Devialet Expert 200 Amplifier, DAC and Streamer Review

[pavuol]

their marketing speeches ruin it all ...

We all should be more reserved in our judgements and just wait for a fully functional piece to be retested.
Because the manufacturer is clearly confident with this Expert line :
"By rethinking sound reproduction at every turn, Devialet engineers have been able to achieve the best performance ever measured, at all power levels. "

 

[gvl]

Could it be the first Coronavirus amplifier death?

 

[amirm]

There's a setting called, I think, DPM, which does some sort of power management. This might be switched on by default in your unit. I understand most owners prefer this setting off. It could be causing weirdies.

I left this on. This is what hifinews had to say about it:

Seems to be something that would impact low level signals more than max power with a steady state input.

That said, its dynamic nature could explain the max compression (bug or feature).

 

[amirm]

Another possibility is that Amir hasn't disabled SAM, but instead set it to zero on the remote?

During my testing, I disabled SAM. I also tested it in Factory Mode with the SD card out. Same power limiting at higher frequencies.

 

[Soniclife]

Unless you are a journalist

One of pet hates is reviewers slagging a product of for something they found annoying because they swap kit every day, but no normal user would ever notice. But in this case I agree the card and wed download config is annoying if you need to make changes, it's fine when you have a very minimal config with no reason to change it, but when you get into the more complicated things you can only change in the web it's very slow.

 

[Frank Dernie]

One of pet hates is reviewers slagging a product of for something they found annoying because they swap kit every day, but no normal user would ever notice. But in this case I agree the card and wed download config is annoying if you need to make changes, it's fine when you have a very minimal config with no reason to change it, but when you get into the more complicated things you can only change in the web it's very slow.

Well my configuration isn't simple but I just don't change it.
I didn't on any of the previous kit either, but that was because their configuration was "soldered in"!

 

[Soniclife]

During my testing, I disabled SAM. I also tested it in Factory Mode with the SD card out. Same power limiting at higher frequencies.

With the card out DPM, and the subsonic filter are the only 2 things that should be active by default.
There is also ICM, a video dialog thing I don't think anyone uses, that should be off by default.

I've no idea what happens if you clip the analogue input in the ADC at high volume, it has some form of soft clipping always on.

 

[Frank Dernie]

There is a very substantial remote but strangely has no display on it. That would consume a lot more power, likely requiring a charger and such.

I asked the designer and that is what he said.
I originally wasn't going to get one because i couldn't see the display, but vertical mounting fixed that. I like watching the level meters

 

[Soniclife]

Well my configuration isn't simple but I just don't change it.

Complicated to me is when you get into the sub crossover settings, where you can delay the mains, and set the slope and crossover freq, when dialling that in there can be a lot of tedious back and forth. Most of the other settings are more personal preference that once set then to be static.

 

[Frank Dernie]

I left this on. This is what hifinews had to say about it:

I leave it on.
Currently I am listening to Tchaikovsky at a typical concert hall level, the display shows Class A amp is 36C, class D amps are 34C and the power supply 42C.
My speakers are efficient but a tough load (I tried a friend's SET amp with them and it could hardly raise a whisper)

 

[Frank Dernie]

Complicated to me is when you get into the sub crossover settings, where you can delay the mains, and set the slope and crossover freq, when dialling that in there can be a lot of tedious back and forth. Most of the other settings are more personal preference that once set then to be static.

The crossover is adjustable on my REL sub so I set the Devialet crossover at default and adjusted the sub using its switches. It would indeed be a nightmare doing it using the configurator

 

[BDWoody]

One of pet hates is reviewers slagging a product of for something they found annoying because they swap kit every day, but no normal user would ever notice. But in this case I agree the card and wed download config is annoying if you need to make changes, it's fine when you have a very minimal config with no reason to change it, but when you get into the more complicated things you can only change in the web it's very slow.

Probably be worth keeping a few pre-set that could easily be changed in and out if that was something you did often. The setting stays with the card I believe, so wouldn't require an online reconfig. That said, I agree being able to do that in a less cumbersome fashion would be great.

 

[Frank Dernie]

Probably be worth keeping a few pre-set that could easily be changed in and out if that was something you did often. The setting stays with the card I believe, so wouldn't require an online reconfig. That said, I agree being able to do that in a less cumbersome fashion would be great.

I do have cards with a low power max for when I used my Devialets with my 109dB/watt horns (!) but actually now just use a different amp with the horns.

 

[Soniclife]

Probably be worth keeping a few pre-set that could easily be changed in and out if that was something you did often. The setting stays with the card I believe, so wouldn't require an online reconfig. That said, I agree being able to do that in a less cumbersome fashion would be great.

You can have multiple setups on different cards, but I cannot think of a good reason to do so unless you have multiple turntables or speakers.

 

[amirm]

Got a nice response from customer service at Devialet saying they have escalated the issue to management.

 

[Soniclife]

I am therefore quite sure that the power is thermally limited on this model and intended to be protected by the DSP. The bigger one may well be thermally limited too, just getting to higher power before the controller steps in.

The 200 is thermally limited, the bigger 250 is voltage limited, you can see this most easily in the way power goes up when bridged, the 200 only doubles, the 250 quadruples. I don't know how it's limited.

 

[Soniclife]

Got a nice response from customer service at Devialet saying they have escalated the issue to management.

Good they are still working.
They have said in the past they don't listen to the amps when developing them, only use an analyser, so they should know if this is normal behaviour.

 

[Aaron Garrett]

Got a nice response from customer service at Devialet saying they have escalated the issue to management.

Ha! I never got that one.

 

[Thomas savage]

Got a nice response from customer service at Devialet saying they have escalated the issue to management.

You must of tripped the ' Amirm ' email alert system.

 

[Soniclife]

You must of tripped the email ' Amirm ' alert system.

Hopefully all the large manufactures have rolled that out now, and trained their support staff in to respond correctly, which is to engage professionally and work to understand the problem, not have a hissy fit in denial.