Colorfly C4 Pro - the world's first pocket Hi-Fi - Best Portable Music Player

In this age of portable digital music, the iPod has transformed the way people listen to music on the move, with it's library of music at your fingertips, and its great usability. Unfortunately the most important feature, good sound quality, has taken a back seat in recent years. What the serious music lover wants is a digital music player with true audiophile sound quality. The new Colorfly Pocket Hi-Fi C4 Pro is designed to rectify this need, incorporating as it does a number of features aimed to give no-compromise sound quality.

On opening the box one is struck by the fine build quality. There is no cheap plastic case on this; the player is cocooned in a beautiful hard wood case, giving it a luxury feel, as well as making it virtually bomb-proof. The styling is best described as Steam-Punk, and I mean that in a good way... if Isambard Kingdom Brunel wanted a portable player, this is the one he would buy or design.

The Wooden cover opens to reveal the player itself, which again is beautifully built, with the display and controls easily accessible on the front panel. Connectivity is excellent with a mini-jack for headphone use, a 1/4” jack for connecting the Pocket Hi-Fi to an amplifier, plus a usb connection. An unusual, but welcome, feature is the provision of digital inputs and outputs, allowing the player to be used a a DAC or upsampler.
Internally the player has a 32G memory, and the ability to playback CD quality WAV files, and FLAC files, up to 24bit/192khz, making the Colorfly fully compatible with high-resolution audio downloads, and FLAC rips from DVD-A discs. The internal componant quality is on a parr with that seen in a standalone CD player, and it is clear from that the designers have sound quality as a priority.

For the listening tests we ripped some CDs at 16bit/44.1khz, plus loaded some hi-rez audio from The Beatles at 24bit/44.1khz, and some free downloads at 24/96, and we listened both through some high quality headphones, and a high end Hi-Fi.

The CD rips were reproduced to an extremely high standard, far surpassing the quality of the iPod we used as a reference, giving a clarity and musicality normally only found from Hi-Fi seperates. Treble was clear and extended, the midrange was clean, giving good articulation to vocals, whilst at the bass end things were punchy, deep and tuneful.

Moving onto the hi-rez material, the Colorfly easily showed off the extra detail available with those extra bits, with even vintage material such as 'Revolver' sounding like it could have been recorded today, and easily surpassing the already excellent performance of the player on the CD rip of the same album.
The quality of sound was such, that we forgot we were listening to a portable device, and just got on with enjoying the music.

In conclusion I can highly recommend the Colorfly Pocket Hi-Fi to anyone after a superb sounding portable music player, that is easily good enough to double as a source of hi-rez music for your Big Hi-Fi. Plus it looks funky!

Reviewed By Mike Foley, Edited by Mark Charlesworth and Dave Barker

New Elipson Planet Range - Hi-FI Speakers and System

Founded in 1938, French brand Elipson are renowned for making hi-fi equipment that is both technically
innovative and visually stunning. Their latest products, looked at here, continue that tradition with typical Gallic flair and style, but with a big dose of
21st century tech.

First out the box was the CD system, simply called 'The Music Center MC1'. Hewn from solid aluminium disc, this unit contains a CD player, DAB/DAB+/FM tuner, a 120wpc amplifier, plus wireless connectivity for computer/iPod music. Despite the name, it's about as far removed from the 1970's music centre as one can get. Circular in form, to mirror
the shape of the CD, The Music Centre features a 24/96 DAC to extract the most information from CDs, and includes a B&O Icepower amplifier to give a clean,
powerful signal to the speakers, all with the benefit of economical power consumption.

Elipson has designed a stylish range of loudspeakers to partner this system: the Planet L, and its little brother the Planet M. These spherical speakers can be used on their own, or in conjuction with the matching subwoofer - the Planet Sub - to give some deep bass heft. Both the L and M speakers are available in black, white or red finishes, making them easy to blend in with a wide range of decors. The main difference between the Planet L and M speakers is that the L features a larger cabinet and drive units, making it ideal for larger rooms, or for those who do not want to use the Planet Sub. The smaller Planet M is ideal for wall or shelf mounting, and when used with the Planet Sub makes a discreet full range speaker system. The globe-like enclosures are shaped to eliminate standing waves, and hence reduce distortion, giving both speakers a clean pure sound.

We tested the Planet L speakers in 2 channel and 2.1, with the Sub, using the Music Center as a source; in addition to the Music Center with Planet M and
the Sub as a 2.1 stereo system. We also set up a home cinema system and auditioned both the Planet L and Planet M in a 5.1 surround sound situation, using
the Planet Sub. The Music Center, using a pair of Planet L gave a very clean, clear sound when we played our copy of the R.E.M classic 'Out of Time', making it easy to distinguish the different textures and sounds of the predominantly acoustic instrumentation. Tonal colours were superbly reproduced making for a very natural sound. Imaging was excellent, with Michael Stipe's voice positioned nicely in the centre, with the rest of the band believably positioned around him. The treble was found to be crisp and clear, with a tuneful and melodic bass end. The Planet Sub added depth to the bass, without spoiling the tunefulness, and made the overall sound more rounded. The Sub integrated well with the Planet Ls, making for a stylish, yet serious sounding, full range speaker system.

At SightandSoundUK we also tried the Music Center with a number of other manufacturers' speakers, and found it to be an excellent sounding piece of equipment in its own
right, and one of the best sounding integrated systems we have had the pleasure to audition. Next up, we auditioned the Planet M and Planet Sub, again using
the Music Center. As we expected this combo sounded similar in many respects to the Planet L, but did not give quite the scale or dynamics as its bigger brother. On its own terms, however, it is a superb sounding little speaker, giving a much more realistic and enjoyable sound than other lifestyle systems. It's the ideal speaker for those who want a great sounding system that does not dominate the room.

In surround mode both Elipson speakers gave great results, with film dialogue being articulate, and sound effects being steered effortlessly around the room. The Planet Sub came into its own here, really giving some power to the more explosive scenes of the films we watched. With all 5 speakers being identical, the consistancy of sound as voices and sound effects moved around the room was superb. We tried some 5.1 SACD and DVD-Audio discs, and the quality of sound we heard in 2 channel was transferred effortlessly to the surround format.

In conclusion - for their excellent engineering, sound quality, stunning looks and ease of use - these Elipson items are highly recommended.

Reviewed by Mike Foley, Edited by Mark Charlesworth and Dave Barker