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ifi Zen DAC and Headphone Amp Review
- Thread starter amirm
- Start date
no more love to ifi. they increase price from 160 to 190. we go buy topping
That's temporary on Amazon. It'll be $159 again...
Edit: and you didn't mention which specific Topping product(s)
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lol you must work for us gov and fed, tell us that the price increase is temp.
Sorry, just going off assumption based on past price (and that holds no weight whatsoever). Maybe the change is permanent, maybe not.
What is the Topping product you speak of?
Topping DX3Pro+
Topping DX3 Pro+ Review (DAC & Headphone Amp)
This is a review and detailed measurements of the Topping DX3 Pro+ DAC and headphone amplifier. It is a replacement for one of my most favorite combo products, the DX3 Pro. It was sent to me by the company and costs US $199. The DX3 Pro+ maintains the gorgeous and high contrast orange LEDs...
www.audiosciencereview.com
Consider the newish iFi ZEN CAN Signature HFM with filter option tuned specifically for HIFIMAN cans including yours.
I actually already bought a Schiit stack
Might buy something from Ifi in the future to have something to compare against.
Please share specifically what “appropriate adapter cables for utilizing the balanced outputs” you purchased. There are outfits selling adapters that claim to turn unbalanced to balanced, but rarely is this actually the case. Also take it to your local shop and try the balanced headphone output with a truly balanced cable/cans (remove the adapter as a test). What are you using with the balanced output on the back to determine that it works fine?
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I would guess our friend has bought a 4.4 male to 3.5/6.35 mm female adapter and is running single ended headphones from a balanced output.
These don't, won't and shouldn't work. Sadly I think we've both seen some advertised that claim to.
Hi guys,
I'm still using the iFi Zen DAC (v1) with a Matrix M-stage headphone amp which pairs up nicely (but have a THX 789 coming, which has balanced inputs).
Currently using some Tara Labs Prism 300i RCA cables. Is it worth getting a 4.4mm pentaconn to dual XLR balanced cable? I realise that balanced cables have mostly been developed for long runs of cable to limit interference, reduce noise leak etc. Besides a neater setup (0.3m long would be ideal), is it worth the money? The iFi cable is about A$150 which is most of the cost of the unit so have ruled it out almost (the specs sound impressive, oxygen free blah blah), there are chinese handmade options on ebay etc at 1/3 of the price (not too much info on them).
It's always fun to try new stuff but agree that once you hit a certain minimum level of gear, upgrades often result in changes to sound as opposed to major sonic improvements, and the laws of diminishing returns. For such a shot cable length I don't think you'd hear any difference (unless the other cables were dodgy or of very cheap quality. Even the purple RCA that comes with it are probably fine but had the Tara labs sitting around.
Thanks,
I'm still using the iFi Zen DAC (v1) with a Matrix M-stage headphone amp which pairs up nicely (but have a THX 789 coming, which has balanced inputs).
Currently using some Tara Labs Prism 300i RCA cables. Is it worth getting a 4.4mm pentaconn to dual XLR balanced cable? I realise that balanced cables have mostly been developed for long runs of cable to limit interference, reduce noise leak etc. Besides a neater setup (0.3m long would be ideal), is it worth the money? The iFi cable is about A$150 which is most of the cost of the unit so have ruled it out almost (the specs sound impressive, oxygen free blah blah), there are chinese handmade options on ebay etc at 1/3 of the price (not too much info on them).
It's always fun to try new stuff but agree that once you hit a certain minimum level of gear, upgrades often result in changes to sound as opposed to major sonic improvements, and the laws of diminishing returns. For such a shot cable length I don't think you'd hear any difference (unless the other cables were dodgy or of very cheap quality. Even the purple RCA that comes with it are probably fine but had the Tara labs sitting around.
Thanks,
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Get the $22 Balanced cable, it does sound a little better than the single ended.
►https://Amazon.com/dp/B07WTQ9M9B
Yes, have been looking at that exact one, Amazon claim end of March or April (delivered to Aus). I've found the same one on eBay which would be the end of the month ( from China). It's probably the most I'd want to spend and looks tidy, the iFi one is pretty excessive cost and still too long.
Ta
Consider supporting a small company (with nice folks that answer the phone and respond to emails) based and making their cables in-house in Tyler, Texas ... Hart Audio Cables. I use their balanced TC-3: 4.4mm Pentaconn to Dual 3-pin XLR to connect the Zen DAC Sigv2 to Schiit Freya+ and it sounds great.
Those look really nice mate!
It's just a case of the shipping a fair bit (probably) if posted outside of the US (unless it's on Amazon).
No doubt it's better than the chinese one.
That little tube amp looks the goods too, nice stack being the same width.
The funny thin is the M-stage and iFi Zen both have stainless finishes so looks ok, just the M-stage is very deep
Ideally would like the same kind of stack but no rush.
Cheers,
It's just a case of the shipping a fair bit (probably) if posted outside of the US (unless it's on Amazon).
No doubt it's better than the chinese one.
That little tube amp looks the goods too, nice stack being the same width.
The funny thin is the M-stage and iFi Zen both have stainless finishes so looks ok, just the M-stage is very deep
Ideally would like the same kind of stack but no rush.
Cheers,
Noodles
Active Member
So this is an update on my earlier rant on the V1 ... I never thought I would be writing these words, but here I go.
I own a V2 Zen DAC due to PS5 support on their 5.3 firmware. It works fine for the PS5.
Up to this point I had not used it on my noisy USB PC, until today. I plugged it in without the power adapter and my usually very noisy USB power did not translate as such on the V2. I used to have a V1 and that was absolutely abysmal.
I can still hear the faintest hint of ground loop noise if I plug in sensitive IEMs but not remotely close to what I had on the V1.
If I plug in the Power supply, it is all but gone.
I do not know what they changed except the XMOS chip, but apparently they have added additional filters (have not looked at schematics yet).
So ... credit where credit is due. Good job iFi ?!
I own a V2 Zen DAC due to PS5 support on their 5.3 firmware. It works fine for the PS5.
Up to this point I had not used it on my noisy USB PC, until today. I plugged it in without the power adapter and my usually very noisy USB power did not translate as such on the V2. I used to have a V1 and that was absolutely abysmal.
I can still hear the faintest hint of ground loop noise if I plug in sensitive IEMs but not remotely close to what I had on the V1.
If I plug in the Power supply, it is all but gone.
I do not know what they changed except the XMOS chip, but apparently they have added additional filters (have not looked at schematics yet).
So ... credit where credit is due. Good job iFi ?!
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