public sector

PLUS: DeepSeek to double peak hour prices for new model; Australia hikes fines for Big Tech; Japan’s next moonshot to ride local rocket; and more!

ASIA IN BRIEF Meta last week briefly took down an unremarkable video posted by India’s prime minister Narendra Modi, earning itself days of criticism and regulatory trouble.

The video featured Modi announcing a new task force that will reform the exams required to secure places in many Indian universities. Those exams have become a major factor in the sudden development of a major youth protest movement in India, after the cancellation of one test amid claims that questions had leaked.

As part of his attempts to quell protests, Modi posted his first-ever selfie-style Instagram reel last week and followed it up with others –including the one Meta took down and replaced with a placeholder saying the vid was the subject of a legal complaint.

The social networking giant said that was a mistake, apologized, and restored the video.

That error gave India’s government the chance to beat up Meta in public.

S. Krishnan, the secretary of India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), said he asked Meta “to come in at the highest level and explain what is happening and why.”

“They have agreed to come – well, they have to – and explain what the situation is,” Krishnan said. “We want to have both a policy level understanding and a technical understanding of the issues, and also adaptation to the kind of concerns India has.”

Krishnan said Meta has written to India’s government to express regret over the incident and established new protocols governing moderation of accounts run by prominent people to avoid future messes of this sort.

India has a complex relationship with Big Tech companies, sometimes celebrating their role in assisting the nation’s development, but often also lamenting their monopolistic tendencies and role in spreading content the Modi government would rather netizens don’t see.

DeepSeek teases ‘peak/valley’ pricing for new models which hit beta last week

Chinese AI upstart DeepSeek last week released a beta API for its next model, deepseek-v4-flash, and revealed a new pricing policy for its APIs.

The company says the new policy will apply “soon” and will see the cost of its services double between 09:00 and 12:00, then again from 14:00 to 18:00 – in China’s single official timezone UTC+8.

DeepSeek startled the AI market last year by releasing models that it claimed to have trained without vast fleets of Nvidia accelerators. Those claims didn’t stand up to close scrutiny, but the company is considered a significant challenger to western AI outfits such as OpenAI and Anthropic.

deepseek-v4-flash is likely to reach general availability within weeks. DeepSeek already claims it outperforms its last model, V4-Pro.

Australia proposes new tax on Big Tech – and a new out

Australia’s government has tweaked its plans to tax Big Tech companies unless they pay local media for the right to share links to their work.

The Land Down Under previously threatened tech companies with a 2.25 percent tax if they don’t fund local media. On Monday, that plan changed to a 2.5 percent levy on advertising revenue only and expanded incentives to fund small and regional publications.

Meta has previously slammed the idea as “A discriminatory tax built on a false premise.”

Also in Australia, regulators last week decided to sue Telegram after it failed to take down violent and terrorism-related content.

Kioxia profits jump by billions, as you’d expect from a memory-maker

Japanese memory-maker Kioxia last week announced [PDF] its quarterly revenue grew 451 percent year over year to reach $11.1 billion, plus profit of $5.3 billion – a massive turnaround from the $287,000 loss for the same quarter last year.

According to Japanese outlet Nikkei, CFO Yoshihiko Kawamura said the company expects even better days ahead because he believes demand for NAND storage is “still in the early stages.”

Japan’s next moonshot to ride local rocket

Japanese space startup iSpace last week announced its next mission will ride a Japanese rocket to the moon.

iSpace has launched two moon lander missions, but both failed. The company’s plan for its third mission involves new lander design called ULTRA that is capable of carrying payloads weighing several hundred kilograms to Luna.

This time around, iSpace plans to use the H3 rocket built by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, instead of the SpaceX Falcon 9 that carried its first two missions. ®

AI slop, the colloquial term for low-effort AI-generated content, has emerged as a huge problem across different industries. Music labels are fighting streaming services to put an AI label on such tra/cks. Publishing houses are wary of AI-written drafts. Research journals are buried under a deluge of AI-generated papers. The software industry is reeling under the pressure of vibe-coded apps brimming with security flaws. Even Apple is struggling against a tide of bug reports created using AI. Of course, the disdain against AI is pretty obvious, but there’s now a new dimension to it.

Boomers are gifting AI-generated books to their grandkids.

“She is creating these storylines based on experiences with my kid and modeling her characters to have similar attributes as my kid, and us[ing] our family’s first names so that they represent us and my kid will ‘see her family reflected,’” an individual wrote on Reddit, detailing how their mother was using AI to make stories for their grandkids, influenced by real-life events.

Multiple parents told WIRED that their kids have received AI-generated story books from grand parents or other senior family members, labelling the trend as “morally reprehensible.” The trend is horrific. I have seen numerous AI-generated books targeted at kids selling on online marketplaces, and even advertisements for tools that use AI to write notes and tributes for real humans.

The whole well is polluted

Ironically, the support for such behaviour comes from AI giants that also own the world’s biggest channels for distrubuting digital content in all shapes and forms. One such source is Amazon, which also runs Kindle as one of the world’s largest digital books platforms.

As far back as 2024, it was reported that Amazon’s store has an AI slop book problem. Poor, AI-written copies of popular books have flooded the ecommerce platform. In the most recent incident that got plenty of coverage in online circles just three weeks ago, Kashmir Hill, a technology journalist at The New York Times, wrote an account of how someone used AI to write her biography and put it for sale on Amazon.

Here is the fun part. You would think that Amazon must be drafting harsh anti-AI policies by now. Well, Amazon is actually adding more fuel to the fire. All the way back in 2022, Amazon released an AI feature called “Create with Alexa,” which lets users create bedtime stories for kids, complete with visuals and animations. In 2026, Amazon rolled out a similar feature that lets you create podcasts on any topic using the Alexa AI assistant.

Platforms like YouTube are also seeing a tsunami of AI-generated brainrot content targeted at kids. It’s pretty odd (and disheartening) to see that the biggest platforms for digital content in varied forms are also owned by companies that are doing cutting-edge work and pushing AI into our lives from every direction.

Amazon should be the guardian of books (on Kindle and its eponymous store for physical books), films and TV shows (through Prime Video) and songs (via Amazon Music). Google and Meta are in a similar position, but once again, they are likely not going to take these AI problems hitting close to home as responsibly as they should.

Strands is the NYT’s latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it’s great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.

Want more word-based fun? Then check out my NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games, and Marc’s Wordle today page for the original viral word game.

What we know so far: AMD is taking a different approach with its upcoming Zen 6 processors, introducing a new type of low-power core built from pieces of several earlier Zen designs rather than a single architecture. The change surfaced in a recent Linux kernel patch, which shows how the system identifies and manages these cores. The patch makes clear that the low-power cores are distinct enough to warrant their own classification, rather than being grouped with AMD’s existing compact “C” cores.

Patch notes that the system needs a way to properly identify these low-power cores in user space, since they currently show up as “unknown” in the CPU topology.

It also specifies that on supported AMD and Hygon chips, these cores should scale performance using amd_get_highest_perf() instead of the fixed CPPC_HIGHEST_PERF_PERFORMANCE limit, aligning them with how existing efficiency cores are managed.

What stands out is how these cores are built. Analysis from leaker InstLatX64 points to a hybrid design that combines multiple generations of Zen. The reported setup includes a Zen 6 instruction set, Zen 5 microarchitecture, Zen 4 floating-point unit, Zen 3 L2 cache, and Zen 2 L3 cache.

– InstLatX64 (@InstLatX64) July 29, 2026

Instead of designing a low-power core from scratch, AMD appears to be reusing and combining existing components. That mix-and-match approach suggests the company is trying to improve efficiency while keeping development time and complexity in check.

These low-power cores would sit alongside AMD’s current Performance and Efficiency cores, creating a three-tier setup. Performance cores handle high-clock workloads, while Efficiency cores are smaller and tuned for lower power use. The new low-power cores go a step further, targeting very light workloads where minimizing power draw is the priority. In that sense, they’re closer in purpose to Intel’s low-power efficiency cores, though AMD’s design is structured differently.

The potential benefit is clearer in mobile devices. Laptops and gaming handhelds could offload lighter tasks to these low-power cores, reducing overall power consumption. That could help extend battery life and let systems run certain processes at just a few watts. How much of a difference that makes will depend heavily on how well software can manage and assign workloads across the different core types.

There are still gaps in what’s known. AMD hasn’t shared performance or efficiency data for these cores, and it’s not yet clear how well this blended architecture will scale under real workloads. The design is unconventional, and its success will likely hinge on how smoothly the hardware and software layers work together.

This development comes as AMD is rolling out its Zen 6 server chips, with desktop versions expected later this year. But the broader market may complicate things. PC shipments have been trending down, and higher memory prices, driven in part by AI demand, are pushing up system costs.

That matters more in laptops and handhelds, where upgrading the CPU usually means replacing the entire device. Even if AMD delivers better efficiency, adoption could be limited if buyers hold off on new hardware.

Still, the idea of building a core from a mix of proven parts marks a notable change in direction. Rather than stretching one architecture across every use case, AMD is carving out more specialized roles for different core types. If it works, it could give the company more flexibility in how it designs chips for power-sensitive devices.

The portable CD player is back, but today’s models have almost nothing in common with the plastic Discman that spent the 1990s eating AA batteries inside your Jansport backpack.

The compact disc was supposed to be dead by now.

Vinyl received the comeback tour, streaming took over the car, and the last laptop with an optical drive probably shares a drawer with your BlackBerry charger and three unidentified power supplies. For most of the past decade, buying a portable CD player meant choosing between a questionable Amazon special and something recovered from a basement beside a Case Logic binder filled with scratched copies of Ten, Automatic for the People, and the soundtrack to Singles.

Something has changed.

U.S. CD sales climbed 16 percent during the first half of 2026 to 16.3 million units, substantially outpacing vinyl’s 2.4 percent growth over the same period. K-pop and its collectible physical releases contributed to that increase, but CD sales were still up 6.7 percent without them.

That is not 2000 all over again, when a new Radiohead album meant a trip to HMV and enough change left for a sweet veal sandwich on the way home, but it is no longer statistical background noise either.

There is also a wonderfully strange wrinkle to the revival: close to half of the Gen Z and millennial consumers buying CDs reportedly do not own a CD player. For younger listeners, the disc has become a collectible object, a direct way to support an artist, or something tangible that exists outside a streaming service.

Manufacturers have noticed.

Why Portable CD Players Are Coming Back

The renewed interest in CDs is not difficult to understand once you remove the assumption that every physical format has to become vinyl.

Used CDs remain plentiful and generally inexpensive. Entire catalogs can be assembled for considerably less than the price of new vinyl reissues, and the discs are easier to store, clean, ship, and replace. You can also leave one on the passenger seat without treating the car like a temperature-controlled archive.

There is also the increasingly appealing concept of actually owning the music.

Streaming remains essential, but subscription prices keep rising, albums can disappear or be replaced with different masters, and the listening experience is constantly interrupted by recommendations, notifications, podcasts, social features, and algorithms convinced that one Steely Dan song means you want to hear yacht rock until the day you die.

A compact disc does something almost radical in 2026: it plays the album you selected, in the order the artist intended, and then stops.

It does not ask whether you enjoyed the experience. It does not generate a playlist called “Ian’s Sophisticated Tuesday Vibes.” It just plays the music.

For Gen X listeners, there is another obvious reason. Many of us already own hundreds or thousands of CDs purchased over several decades. We bought the album once and considered the transaction complete.

What disappeared was not the music collection but the convenient hardware required to play it. New cars rarely include optical drives, computers abandoned them years ago, and many modern audio systems were designed as though everyone willingly donated their record collection to a server farm.

The current generation of portable CD players fills that hardware gap, although the word “portable” now requires some flexibility.

These Are Not the Discmans We Grew Up With

The portable players of the 1980s and 1990s were designed around one primary task: spinning a disc while attempting not to skip whenever you stepped off a curb.

They were generally made from plastic, ran on AA batteries, offered a single 3.5mm headphone output, and delivered just enough amplification for the inexpensive headphones supplied in the box. Anti-skip protection was treated like military technology. A wired remote clipped to your jacket was considered progress.

Today’s models are very different machines.

Depending on the price, they can include aluminum construction, rechargeable batteries, balanced headphone outputs, Bluetooth, digital connections, USB DAC operation, CD ripping, R2R conversion, selectable amplifier modes, and even vacuum tubes.

A Discman played CDs. Some of these products are complete digital source components, DACs, headphone amplifiers, wireless transmitters, and desktop transports that also happen to spin a disc.

They are not necessarily smaller. Several belong in a messenger bag rather than a jacket pocket, and nobody should attempt to jog with a 700-gram tube CD player unless the route ends at an orthopedic surgeon.

They are, however, far more useful inside a modern audio system.

A Note About This Guide

This is not a ranked list of the “best” portable CD players.

We have personally used three of the models included below. The remaining selections are based on verified specifications, current availability, features, intended use, and our existing product coverage.

As more review samples become available, this guide will be updated with additional listening impressions and direct comparisons.

Prices were checked on July 27, 2026 and may change.

Syitren R300 ($99)

The Syitren R300 is the least expensive model in this guide and the one that looks least like traditional audio equipment. Its rounded enclosure, raised controls, and range of finishes suggest that Braun and Muji designed a CD player after spending an afternoon inside Tower Records.

It supports standard CDs, CD-G discs, and MP3 CDs. Bluetooth 5.3 can transmit playback to wireless speakers or headphones, while wired connections include a 3.5mm analog output and an optical digital output. Its 2,000mAh battery is rated for up to six hours.

The R300 does not include a balanced output, USB DAC operation, ripping, or a particularly powerful headphone amplifier. It is primarily a stylish and uncomplicated way to play discs through basic wired headphones, an external DAC, or a Bluetooth speaker.

Bluetooth compatibility may vary with automotive systems, so buyers hoping to restore CD playback in a newer car should temper their expectations.

At $99.99, however, it remains the most approachable entry point for someone who wants physical playback without studying an output-power chart first.

Where to buy: $109.99 $99.99 at Amazon

FiiO DM13 ($164)

The FiiO DM13 helped establish the current portable CD player category by demonstrating that an affordable model could offer considerably more than a headphone jack and a prayer.

Its dual Cirrus Logic CS43198 DACs feed both 3.5mm and 4.4mm balanced headphone outputs, with up to 180mW and 660mW per channel into 32 ohms, respectively. It also offers line-level operation, optical and coaxial digital outputs, Bluetooth transmission, gapless playback, and more than ten hours of rated battery life.

The DM13 can rip CDs directly to a FAT32-formatted USB storage device as WAV files, making it one of the least expensive ways to play and archive a collection without involving an aging computer or external optical drive.

It does not function as a USB DAC. The USB connection is used for power and ripping rather than accepting digital audio from a computer.

At $164.99, the DM13 remains one of the strongest combinations of price, output power, connectivity, wireless playback, and ripping support. It lacks the R2R conversion and more elaborate amplifier architecture of the DM15, but covers the fundamentals without turning a portable CD player into a graduate-level engineering course.

Where to buy: $164.99 at Amazon | Apos Audio

Moondrop DiscDream 2 ($179)

The Moondrop DiscDream 2 takes a more focused approach than the FiiO DM13.

There is no Bluetooth transmitter, balanced headphone connection, or onboard ripping. What it provides instead is a straightforward wired player with a transparent lid, clearly marked controls, USB DAC operation, and a nine-hour battery.

Its 3.5mm headphone output delivers 124mW into 32 ohms, while a multifunction connection provides line-level and optical output for use with an amplifier or external DAC. The DiscDream 2 supports CD, CD-R, and CD-RW playback, and its USB DAC mode handles high-resolution PCM and DSD files.

This is the model for listeners who want their portable CD player to remain primarily a CD player.

The absence of Bluetooth will be a deal breaker for some buyers, but it also means fewer menus, codecs, pairing routines, and negotiations with whatever wireless device happens to be nearby.

The design is more distinctive than the DM13, and the nine-hour battery makes it suitable for travel or extended desktop listening. Its headphone amplifier is best suited to reasonably efficient headphones and IEMs rather than difficult planar models.

Where to buy: $179.99 at Amazon | Apos Audio

Shanling EC Play ($220)

The EC Play is Shanling’s smallest, lightest, and least expensive portable CD player, although “lightest” still means approximately 418 grams.

That is considerably more substantial than the plastic players we carried during the first Bush administration, but the aluminum construction, active magnetic disc clamp, and internal hardware also belong to a different class.

A Cirrus Logic CS43198 DAC and dual SGM8262-2 amplifiers deliver 177mW through the 3.5mm output and as much as 700mW into 32 ohms through the balanced connection. The EC Play can also operate as a USB DAC and provides coaxial digital output for an external converter.

Bluetooth 6.0 works in both directions, although codec support depends on the operating mode. Receiver mode supports LDAC, AAC, and SBC, allowing the EC Play to function as a wireless DAC and headphone amplifier for a phone. CD transmission is limited to SBC.

Its 3,450mAh battery is rated for up to 12 hours, currently the longest claimed CD playback time among the models in this guide.

There is no ripping function, but the combination of balanced output, USB DAC operation, two-way Bluetooth, and excellent battery life makes the EC Play one of the most practical all-around designs under $200.

Where to buy: $220 at Amazon

FiiO DM15 R2R

The FiiO DM15 R2R takes the basic formula established by the DM13 and adds a 24-bit resistor-ladder DAC, stronger amplification, USB DAC operation, improved controls, and a transparent lid that lets you watch the disc spin.

Because apparently we missed doing that.

FiiO’s fully differential R2R DAC uses 192 precision thin-film resistors and supports PCM up to 32-bit/384kHz and DSD256 in USB DAC mode. Bluetooth transmission includes aptX, aptX HD, aptX Adaptive, and SBC, while optical and coaxial outputs allow the DM15 to serve as a transport inside a larger system.

Output power rises substantially over the DM13. In battery mode, the DM15 provides approximately 220mW through its 3.5mm output and 812mW through its balanced connection into 32 ohms. Desktop mode increases those figures to roughly 310mW and 1,150mW.

Battery life is rated at more than seven hours during CD playback.

The DM15 can also rip CDs to WAV while listening and includes three bass settings and eight EQ presets. At $269.99, it is the point where this category begins to resemble proper headphone hardware rather than a modern reproduction of something purchased at RadioShack.

Where to buy: $269.99 at Amazon | Apos Audio

Shanling EC Zero AKM ($319)

The Shanling EC Zero AKM uses the same basic enclosure, disc mechanism, display, controls, inputs, and outputs as the more expensive EC Zero T but removes the R2R converter and JAN6418 vacuum tubes.

In their place are an AKM AK4493S DAC and dual SGM8262-2 amplifiers. The change reduces the price to $319, extends rated wired playback to ten hours, lowers the output impedance for better compatibility with sensitive IEMs, and still provides up to 836mW through the balanced connection.

The EC Zero AKM includes dedicated headphone and line outputs, USB DAC operation, Bluetooth transmission with aptX Adaptive, combined optical and coaxial digital output, and real-time CD ripping to compatible USB storage.

It does not receive Bluetooth audio, and there is no LDAC support.

What it offers instead is most of the EC Zero platform’s flexibility without asking the buyer to pay for tubes or R2R conversion. For listeners who plan to use the player with several pairs of headphones, powered speakers, a desktop amplifier, and an external DAC, it may be the most rational member of the family.

Yes, “rational” is a relative term when discussing a $319 portable CD player in 2026.

Where to buy: $319 at Amazon

Moondrop DiscDream 2 Ultra ($349)

The DiscDream 2 Ultra is the more ambitious and substantially more expensive sibling of the standard DiscDream 2. Current pricing has climbed to approximately $349.99, although the model originally entered the market closer to $289.99.

Its CNC-machined aluminum clamshell enclosure is one of the most distinctive designs in the category. Connectivity includes 3.5mm and balanced 4.4mm headphone outputs, along with a separate multifunction connection for line-level and optical output.

The balanced output delivers 222mW into 32 ohms, while the single-ended connection supplies 112mW. USB DAC operation supports PCM up to 384kHz and DSD256, and the 3,500mAh battery is rated for eight hours of CD playback.

As with the less expensive DiscDream 2, there is no Bluetooth or ripping function. The Ultra is therefore less versatile than similarly priced alternatives from FiiO and Shanling, and its headphone amplifier is not intended for especially difficult loads.

What it offers is a more luxurious enclosure, balanced wired playback, and a focused operating experience without wireless features or an extensive menu structure.

It is also more transportable than genuinely pocketable, unless your jeans were designed by the same people responsible for JNCO.

Where to buy: $349.99 at Amazon | Apos Audio

Shanling EC Zero T ($559)

The original EC Zero T marked the point where portable CD players stopped pretending to be simple devices.

Its in-house R2R DAC uses 192 precision resistors and offers selectable non-oversampling and oversampling modes. Dual JAN6418 vacuum tubes allow users to switch between tube and transistor output stages, while a TPA6120 headphone amplifier drives both single-ended and balanced headphones.

The EC Zero T also includes dedicated line outputs, Bluetooth transmission with aptX Adaptive, digital output, high-resolution USB DAC operation, and real-time CD ripping. Its 5,500mAh battery is rated for eight hours.

Output power depends on the operating mode and power source. On battery power, the balanced output reaches 551mW into 32 ohms. Connecting external DC power raises that figure to 1,220mW in transistor mode or 1,087mW in tube mode.

At 669 grams, about the weight of six Sony NW-A306 Walkmans, the EC Zero T stretches the definition of portable without completely snapping it.

The arrival of the more powerful EC Zero T Max makes the original harder to justify at its full MSRP, but current pricing around $519 changes the equation substantially.

Where to buy: $559 at Amazon

Shanling EC Zero T Max ($632)

The EC Zero T Max is not a completely new player.

It takes the original EC Zero T’s R2R DAC, dual JAN6418 tubes, disc mechanism, USB DAC support, Bluetooth transmission, digital outputs, and ripping capabilities and addresses one of the original model’s primary limitations: maximum headphone power while operating from its internal battery.

The upgraded amplifier circuit is built around AD8397 devices and delivers up to 361mW into 32 ohms through the 3.5mm output and 1,300mW through the balanced connection without requiring external power. Output impedance has also been reduced, potentially improving compatibility with both demanding full-size headphones and sensitive IEMs.

Shanling also applied power-supply and circuit refinements derived from its newer R2R products, while the titanium-gray finish and patterned disc cover distinguish the Max from the original.

The important distinction is not merely another number on a specification sheet. The original EC Zero T required external power to deliver its maximum output, while the Max can produce 1.3 watts per channel from its battery.

That makes the “portable” part of its description considerably more convincing, even if Eugene Pontecorvo would need a larger Members Only jacket to carry it.

Shanling had not published a final battery-life rating for the Max when this guide was prepared.

Where to buy: $632.64 at AliExpress

Cayin CP6

The Cayin CP6 is the most ambitious and expensive portable CD player in this group, combining dual Raytheon JAN6418 tubes, three selectable timbre modes, switchable amplifier operation, a discrete headphone output stage, dual DACs, two-way Bluetooth, USB DAC operation, CD ripping, and enough aluminum to make its definition of portability somewhat theoretical.

Its three output modes include Classic Tube, Modern Tube, and Solid State. Classic Tube is intended to provide a smoother and warmer presentation, while Modern Tube emphasizes openness and resolution. Solid State bypasses the tube character for a cleaner and more neutral output.

The digital section uses two Cirrus Logic CS4308P DACs operating in mono mode, followed by OPA1612 devices for current-to-voltage conversion and filtering. An XMOS XU316 processor manages USB audio, allowing the CP6 to operate as a high-resolution external DAC when it is not playing discs.

The CP6 includes single-ended and balanced headphone outputs, optical and coaxial digital connections, and Bluetooth 5.4 through a Qualcomm QCC3083 chipset. Unlike most of the players in this guide, it can transmit CD playback to wireless headphones or receive audio from a phone.

Battery operation is rated for up to 7.5 hours. When connected to external DC power, the balanced amplifier can deliver as much as 1,300mW per channel into 16 ohms.

The CP6 does not include Wi-Fi, Ethernet, native streaming applications, SACD playback, or conventional RCA and XLR outputs. It is not a network player, and it is not trying to replace a full-size disc transport.

It is better understood as a tube DAC and powerful balanced headphone amplifier with a rechargeable battery, Bluetooth, and a CD mechanism installed on top.

Calling it a Discman is rather like calling a Porsche 911 a Volkswagen with better seats.

Where to buy: $699 at Apos Audio

Which Portable CD Player Makes the Most Sense?

Below $200, the FiiO DM13 offers the broadest feature set, especially for listeners who want balanced headphone output, wireless transmission, digital outputs, and ripping. The Shanling EC Play costs slightly more but counters with USB DAC operation, two-way Bluetooth, greater balanced power, and longer battery life.

The Syitren R300 makes sense as an inexpensive and design-focused entry point, while the Moondrop DiscDream 2 is better suited to listeners who prefer a simpler wired player and have no need for Bluetooth or ripping.

Between $250 and $400, the FiiO DM15 R2R provides the most aggressive combination of output power, R2R conversion, USB DAC operation, Bluetooth, and ripping. The Shanling EC Zero AKM costs more but adds dedicated line outputs, a larger battery, and a broader range of system connections.

The DiscDream 2 Ultra prioritizes enclosure quality and straightforward wired playback over features.

The Shanling EC Zero T, EC Zero T Max, and Cayin CP6 occupy a very different part of the market. These are transportable audiophile source components designed for listeners who want tube output, stronger headphone amplification, multiple operating modes, and integration with desktop or full-size audio systems.

None of them will recreate the experience of skating to school with a Discman clipped to your belt and Dookie skipping every time you hit a crack in the sidewalk.

That is probably for the best.

Portable CD Player Comparison

Prices and specifications checked Aug 2, 2026. Manufacturer-rated battery life and output figures are shown.

The Bottom Line

Portable CD players make sense because many of them use rather good DACs for the application, can drive everything from sensitive IEMs to demanding headphones, and fit comfortably on a desk, an airline tray at 30,000 feet, or a nightstand.

Just make sure the headphone cable is long enough. That awful thud at 3 a.m. when you roll over, pull the player onto the floor, and mumble something about not touching the last piece of biltong is not part of the listening experience anyone needs.

They are practical, increasingly capable, easy to move around, and yes, still undeniably cool.

Related Reading:

Dan Wood sat down with the same kind of machine that once filled university labs and design studios, the blue-and-white Power Mac G3, and rebuilt the exact setup he remembered from the early 2000s. Nearly three decades later the computer boots, runs its original software, and still feels purposeful in a way modern machines rarely do.

This tower, released in January 1999, appeared only fourteen months after the first aggregation of beige G3 models that were the standard for late 1990s PCs, which were essentially a lot of beige boxes. The blue and white version took a page from the iMac’s book, borrowing some of the same translucent plastic and curved design but applying it to a serious desktop system. Steve Jobs had returned to Apple, they had acquired NeXT, and suddenly the professional line had the same design swagger as the consumer goods. Dan’s particular machine is a 400 MHz model, which happens to be one of the fastest configurations available at the time.

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Opening the case is simple, as there is only one catch on the side that lowers the entire top and swings the motherboard and all of the expansion cards out of the way. Inside, you’ll find a quiet G3 processor sitting pretty under a smallish heatsink, three of the four memory slots filled with 64MB sticks for a total of 192MB, an ATI Rage 128 graphics card with a DVD decoder daughterboard, and a front loading DVD-ROM drive, which was a real premium feature back in 1999. You have Firewire connectors next to the USB ones, an Ethernet port, and only one ADB connector for older keyboards or software that still uses those ugly old dongles. By the way, there is no disk drive in sight since Apple abandoned them with the iMac (1998) a year prior.

The matching keyboard feels soft and flimsy in comparison to older mechanical versions that many people still rely on. The function and arrow keys are half height, as Steve Jobs insisted, but I don’t see the benefit. The mouse that came with it is, of course, the round one-button “hockey puck,” which still elicits a strong reaction from anyone compelled to use one in a lab. Getting it to track properly requires some work, and the single button drives you into some awkward grip positions. Dan is utilizing the tower with a 15-inch Apple Studio Display, a thin screen with an active matrix that is nearly identical to the computer’s translucent blue and white plastic, and it connects by VGA and ADB.

Mac OS 8.6 boots up quickly and remains snappy, as Dan runs all of the same software that used to populate those university multimedia suites: early versions of Photoshop, QuarkXPress for page layout, and Microsoft Office 98. The machine sat in a church office for years, producing fliers and documents until being retired. Internet Explorer for Mac still works, but getting modern websites to load is nearly hard without special services that only provide a limited version of things. An outdated FTP client may still move files like people used to do.

Two or three pieces of Connectix software still work on Dans machine: Virtual Game Station allows the G3 to boot up actual PlayStation discs at full speed, Wipeout runs fairly smoothly, which is a pleasant surprise, and Virtual PC boots up Windows 2000 in a matter of minutes and remains usable for older business applications. On the native side, the Rage 128 card runs Unreal and Quake III Arena with the same heavy-duty lighting and shadows that Steve Jobs used to demonstrate on stage with John Carmack.