Do CDs STILL MATTER? Shanling EC Mini review 

As someone who's already seen the efforts in the trenches for preservation in other media (games, dvd media, vhs media), seeing stuff like this and Fiio's cassette players is amazing to see not only for preservation, but not letting media become truly obsolete. I do love physical media, so these kinds of products I encourage more of, even if there's some stumbles and issues!

I had the first Toshiba portable CD player. The thing was huge taking 4 C sized batteries. I had lots of people on the train point and laugh at me using their tiny cassette Walkmans. Right up until the point when I changed disks;-)

When playing music in sd card mode, it shows album art, plus you can see the album art in the edict player app when you sync it with your cell phone.

Thanks for the review. LOL on the battery follow up. OUCHIE! When's portable Vinyl player?

'1975' on that Queen CD refers to when the music was published, there were no CDs back then

My old portable Sony all metal thin elegant cd player I bought 30 years ago .. has the most useful feature of all .. a digital optical out, which I could use with an optical to coaxial converter with my amplifier (Monitor audio A100) which has a good dac (digital to analogue converter) in it It’s only recently that I was able to get a CD player .. an Amazon branded device (costs £20 and has a very functional remote ) which runs off a standard phone charger or external battery pack for phone charging. (Which makes it movable .. possible to play it without a mains charger unit) Importantly it has a coaxial wired digital out (and hdmi) which I connect to the dac in my amp and sounds indistinguishable from the great mains £400 Arcam cd player I have .. which has great digital to analogue conversion . My new set up has a tiny foot 🦶 print in my living room. Very pleased with it and cost £20. The A100 dac amp can be had 2nd hand for 100 to £200

I've been ripping and streaming CDs for the last 15 years, and I've been thinking of getting a CD transport for my living room system for a while. Purely for nostalgic reasons. I'll have to look into this one 🙂

My primary use case scenario for purchasing this devise was to connect it via the analog outputs to my integrated amp. However, no sound comes out of my speakers! The little screen on top always shows the headphone symbol, so not sure if you need to somehow switch on the analog pre-outs in the menu system, but for now it's simply a paper weight.

I enjoy CDs and have a smallish bunch that I’ve still kept from my larger 90-00’s collection. For headphone usage (low/mid budget IEMs, Koss, etc) how much difference in sound do you think you’d get from this versus a vintage Panasonic or Sony portable unit from the late 90’s?

A relaxing friday evening is ripping that new CD and adding the FLAC to my collection. 🙃

I've read that some modern CD players inset gaps between songs, is this one gapless?

I wonder if it reads DVDs, with FLAC files. The display is way too small, and I would want bottons also on top, just below display. And higher headphone output. My second hand Sony from mid 1990s still keeps going - pretty scratch resistant and good error correction.

Hi Mark, any chance you'll be restarting your photography channel? Just happened upon it today, and liked seeing your take on m4/3 cameras but its been like 6 years since the last video.

It's a cool nostalgic device to have fpr sure

Any chance you review the moondrop disdream? Really interested on that one

CDs nuts

I am still a fan of CDs more than vinyl but I have a reel to reel and DAT and DCC so I don't bail on formats LoL

my dad gave me his old phillips portable cd player. I did not know what it was lmao.

It depends, Qobuz has multiple remasters of some popular music.

YES!!! :)

It feels like it's doing too much... No digital/optical out, which is interesting considering there's rca stereo out. You have a top touch screen that's tiny but you have pretty much the same buttons. Should've either made an app or added a remote. Car mode is useless unless the stability is so good that you can go offroading with it.

I love cds and I do think as a transport a cd player sounds better than streaming. Not because of the media but the player itself. But streaming is just way too functional for music discovery. I would rather spin vinyl than cds when in the mood to interact with physical media. The og pressed rock, blues and jazz on vinyl sound great.

Listening in CDs is more focused and since its physical one is more likely to listen same album over and over again. In Streaming apps, listening gets hijacked with skipping with another album and another. When I was teenage I used to listen in CDs, now CDs are not available anymore in INDIA. If music publishers manufacture CDs in INDIA or CHINA, cd price will reduce and chances are people will buy more cd compared to the sales at present.

Have you considered the fiio cp13 portable cassette player?

Pretty shocked it can’t be used as a CD ripper too. That feature got orphaned on the Shanling whiteboard, I guess.

At this point we have a new value offer: Any media offer which is in your control and online corporations cannot just change it on you.

CD made in 1975 😊

Why is the “mini” larger than the diskman 😨

Personally waiting for a casette player, and then a floppy drive. Someone page me please when it happens 🙏

Gr8 review as ever Mark. All the features and pitfalls have to be considered for sure - completely fair. Over time I've seen front loading slots lightly mark CD's - I prefer top loading due to this. I think 7-7.5 hours is meh in 2024 for me personally. CD playback to me should be 14+ hours between charges. Each time the battery goes through a charge cycle it degrades, the quicker it ends up in land-fill. I'd prefer to see a battery tray, so we can replace it when it moves down to only lasting 3hrs. All it would have taken is a larger area for the battery - which at worst would have added 6-7mm to the depth of the unit. Had they just thought a little harder before release. PC external drive functionality would have been really handy. I have quite a few CD's that are 80 mins long, so 7hrs in winter time when the cold affects battery drain more - is meh to me. A deal breaker. Wicked review, and like you I rip my CD's to FLAC. At present I don't own a physical CD player, and with the flaws - I see no reason to not continue to use my DAP 100% of the time. Hopefully Fiio will get the M23 to you soon for review. Cheers, have a good one...

I call these slot-loaders CD Scratchers! :) Also, how do you get your cd out if its dead or faulty?

Idk why, the biggest offense to me is volume control being a rocker instead of a knob. For something this pricy that feels like an oversight to me.

Older CDs rule!

CDs to me, aside from the physical collection aspect, represent ownership and preservation. Generally speaking, music rights holders and web music stores are fickle soulless corporations. I do not trust them as far as I can throw them when it comes to preservation and product quality. In the age of enshittification, none of them can be trusted with regard to those factors. They can simply change the rules of the subscription streaming game to whatever suits their bottom line. CDs ripped to FLAC for local playback ensure that my music won’t change when CEO Billy Bob wants a golden parachute after rotting a company from the inside out in the name of “shareholder value”.

Wish they had optical outs to use them as transports which are laughably overpriced in the current market.

In my country it is almost impossible to get CD discs. And also in my opinion, all those things take up too much space and are not practical.

1:27 oh boy I think You are wrong. Did You listened to the same cd Quality file in Tidal and QOBUZ? You Will perceive as I do that Tidal is Warner, with more flash from top to bottom while Qobuz is more clear and analytical. Which is right? Perhaps NONE. The MQA stuff told US that music platforms add their personal sauce to the Dish. I think that ALL musical platforms do the same so the original release, the one closest to the Master should be the proper source if You want to listen to what the artist had in its mind. Before high res, it is cd or the music downloaded from the record company, NOT QOBUZ or Tidal

One word: BRING BACK FUCKING CABLE REMOTE! PS: CD > vinyl

Sony MHC-V13 will be cheaper and better option.

Don't see the point of this when you can just rip to lossless and stick your files on a high quality DAP.

The huge MQA logo on top is very unfortunate. I won't buy anything with that nonsense meme plastered prominently on it on principle.

CD's haven't mattered since 2013. I know because that's when I bought a new car, and it has never ever used its Cd player.