Fiio K19 looks like a versatile beast

[Human Bass]

FIIO on Instagram: "Now, here comes the pictures of K19 desktop dac/amp. You can touch and feel it at Canjam NYC 2024 this weekend! #fiio #k19 #fiioK19 #DAC #AMP"

814 likes, 17 comments - fiioofficial on March 7, 2024: "Now, here comes the pictures of K19 desktop dac/amp. You can touch and feel it at Canjam NYC 2024 this weekend! #fiio #k19 #fiioK19 #DAC #AMP".

www.instagram.com

Fiio is about to launch a new dac-amp and they listend to the people. HDMI Arc in with an out for video.

Also optical and coaxial also have outputs.

And it looks damn good. I can only wonder how powerful the amp section is.

 

[Tremolo]

"Equipped with a precise 31-band Parametric Equalizer (PEQ)... "

 

[Human Bass]

Btw, it has a quite powerful amp, around 8watts.

 

[Rednaxela]

The K19 is scheduled for launch in March, priced at £1,249 / €1,300 / $1,300.

FiiO M23 and K19 - Fidelity Magazine

FiiO unveils the M23 Digital Audio Player (DAP) and the K19 flagship balanced Hi-Res desktop headphone amplifier/DAC.

www.fidelity-magazine.com

 

[poldo]

I guess the HDMIs imply it's also able to convert the DSD streams of SACDs? I just ordered a UBP-X800M2

 

[Tremolo]

Avalaible on order at Audiophonics. I don't know, it is an interesting product but 1400 euros for a dac are a lot of money nowadays, specially if intended mainly for desktop use (tiny screen, no remote). I wonder how the user is expected to manage a 31 bands peq, the Fiio Control app for android is not the best in class, I am afraid you need to connect the dac to a PC.

 

[Human Bass]

Avalaible on order at Audiophonics. I don't know, it is an interesting product but 1400 euros for a dac are a lot of money nowadays, specially if intended mainly for desktop use (tiny screen, no remote). I wonder how the user is expected to manage a 31 bands peq, the Fiio Control app for android is not the best in class, I am afraid you need to connect the dac to a PC.

It is also a powerful amp. So not cheap, but not crazy expensive either.

 

[poldo]

Avalaible on order at Audiophonics. I don't know, it is an interesting product but 1400 euros for a dac are a lot of money nowadays, specially if intended mainly for desktop use (tiny screen, no remote). I wonder how the user is expected to manage a 31 bands peq, the Fiio Control app for android is not the best in class, I am afraid you need to connect the dac to a PC.

Good points. By the way, the R9 too has got the rather rare HDMI-in useful together with Blu-ray players as music players: I had no idea before the K19 attracted my attention!?!

 

[Tremolo]

Good points. By the way, the R9 too has got the rather rare HDMI-in useful together with Blu-ray players as music players: I had no idea before the K19 attracted my attention!?!

No DSD support on hdmi for the R9: HDMI IN: Supports up to 192kHz/24bit. I guess the K19 is the same. You would loose the eq ability anyway, so why use DSD?

 

[poldo]

No DSD support on hdmi for the R9: HDMI IN: Supports up to 192kHz/24bit. I guess the K19 is the same. You would loose the eq ability anyway, so why use DSD?

Yes, but too bad for the DSD decoding, I think it would be useful in some cases. Given the hardware, it would be feasible to implement it in a new firmware? Certainly the DACs themselves are ready, and they seem to generally care about DSD. I have quite a few rather rare physical SACDs and for the time being I ordered a chinese extractor which should be enough for my needs (https://forums.stevehoffman.tv/thre...y-its-s-pdif-opinions-and-help-please.1153948)

 

[poldo]

No DSD support on hdmi for the R9: HDMI IN: Supports up to 192kHz/24bit. I guess the K19 is the same. You would loose the eq ability anyway, so why use DSD?

By the way, that piece of terse info from the FIIO site is wrong/out of date at least as far as the R9 is concerned (I don't think the K19 can possibly be worse!): today I got my Sony UBP-X800M2, connected its HDMI Audio to the HDMI in of my R9 and no problem at all decoding the DSD streams of my SACDs. Fantastic, as far as I'm concerned!

 

[Hülse]

Two line outs? Why? Why not a line in and a line out? I also want to listen to records with my headphones!

 

[NexusOne]

Does the hdmi arc output have the same function like the hdmi port in the Smsl Do 100 Pro? So it is also an input for the TV? I am a bit confused because they call it output. But I think Smsl DO 100 Pro + Topping A70Pro is the cheaper and more powerful solution.

 

[Human Bass]

Does the hdmi arc output have the same function like the hdmi port in the Smsl Do 100 Pro? So it is also an input for the TV? I am a bit confused because they call it output. But I think Smsl DO 100 Pro + Topping A70Pro is the cheaper and more powerful solution.

The A70pro is a defective turd. Dont ever buy it, insanely high failure rate.

And power wise they are pretty similar. K19 deliveries 8watts at 32ohm, plenty of power with much more resources

 

[johny_2000]

It is clear that FIO is investing and growing its portfolio at leaps and bounds in all aspects of quality audio. So many new (and quality) products in the last couple of years. They spare no expense in purchasing the latest electronics components from all the world's leading manufacturers, and implement all the standard functions demanded by consumers included in DACs, DSPs, USB / Bluetooth transceivers, etc. I already have their latest USB dongle (DAC+Amp) and a pair of headphones (dynamic and planar).

 

[NexusOne]

O.k. I won't buy the A70Pro. The same things you can read about the Aune S17Pro.

I read the quick start guide but didn't find an answer. Is it possible to dimm the knobs, too or only the display? The bright lights would be bad in a completely dark room.

And is hdmi in practice better than optical in or is there no difference for using headphones?

I think the K19 could be a good AVR for headphones but it is a bit overprized.

 

[Bill_S]

Greetings! Long time lurker here. Just saw this in my email and thought I would share.

FiiO K19 Desktop DAC/Headphone Amplifier

31-band high-precision lossless PEQ, ADI ADSP-21565 DSP chip with SHARC+ core. The arms race is on. Now give me bass management and I would buy it.

 

[johny_2000]

It looks very promising from the renderings and specs pages. But, as always, the devil is in the details. In most cases, these specifications are neither supported by documented measurements on certified equipment nor verified by a third party. None of the equipment manufacturers are immune from hardware, firmware and software bugs. This is where most newbies fail. They don't have enough knowledge, experience, relationships with component engineers, customer feedbacks, etc. So chances are you'll get a device that works somehow at first, with a few hiccups here and there, and then you'll find yourself stuck with a manufacturer that provides little to no technical support or ability to solve your problems, let alone that some errors are corrected. After a while of struggling with all this, you will give up, and the manufacturer will also give up and move on to the next model.

That's how I feel about FiiO products. By this time I already had FiiO FT3 / FT5 headphones, and portable DAC/amplifier KA17. All of them had problems that the manufacturer's support specialists could not solve. The software is low quality and buggy. Hardware output measurements taken on spec-proven equipment did not come close to the published information on their product pages.

 

[Bill_S]

I really don't know anything about FiiO products. My DACS are all Topping and S.M.S.L at the moment. I just thought it interesting that someone was bringing out something other than the usual DAC chasing sinad.

 

[raif71]

It looks very promising from the renderings and specs pages. But, as always, the devil is in the details. In most cases, these specifications are neither supported by documented measurements on certified equipment nor verified by a third party. None of the equipment manufacturers are immune from hardware, firmware and software bugs. This is where most newbies fail. They don't have enough knowledge, experience, relationships with component engineers, customer feedbacks, etc. So chances are you'll get a device that works somehow at first, with a few hiccups here and there, and then you'll find yourself stuck with a manufacturer that provides little to no technical support or ability to solve your problems, let alone that some errors are corrected. After a while of struggling with all this, you will give up, and the manufacturer will also give up and move on to the next model.

That's how I feel about FiiO products. By this time I already had FiiO FT3 / FT5 headphones, and portable DAC/amplifier KA17. All of them had problems that the manufacturer's support specialists could not solve. The software is low quality and buggy. Hardware output measurements taken on spec-proven equipment did not come close to the published information on their product pages.

Whatever... the early customers are usually lab rats for new and untried products but companies need to wade in the waters of uncertainty otherwise the status quo remains and the audiophile market desperately need change.