IFI Audio Icannano Enhancer for Headphones Portable XBASS 3D Holographic Silver

There are only a few dedicated portable amplifiers around at this sort of price and even if the ican was just a good product it would have to be recommended but the ican is a great piece of kit; in fact I would put it into my personal hall of fame. The only big issue is the poor performance of the 3.5mm input, which is a disappointment and can be a problem if you want a truly, ‘on the go solution’. If you have a good quality DAP (over £250) or DAC/Amp such as the Chord Mojo and you listen to lossless formats then the ican, through its phono input, should be considered before upgrading your player or DAC because it will wring every ounce out of what you already have, regardless of its price. The ican will shine a light on just how good or bad your system is by freeing it from the clutches of its well-intentioned, but compromised internal amplification stage. Don't tell ifi this, but I would pay £300 for a truly portable amplifier of this quality, in my opinion it is that good. Highly recommended.Pros• Awesome! Fantastic musical engagement and fun when using the phono input.• Will improve musical enjoyment for DAPs’ well over £1000 and also high quality portable DAC/Amps such as the Chord Mojo.• Battery powered. Always a good thing and not only for portable systems.• With a high quality source the ican can be used with true audiophile headphones (£1,000+)• Build quality. Looks and feels good. Smooth actioned and nicely weighted volume control• Good packaging and accessories including low noise power supply, phono leads, short 3.5mm cable, rubber bands for tethering to a DAP, tool to adjust gain setting, headphone Jack converter, soft carrying case and simple instructions.• Easy to use and set up.• Good features – two gain settings (6db and 18db) and effective Xbass and 3D equalisation switches. Phono and 3.5mm inputs.• Battery life of at least 50 hours.• Can be used when connected to the mains.• Future proof. Music will just keep improving as you upgrade your source and headphones.Cons• The 3.5mm input introduces a distracting and fatiguing harshness and there is a significant loss in the level of detail. Lesser DAPs’ still benefit but by a lesser marging.• Sensitive to input quality. The ican just makes the best of the signal it is given so if you have a poor quality player or headphones that have significant sonic characteristics then they will be found out by the ican. For example my cheap AKG 50 headphones (£50) just weren’t good enough to reap much of a benefit. The Grado 325es’ (£325) sounded too bright through the ican and Onkyo DP-X1, whereas straight from the DAP they sounded fine. The Sennheiser HD25s’ (£150) really kicked arse with deep and fast bass and a wonderfully smooth presentation. The Grado RS2 (£550) headphones sounded sublime.• No supplied, ‘on the go’ 3.5mm jack to phono cable. Given that you really need to use the phono inputs you may need to buy a custom short 3.5mm to phono lead which will probably cost £50 plus. A standard short 30cm cable can be used for home and office use.• Too good for a phone. Don’t bother, the ican will just show you how poor the phone is.• Too good for low quality MP3. Unless you listen to at least 320 kbit/sec MP3 or 256 kbit/sec AAC then the ican will just show up how poor the music format is.• Size and Shape. Not easy to tether to a DAP using the supplied rubber bands as they obstruct the screen and it is a bit bulky combo.• Does enhance digital noise on digital music and also noise on old remastered recordings, which is especially evident in remastered classical music.• Slight background hiss in quiet passages but doesn’t spoil the presentation as is probably just a limiting factor of the cost and being a direct coupled amplifier circuit.Musically SpeakingThe ican is an impressively neutral device for its price. This means it has the ability to pretty faithfully amplify whatever signal it receives without changing it. It only started to sonically flinch a little when connected to a £6,000 CD/DAC combo.The phono inputs were far superior and were tested using DAPs from £250 to £700 and headphones from £50 to £600. A £6,000 reference CD system was also used and the ican was compared to a £250 tube desktop amplifier and a £5,000 integrated amplifier as well as the direct output from the DAPs.Sonic Impressions:• Far superior musically to the well-meaning, but highly compromised amps that you will find in real world DAPs or DAC/Amp combos.• Highly neutral for the price and little sonic characteristics of its own.• No significant perceived sonic irregularities to distract from the musical enjoyment.• High degree of tonal accuracy was possible, depending upon the quality of the source.• Never harsh or clinical, but not warm or over sweet either. Just about spot on.• Open expansive soundstage.• Ability to create a wonderfully cohesive sound.• Ability to create fantastic dynamic swings. So much so that on occasions the volume needed to be turned down on crescendos.• Finely balanced sound with everything just sounding in the right place within the mix albeit a slightly distanced presentation.• Bass was solid, tight and fast and each note could be distinguished with little blurring into the often heard booming mess that can pass as bass. Depending upon your headphones some may understandably consider the bass end a little lean and may prefer a slightly warmer bass at the expense of less detail and control. This is not the ican’s fault, but just a personal preference for some. I would say it has an audiophile’s type of bass.• Always sounded, ‘in control’, relaxed and never fatiguing.• Great rhythmic impulsion giving music real verve and energy.• Fantastic detailing with the rise and decay of each note being evident. Slight imperfections and artistic nuances to vocals and the playing of instruments were served up to the listener. This just added to the musical and emotional engagement. My reference CD system is slightly old style and has a distinct digital clarity and this was picked up by the ican although it became a little strident, but the ican still produced an amazing musical performance given that it cost over thirty times less than the cd player.• Emotion packed. Ability to create a feeling of reality to music and to illicit emotional responses including goose bumps, foot tapping and even a lump in the throat.• Played every genre with aplomb, nothing phased the ican, however heavy rockers or dubstep fans may find the bass a bit lean but all you need to do is change your headphones because believe me the bass is there.• Does show up poorly recorded music as lack-lustre. However the well implemented 3D and XBass switches can breathe life back into such recordings.• Its level of detail does make digital noise and general background pops and clicks a bit more obvious. Also aware of background noise from remastered old recordings.• Minimum music quality for the ican is high quality MP3 (320 kbit/sec) or 256 kbit/sec AAC streamed. Anything below this doesn’t allow the ican to ‘do its thing’.• Minimum quality of input is probably somewhere around a £250 DAP such as the Fiio X5 mark ii and it just gets better with higher quality equipment including DAC/Amps such as the Chord Mojo.Hints and Tips• The ican can buzz a little when turned on without an active input, but I think this has more to do with the design approach taken (it’s a direct coupled amp) than a fault. This may also explain the noisy volume control and background hiss. When you turn on your player the buzz will disappear.• If you have a good quality DAP then consider the ifi ican instead of a DAC/Amp combo (such as a Chord Mojo). You may be surprised just how good your DAP is when it is untethered from its puny internal amplifier, and it’s a cheaper upgrade.• Try to use it battery mode. I found the mains performance wasn’t quite as good.• Try to use the lower gain setting on the ican. I found the 18db gain setting a created a slight harshness.• Try to set the gain of your digital source so that for crescendos the ican volume control is heading toward 3 o’clock.• The ican is good enough to use specialist quality audio cables.

This is a superb headphone amp which has greatly improved the sound from my Grado SR60s.Bought after an excellent review in HiFi+.It is a small portable unit with great construction in solid aluminium.Output has two switchable settings to suit most headphones, and there are bass and soundstage enhancements which can be very effective, or switched out if not liked.I listen to a wide range of music from orchestral and choral classical to folk, jazz, classic rock and metal, about equally on vinyl and cd with a large amount of Spotify downloads.Everything has a lot of added detail, great soundstaging, and accurate ( not overwhelming) bass... if the recording is good!The ifi nano is pocket-sized and entirely portable with great quoted battery life, but I haven't brought myself to detatch it from my main system to try it as a smartphone amp.Maybe I need another...There is an adequate pair of phono leads and a short 3.5/3.5 link cable in the box, but the ifi benefits from good cables : I am using Cambridge Aud500s like the rest of my system.Fast and secure delivery.Highly recommended.

For the money this is very good value and did the job and one of the best mobile amps on the market for headphones. It is not HiFi in the highness of things you will have to pay well more than twice for that but it is a good up grade from the mobile and iPod on their own and battery life is simply fantastic.

Ok, but not as powerful as I'd hoped. Stick to lower impedance headphones and it's fine. But if you're using low impedance headphones; for an extra £15 you can buy the nano idac with a headphone amp included. With hindsight I wish I'd spent the extra cash.

I bought the iFi Nano iCAN as an upgrade to the excellent value-for-money Fiio A3 portable amp. This was fine for me, but I have assembled a whole range of iFi Audio products and was impressed enough to make me want to acquire one more. It is somewhat bulkier than the A3, yet it binds well with my Sony NWZ ZX1 thanks to 2 stout elastic bands. Headphones are Etymotic ER4-S for classical, with Meze 99 Classics for rock. These are early impressions: it is often said that amplifiers need some running in time before they deliver their best, but I suspect it's the other way round, the ear gradually adapts itself to the equipment. Anyhow, I was surprised to find the output wasn't quite as high as I had expected, I had to raise the gain by 6db. You can do this with 2 tiny switches on the underneath of the amp, one for 6 and the other for 12db. IFi thoughtfully supply a little screwdriver to effect this, but it's odd there is not a simple gain switch you can flip with your finger, as is on the A3. There are 2 other facilities, an X-bass boost and a 3D switch: to be honest, the X-bass difference is too subtle for me to detect, while the 3D switch broadens the stage and drops the volume at the same time. You can choose between RCA Phono and 3.5mm inputs (though why you would need phono on a portable amp defeats me: I suppose it makes it more versatile for home use.) First listening made me suspect a slight favouring of the RH channel, though this is evening out. There is a little hexagonal socket between the phono inputs: I thought turning this would adjust the balance, but it would seem it applies only to the phono. The sound is very rich and powerful: Paul Simon's "Graceland" was blowing the 'phones off the sides of my head! Classical music has splendid detail and clarity. And you get an impressive 70-hour battery charge! There is one blip, in that the volume control is noisy, and you should switch the amp on before putting on the headphones to avoid a loud pop in your ear. Nevertheless, altogether this is a significant upgrade for me. Ifi Audio are bucking the trend for purity and simplicity, and instead are cheerfully piling in new facilities for versatility. Purists might cavil at the multiple switching, but at this price who is going to complain?Update 20/07/2016: I contacted ifi Audio about the channel imbalance and they asked me to check whether the dipswitches on the underneath were in line: I had indeed moved one switch which I had assumed would give me a 6db gain in output, but it seems that if the switches are misaligned, you get channel imbalance. Lining them up rectified the imbalance, but it seems to me a bit of a glitch.

Good, if you like listening to electric razors.