There’s expensive and then there’s expensive. Astell&Kern’s SP3000T portable music player and NOVUS in-ear monitors belong to the latter category.
The SP3000T follows on from the SP3000 model this site reviewed in 2023, and it features Astell&Kern’s cutting-edge Triple Amp System, with users able to customise the sound using either tube amplification, a digital op-amp or a hybrid of both methods.
The Tube Amp mode uses a dual Raytheon JAN6418 MIL-SPEC Vintage Vacuum Tubes to create a “warm and soothing tone”, while the SP3000T’s Op-Amp delivers a different type of sound in what Astell describes as delivering “dynamic extreme clarity” in its low noise floor.
Much like the SP3000 player, the SP3000T uses AKM’s latest flagship DAC in the AKM AK4499EX that features complete separation of the digital and analogue signals to produce a higher quality performance.
Elsewhere there’s a Snapdragon 6125 Octa-core processor and 8GB of DDR4 RAM to ensure everything runs smoothly. File format support includes WAV, FLAC, WMA, MP3, OGG, APE, AAC, ALAC, AIFF, DFF, DSF, and MQA. Storage is 256GB, and expandable to 1TB
Connections include a 2.5mm, 3.5mm and 4.4mm auxillary outputs, with the player housed in a stainless-steel body made up of 99.9% pure silver plating. It’s a design that’s already bagged Astell&Kern an iF Design Award.
The A&ultima SP3000T is available now from the Astell&Kern site as well as retailers including Selfridges for £3199 / $2999 / €3,599. Though it’s expensive, it’s actually less so than the SP3000.
The second new product that Astell&Kern announced was that of the NOVUS in-ear monitors, in a collaboration with Empire Ears.
These limited edition in-earphones have been developed to extract the maximum performance when partnered with the SP3000T. Astell&Kern says that every “compenent and material has been meticulously chosen with compromise” to deliver high fidelity sound through its purpose-built W9+ dynamic drivers.
You also get a custom-made four-wire hybrid copper, gold, and silver cable that’s been reinforced with black macro-molecular fibre and a 4.4mm balanced jack to extract every bit of audio goodness coming from the SP3000T’s audio signal.
The Astell&Kern x Empire Ears NOVUS arrive a little later on the scene than the SP3000T towards the end of May. They are priced at £4999 / $4,999 / €5799.
