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About Me

Found 2 results

  1. "At iFi we believe that high-quality sound is a way of life. The nano iOne was created for both audiophiles and those who yearn for better sound quality from their existing home systems. The iOne is neither a one-trick pony nor is it a jack-of-all-trades. It is simply incredibly versatile and offers cutting-edge technology, with each separate function designed and implemented with as much care and dedication as they would receive in a single function device from iFi Audio." Bluetooth connectivity. In two words, that is what makes the iFi nano iOne different from any other external DAC in the marketplace. The postman dropped off a unit today for my review and recommendation. It is a very remarkable device and we here at "Computer Audiophile on the Cheap" are putting this to the test. At an MSRP of $199, it certainly fits into our price range. It can become part of your home audio system, and set-up is almost too easy. "The Burr-Brown True Native chipset is a MultiBit DAC which represents the ‘best of the best’ chipset design. This chipset handles PCM and DSD natively, so the music signal stays in its original format all the way through." There is a difference between the DAC chipset in the nano iOne, and the Schiit Modi 2, which is the standard reference in my system. I reviewed the iFi iDSD nano LE, which is a DAC/headphone amplifier. I felt that the amplification stage for headphones had an adverse effect on the line output through the RCA connectors. I liked the sound that it produced, but I found that too many pots spoiled the soup. There were issues when the signal was amplified in the DAC, and then the volume could also be adjusted by the receiver or pre-amp. Call me crazy but in a head to head competition, my lament was the iFi didn't sound as "musical" as the Schiit. I thought at that time, that it was a shame that the RCA line out was running through the amplifier stage. It affected the Sound Quality, and not in a good way. My contact at iFi offered to loan me the Black Label version of the nano LE, but in its current ideation, it is strictly a headphone DAC/Amplifier. Now I love headphones for my Smartphone, and when I want to really hear my music, even if nobody else likes it. I wanted to review the iOne mainly because it is a "pure DAC" with RCA output. There is no amplification stage, which suits me just fine. My man at iFi emphasized the "Bluetooth connectivity" as the selling point for the iOne. I was thinking, "Yeah, right" because my CAOTC system is computer-based, and with a Denon AVR-2805 to provide all the amplification I need to drive my Advents--the Bluetooth was a nice feature, but I hardly doubted if I would be doing much with it. Man, was I wrong? It was so simple to set-up. and the sound quality was remarkable. The files on my Moto G3 are all MP3 @ 192, hardly "Hi-Res Audio" but when the Moto was paired via Bluetooth, the SQ was still remarkable. I am using open-source VLC as my media player-- so playing FLAC Hi-Res files would not be a problem. My only consideration would be the file sizes--meaning I might need a 32 Gb SD Micro card for the phone instead of the little 16 Gb card, filled with MP3s. But streaming DSD files--which is basically the best source material in our current technology would be a breeze with iOne and the Bluetooth. (Sure I could stream through the computer, which is on my Internet connection-- but that is hardly a 'portable' option) How does the iOne stand up against the Schiit Modi 2? That is apples and oranges. My Schiit sells for $99 and is NOT Multibit. The Multibit version of Schiit Modi will cost you $249. The iFi nano iOne is a Multibit DAC which can play DSD natively. It sounds incredible. Does this mean that I can no longer use the Modi 2? Absolutely not. It will replace the Dragonfly by Audioquest (Version 1.2) on my second system in the bedroom. That will give me 24/192 resolution back there, instead of the 24/96 from the Dragonfly. But on the big rig-- my main listening system with the Denon and the $4,000 Nordost Valhalla speaker ribbon cables--the iFi nano iOne is the new Sheriff in town. I just finished listening to Thomas Dolby's "Aliens Ate My Buick"-- a very well engineered but not that popular recording that even Dolby himself said was a bit over the top. You know Dolby for his "She Blinded Me with Science" off his debut "The Golden Age of Wireless" album. I am playing that now, and it is crisp, clear, and accurate reproduction without any coloration. In the audiophile world, 'coloration' can be an attribute or a detriment. I prefer "pure" reproduction. I want to hear what the Engineer heard through their headphones when they were making the mix-down in the recording studio. I want to be able to listen at a moderate level and want for nothing more. I don't want any point in the signal path to be adding "warmth" or some other buzz word that describes what some say "makes digital sound like an album". If I wanted to replace my entire music library with 180 gram Virgin Vinyl LPs and all the accoutrement of that--then I would not be a "Computer Audiophile" and I would be hearing clicks and pops, not to mention having to get up from my sweet spot to flip the disc over every 15 minutes. No, Thank you! In my former life, as a photojournalist, I remember people asking me if Digital was "as good" as the film. From my practical considerations as a wire-service photojournalist, I had to admit the convenience of no wet processing made digital my preference. But those were the days of less than 5-megapixel files from my Nikon D2H. Once I moved up to a 16 Mp sensor on my Sony, I could honestly tell people that Digital was Better than film. Without question, the film was a nostalgic, albeit troublesome choice. Kodachrome had long since been discontinued, and if the reference was ISO 800 Fujicolor negative film--a 16 Mp file blew film off the map. In audiophile world, there is a traditionalist snobbery associated with spinning vinyl. And since the roof has been blown off the high-end turntables, cartridges, and record-cleaning machines--I have to put all my effort into digital as my source. If you want to defend analog (LP records) you need to find someone else to argue with. I am a Modern consumer, I have no use for Tubes or LP records. I will take an HDTracks 24/192 file and enjoy the Hell out of the listening experience for hours on end with no record flipping, no pops, and cracks, no scratches, period. Two albums into this testing session and iFi have convinced me that this is the Modern Solution to digital music reproduction. Now I am listening to a playlist of 24 bit 192 recordings. One word...Spectacular! The Brown-Burr chipset is awesome with Hi-Res Audio recordings from Linn, on their 40th Anniversary Collection sampler. There is NO noise floor, it is gone. What is coming out of these 40-year-old loudspeakers is a sound that Henry Koss could have never imagined when he designed these speakers. The iFi Nano iOne is an obvious "Must Buy" when you are ready to upgrade your music system. Back to the Apples and Oranges-- the Schiit is a good DAC for $99, but the iFi with Bluetooth Connectivity is a steal at $199, and well worth an extra C-note. Recommended by the Computer Audiophile on the Cheap! That is my highest accolade. Computer Audiophile on the Cheap Magazine Chat (26)
  2. Testing, Comparing, Listening, and analysis of the results-- It is the lifeblood of this hobby called Audiophilia. We here at Computer Audiophile on the Cheap are looking for the BEST combination of entry-level DACs, with Vintage Electronics, at a reasonable price point. Our first foray into Hi-Res Audio was an Audioquest Dragonfly v1.2, which I bought for $79 on closeout at Best Buy. The first unit was defective, as it was wanting to shut down after precisely 20 seconds of music. AQ replaced that unit, and it worked well. But, in the interim, I found the Schiit Modi 2 priced at $99. I contacted iFi about doing a test against their iFi iDSD nano LE, which retails for $129. By this test, I realized that the center of any Computer Audiophile system was the external DAC. Afterall, it was the one thing in the replay path, which would have the most impact on SQ--whether compared to an onboard chip DAC in the laptop or a soundcard in your desktop computer. Amplifiers, speakers, and interconnects are all a variable factor, but if the zeros and ones are not turned into an analog signal properly--everything else becomes secondary. My attention turned to what the DAC was doing with the same set of digital data--whether from a 24-192 HDTracks file or a low-res MP3 lossy recording. I determined that while all digital files are binary, the analog interpretation of those files varied greatly. In the head to head comparison, I liked the 'musicality' of the Schiit Modi 2 over the iFi nano LE. I determined that the headphone amplifier stage in the nano was making the sound 'different'. In audiophile listening, different can be better, or it can be worse. Or it can just be different, without it being better or worse. The Schiit sounded better, but I did like the Burr-Brown chipset in the iFi. I hoped that iFi had a DAC, which was not also a headphone amplifier, which also deployed the Burr-Brown chipset. If you threw in the Active Noise Cancellation, which came from the iFi iPurifier2, that would be a dynamite DAC. And the iFi iOne did all that plus has native Bluetooth connectivity. To my ears, comparing the iFi iOne to the Modi 2 was apples and oranges. I still use the Modi 2, with iPurifier2, and I am listening to the iOne right now. The iOne is $199, the Modi 2 is still $99, but the iPurifier2 costs $109--so price wise they are in the same ballpark. My next challenge came from reading about the top-of-the-line Schiit Yggdrasil, which at $2399 was not on anyone's "on the Cheap" list. A fellow CA reader suggested the Modi Multibit (Mimby) which he said compared favorably with the Bifrost Multibit (Bimby). OK, let's through that into the mix. Jason Stoddard, co-founder of Schiit, threw some further light on the subject: "...but one comment: our stuff is true multibit, not some 2-5 bit delta-sigma implementation pawned off as "multibit." If we used that terminology, you could call Modi 2 and Modi 2 Uber "multibit," since they are technically multibit delta-sigma designs. But so is literally everything else out there. Bottom line, if it's not 16 or more bits, it's not truly multibit. In addition, all of our true multibit products--from Modi Multibit on up--also use unique medical/military grade D/A converters (find any other DAC using the Analog Devices AD5547...there are none) and also use our own proprietary, unique time- and frequency-domain optimized digital filter, implemented in an Analog Devices SHARC DSP, not the embedded digital filter in a delta-sigma DAC, so they are really very different than anything else out there." The "Mimby" comes in at $249--still very reasonable for a CAOTC system, if we agree that the external DAC is the key to a good sounding system. The challenge is to pair it with a RasPi server, a refurbished amplifier or receiver, and some reasonably priced speakers for around $500. I think we can do that.
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