Aiyima A05

Aiyima A05 Review

Note: This is an old review copied over to this new website.

This is a nice ampliflier for the money and the size (I can’t believe it’s the size of a large box of matches).

Whats in the box

Its nicely packaged up in the box from Aiyima:

Subjective audio quality

I am no audiophile but this device sounds clear with accurate separation with a deep base (its has a separate treble and bass knobs as well as a volume). It is actually amazingly small (my only complaint is also related to it being so small see below).

Some measurements

Soon after I bought this amplifier, I spotted that the AudioScienceReview website reviewed and measured the amplifiers and gave it a recommendation. AudioScienceReview Review

These measurements show the SINAD value for the A05 on ASR’s AudioPrecision analyser: It got a SINAD score of 74 which is not great but not bad for a small and cheap amplifier.

Home setup

So, I got this as part of my Covid project to cleared out my garage and while doing this I found I had a couple of devices and gadgets that I could not dump including some lovely Mordaunt Short Speakers that are 25 years old and an old TV that was still working.

Powerful sound

But because I didn’t want to spent more than Eur100 I was looking for a cheap device to drive these Speakers. The speakers used to be paired with a large Yamama Receiver (and then with an Onkyo receiver) both these receivers are > 5 times the price of this but this Aiyima device is close to the sound quality and easily able to drive these speakers with a rich sound at very high volumes (and annoy the neighbours).

Clean Tone controls

One of the best features of this amplifier is the clean implementation of tone controls. I believe especially when using bluetooth streaming music that having some tone controls to get the best sound is vital and this amplifier has nice tone controls.

Bluetooth Support

I decided bluetooth was the ideal technology for this project as mostly I have every piece of music available on my mobile (and I couldn’t afford any of the Airplay receivers which are also amp’s) but I am very impressed with technical capabilities of this device, specifically with bluetooth 5.0 and AAC, APTX codecs -( I also tested the SBC codec ) and with the extra bandwidth 5.0 provides

I got excellent quality from the basic SBC codec but AAC (at 256kpbs) was superb. As well as bluetooth I am using this device like a ‘receiver’ / sound bar with all the sound from the old TV coming through this device into the speakers using the RCA audio-input connections and it works great.

Minor complaint

My only complaint is when the 2 RCA connectors and the speaker connections and power are all connected to the back of the Aiyima its a bit cramped - see photo.

Alternative products

I had looked at some other products including the slightly higher end Aiyima A07 (which doesn’t have bluetooth) and some similar products (but non had Bluetooth 5.0 with AAC/APTX at this price) so in the end I am super happy with this product.

Rating

I gave this a Pragmatic rating of 3 - it’s was a good price when I bought it and had nice features but other Amplifiers are more pragmatic options now.

Conclusion

This was one of my first class D amplifiers and It work excellent well during covid when I needs space within the house and convert my garage into a work from home office space, to give me some space in the house.

I would still recommend it but there are probably other amplifiers that are now more pragmatic.