WiiM
Professional Plus Music Streamer
AUD $339 RRP
There aren’t many merchandise which can be as helpful to these dipping a toe into the world of music streaming as these constructing an entire whole-home wi-fi streaming system, however this caters for each kinds of patrons. The WiiM Professional Plus is a generously specified music streamer designed to convey digital audio modernity to legacy audio techniques or to kind the premise of a critical multi-room streaming system.
For those who decide worth when it comes to how a lot stuff you get on your cash, then it is not significantly particular. Being pretty small and lightweight (42x140x140mm, 400g), the Professional Plus has little in the best way of equipment rack presence. Nor does the plastic from which it is virtually totally made really feel something particular, and that is equally true of the distant management handset that accompanies it.
The place performance is worried, nonetheless, it is a totally different story. The rear panel provides an excellent indication of what a helpful little system that is. Together with a USB-C socket for energy, it options an Ethernet socket, a digital optical enter and output, a digital coaxial output and stereo RCA line-level ins and outs. It is value noting that the RCAs are fairly shut collectively and barely recessed into the casework, which implies it is a battle to suit costly analogue interconnects with their fancy big-barrelled plugs. WiiM kindly gives a pair of extra prosaic and slimmer RCAs within the packaging.
Wi-fi connectivity is dealt with by Bluetooth 5.1 (with SBC and AAC codec compatibility) and Wi-Fi. Chromecast is built-in, Apple AirPlay 2 is accessible, and the (logical, secure) ‘WiiM Dwelling’ management app that is free for iOS and Android contains Spotify Join, TIDAL Join, Qobuz, Deezer, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn – plus a lot extra in addition to. It is notoriously difficult to give you a clear, usable and dependable management app with out spending the equal of the gross home product of a small creating nation, so WiiM is to be congratulated for its effort right here.
Management can be accessible from some capacitive touch-points on the fascia (‘play/pause’, ‘quantity up/down’, ‘setup’, ‘Bluetooth pairing’ and ‘assign preset’, for which there are a dozen slots accessible) or the bundled distant management handset. In addition to all the plain features like quantity management and enter choice, the distant additionally has a ‘mic’ button to be used with Amazon Alexa voice management. It is a lower or two above these clicky-membrane credit score card-sized handsets that always accompany merchandise like this, however that is not the identical as saying it is significantly nice to make use of.
On the within, the vast majority of enterprise is taken care of by a extremely succesful AKM 4493SEQ digital-to-analogue converter chip. It is in a position to deal with digital audio recordsdata of each fashionable kind (in addition to fairly just a few unpopular alternate options) at a decision of as much as 32-bit, 768kHz and DSD512. For these ‘group one’ potential clients I discussed – the oldsters who need to convey some streaming smarts to their current system – be assured that this DAC is totally match for function in any real looking state of affairs. Simply join the WiiM’s line-level output to one in every of your amplifier’s line-level inputs, and also you’re good to go. Even potential purchasers with a good DAC already of their set-up are suggested to check the Professional Plus with what they’re presently utilizing.
Analogue-to-digital conversion circuitry courtesy of Burr Brown’s PCM1861 chipset is offered. This implies you may join an analogue supply to your WiiM after which wirelessly stream it to different WiiM models (equivalent to the marginally much less well-specified WiiM Professional) you will have round your property. It is a actually useful characteristic, as multi-room audio would not actually get any extra simple or handy.
THE LISTENING
It goes with out saying that you will get the perfect outcomes from a product like this through the use of the very best high quality, most information-rich digital audio recordsdata potential. However one of the notable issues concerning the WiiM Professional Plus is how agnostic it’s in relation to the music supply it’s coping with. In each circumstance, it is an open and organised pay attention, attentive to even the best particulars and maybe simply barely reticent in relation to dynamic expression.
With a pleasant chunky file of Brian Eno‘s Burning Airways Give You So A lot Extra streaming by way of TIDAL Join, the Professional Plus units up a spacious, well-defined soundstage with greater than sufficient elbow-room accessible to every particular person strand of the recording. Element ranges are excessive throughout the board, and that is particularly obvious within the midrange, the place Eno‘s dedicated however relatively approximate singing is delivered with all of its character intact. The beneficiant dimensions of the recorded acoustic imply that he has loads of room during which to function, however this isn’t on the expense of integration. The WiiM presents the recording as a neatly unified complete, relatively than as a group of discrete occurrences.
An equally sizeable file of Spiritualized‘s Come Collectively provides the Professional+ the chance to display its spectacular low-frequency extension and management. Bass sounds are deep and taut, with first rate definition to main edges and convincing rhythmic expression as a consequence. Regardless of the dense and hazy nature of the recording, there’s loads of element relating to texture revealed, and a gratifying sensation of being in full possession of the details in consequence. The identical tune makes the WiiM’s facility with excessive frequencies obvious, too – there may be chunk and shine to the highest finish, beneficiant ranges of element, and greater than sufficient assault.
Total, tonality is simply barely on the cool aspect of impartial. It is the audio equal of barely an excessive amount of emphasis on blue in your tv image, however it’s removed from deadly. The frequency vary is easily built-in, with no space overstated or underplayed, and the feeling of togetherness, of a group of musicians – a really massive assortment within the case of Spiritualized – bearing down on a chunk of music with a commonality of function, is made fairly plain.
A take heed to The sunshine by Ólafur Arnalds lets the WiiM illustrate its fantastic facility with tonality and area – this can be a recording that is virtually totally solo piano, and the silences between notes are given simply as a lot emphasis because the notes themselves. The absences listed below are darkish and quiet, and the harmonic variations obvious from key-strike to key-strike are reported on virtually fanatically. This facility with low-level dynamics means the Professional Plus is a vivid and interesting pay attention even – or maybe particularly – when next-to nothing is occurring in a recording.
That is all unalloyed excellent news, after all, but little in life is ideal, and there are areas the place the WiiM provides a lower than virtuoso account of itself. A take heed to PJ Harvey‘s fulminating Rid of Mefor instance, confirms that this music streamer simply would not have fairly the mandatory headroom in relation to the broad dynamics of ‘extraordinarily quiet’ to ‘bloody loud’. The visceral Steve Albini recording – as a result of it is nothing as bougie as ‘manufacturing’, oh expensive me no – switches from ‘malevolent near-silence’ to ‘everything-louder-than-everything-else’ assault and again once more a number of instances. But the Professional Plus would not fairly breathe deeply sufficient to offer these huge adjustments in depth adequate expression. It is a borderline-terrifying recording, you perceive, however not as unhinged or deserted as it may be when handled by a streamer that is barrel-chested sufficient to manage.
Must you determine that the WiiM’s onboard DAC is not fairly as much as the job and like to make use of it merely as a preamplifier or a bridge for different WiiM receivers round your property, the Professional Plus will get fully out of the best way of your analogue sources. Feeding my vinyl copy of Billie Eilish‘s When We All Fall Asleep, The place Do We Go? into it by way of a phono stage after which out once more to an influence amplifier – leaving the Professional Plus in command of nothing besides quantity management – is an attention-grabbing check. The recording would not change character within the slightest, which is the perfect you may hope for. Inevitably the A-to-D conversion, wi-fi transmission and D-to-A conversion that the music undergoes to be streamed to a different zone, impacts element, definition and soundstage depth – but not catastrophically so. If you wish to hear your information throughout your property with out investing in multiple turntable, you possibly can do a lot worse.
THE VERDICT
The WiiM Professional Plus music streamer has loads to suggest it. As a option to convey correct high-resolution digital audio streaming smarts to an current system, it is with out peer on the value. True, different manufacturers can do the same job, generally in even higher type, however inevitably there is a greater outlay required. Add in a management app that is a sight higher than any variety of its market rivals, and this little little bit of equipment seems and seems like the true deal.
