72” (18.3 mm) and it weighs about 17.39oz (493g). It’s large, it’s heavy, it’s everything a TOTL DAP is supposed to be. Pocketability isn’t the very best because of this, but to be honest I use the SP3000 more inside of the house than on-the-go (AK KANN MAX).

As usual the Astell&Kern house design is visible and the SP3000 again has unique lines, with sharp edges and an incredible crown. The polished stainless-steel body shines every moment, and the beautifully shimmering LED light and sharply machined ceramic panel further emphasize the luxury.

The interpretation of light and shadow shown in the SP3000 is expressed as “wrapped in light” whereas the previous SP1000 and SP2000 expressed light as spreading and scattering. The concept of the SP3000 depicts how light gathers and wraps around the wheel.

I absolutely like the design of the SP3000 and the build quality here is excellent, as we’re used to from A&K. Lay-out wise, the AK SP3000 is simple. On the top of the unit, you from left to right find the 3.5mm output, the 4.4mm output and the 2.5mm output. To minimize contact noise from the output jacks, a gold PVD coating method is applied to the headphone connectors. The power button which also serves as volume wheel is located on the right side of the player. Underneath the volume wheel we find the SP3000’s LED. The LED’s colour either changes depending on the volume level, or you can let it indicate the bitrate (24bit is green, 32 is blue, DSD is purple). I have chosen for the latter option myself.

On the bottom of the DAP, we find the USB-C port and the microSD card slot. On the left of the unit, you have the regular previous / play & pause / forward buttons. As said the front of the player features a lovely 5.46-inch, large-screen Full HD touch display. The back of the unit has a nice design but it’s not important in any way.

The SP3000’s design is unique. The player simply looks gorgeous (even though it in its case most of the time) and it oozes luxury in all possible ways. If you’ve been following us on our social media, you will have seen that I accidentally dropped the SP3000 right after I received it. The volume wheel came off completely. AK reacted quickly and even though it was my own fault, the unit returned to me within 2 weeks. Great customer service!

Box, Accessories & Price

The Astell&Kern SP3000 is a super high-end portable player, and it comes in a nice box, as we’re used to from AK. As the player is selling for $3,699 USD, we expect the full experience to be at a top level and AK does deliver, no worries there. It’s not like the HiBy Music RS8’s presentation, but it’s still worth a flagship’s status and price.

When buying the Astell&Kern SP3000, you get the following accessories:

– A&ultima SP3000 Device x 1

– Leather Case, Green x 1

– USB Type-C Cable x 1

– Quick Start Guide x 1

– Warranty Card x 1

– microSD card slot cover x 2

– Protective Film (Front x 2, Back x 2, Top x 2)

– Suede Cloth x 1

– Postcard x 1

It’s a very complete package as you can see. The French premium goat leather case the SP3000 comes with is made by Alran. It isn’t only gorgeous, it also perfectly protects the player while at the same time allowing perfect control of all the buttons.

Firmware / User Interface / Usability 

When I reviewed the KANN MAX a few weeks ago, I reported it to be rather slow in usage with a touch screen that wasn’t very responsive. The SP3000 comes with a completely new UI and it is the complete opposite of the MAX: it’s fast, super responsive and it has never hung up on me.

 The new theme is designed with a focus on the experience of rediscovering songs that you have forgotten; you can quickly browse through music categories with simple gestures. A convenient search feature along with album art has been added so that you can enjoy a digital display of CD album covers of your music collection.

The graphics of the Crimson theme, one of the main features of the new generation UI, are simple and non-intrusive, focusing on usability and intuitiveness. Three key concepts: Edge, Simple, and Dark Mode, were used to improve usability and increase clarity with a style unique to AK. The black and red theme colors are chosen to reduce eye fatigue, maximize battery usage and reduce heat generation.

Working with the SP3000 is not only easy, it’s also a pleasure. It’s straightforward, logic and it offers everything you need. Think AK filedrop, ROON Ready, and much more. With the SP3000’s new BT sink function, you can even listen to Music from an external device, such as a smartphone. I am not the biggest fan of using EQ, cross feed or replaygain, but I’ve explained that before. When coming from the regular (older) AK UI, you will need a bit of time to adjust, but once you figure it out, it’s hard to go back to my other AK DAPS. No, it’s not a full Android experience, but you know that upfront.

The buttons are all in the right places and that makes using it “blind” easy as well. The large screen also makes it very easy to navigate through the different menus, as well using the keyboard for the search function. The menu structure also is very easy to use. When I just received the SP3000, I really preferred using the “old” UI like this DAP has, but now that I am used to the SP3000, I kind of prefer the new system over AK’s older one.

The SP3000 is running on Firmware 1.18CM and keeping that updated is easy as AK does its OTA updates very well. Astell&Kern states that you can get up to 10 hours of continuous playback in ideal conditions. Even though the battery does last long with normal usage, I don’t think I ever managed to get those 10h out of it.

You can of course use the SP3000 as a digital source only, by using the digital output and hooking it up to your DAC. SP3000’s DAC chips perform at a high level however, and so I end up using the SP3000’s LO more than the digital output.

To use the SP3000 with your windows PC, you don’t need to download and install any drivers. You do however need drivers for iOS devices.

The article continues on the third page with the part on Sound. Click here or use the jumps below.

Page 1: Astell&Kern, SP3000, Internals

Page2: Design & Lay-out, Box & Accessories & Price, Firmware/UI/Usability

Page3: Sound – Intro, General, Classics, Competition, End Words