NAD C658 Streaming DAC Review

[Soniclife]

What mixed bag? The jitter "issue" is inaudible and the product was recommended.

I thought someone said the jitter issue was also fixed after the review.

 

[ta240]

The only feature missing that should be there is the unit acting as a USB DAC

I guess for the price, why not have a USB input but if you are using a computer for your audio then you don't need a streaming device like this.

 

[Jim777]

Thanks Amir for this review. As a one-man operation, he seems to be measuring/reviewing gear at the rate of operations like Stereophile/Absolute Sound--or maybe even beyound. How this is possible I can't imagine.

I had my eye on this NAD component for a while ... moving on.

Waaaaay beyond, Stereophile is monthly, Amir is daily! (give or take) And he goes much deeper than the magazines, which is why (for example) he found the issue with the OPPO that no one else did.

 

[amadeuswus]

Waaaaay beyond, Stereophile is monthly, Amir is daily! (give or take) And he goes much deeper than the magazines, which is why (for example) he found the issue with the OPPO that no one else did.

I fixed my post. I no longer subscribe to either Stereophile or Absolute Sound, so I hesitated to go by the number of reviews on their websites. But in Amir's case, lean-and-mean definitely leaves institutional bloat behind.

 

[infinitesymphony]

Yamaha WXA-50 has similar measurements for less than 1/3rd the price and it even comes with a built-in amplifier.

 

[EB1000]

I own the C658. While it does sound good when streaming Tidal or local music from network. It has a ton of bugs. Subwoofer output is almost silent. Pops and clicks coming from the speakers and sub when no music playing. Audible hiss if you get closer to speakers. Very large latency on analog inputs (500ms). Mine is connected to NC400 monoblocks and Focal Aria 906 speakers. I wich I new better before buying it/


You simply cannot trust commercial reviews:

https://www.whathifi.com/reviews/nad-c-658

https://hometheaterhifi.com/reviews/amplifier/nad-c-658-bluos-streaming-dac-review/

https://www.soundstagesimplifi.com/...iews/107-nad-classic-c658-bluos-streaming-dac

https://www.stereonet.co.uk/reviews/nad-electronics-c-658-bluos-streaming-dac-review

I've seen 6 different reviews before buying and all of them praised it... go figure...



P.S. what seems to be the problem with the digital inputs exactly? Mine are functioning OK. The same goes for the HDMI module. If they cant sync, how are they functional and play music w/o a problem (except when the sample rate is changed between songs, then you get a pop sound)

 

[Worth Davis]

Another train wreck, thanks Amirm

I'm a huge fan of the minidsp shd, just works exactly as it says it does

 

[RichB]

I own the C658. While it does sound good when streaming Tidal or local music from network. It has a ton of bugs. Subwoofer output is almost silent. Pops and clicks coming from the speakers and sub when no music playing. Audible hiss if you get closer to speakers. Very large latency on analog inputs (500ms). Mine is connected to NC400 monoblocks and Focal Aria 906 speakers. I wich I new better before buying it/


You simply cannot trust commercial reviews:

https://www.whathifi.com/reviews/nad-c-658

https://hometheaterhifi.com/reviews/amplifier/nad-c-658-bluos-streaming-dac-review/

https://www.soundstagesimplifi.com/...iews/107-nad-classic-c658-bluos-streaming-dac

https://www.stereonet.co.uk/reviews/nad-electronics-c-658-bluos-streaming-dac-review

I've seen 6 different reviews before buying and all of them praised it... go figure...



P.S. what seems to be the problem with the digital inputs exactly? Mine are functioning OK. The same goes for the HDMI module. If they cant sync, how are they functional and play music w/o a problem (except when the sample rate is changed between songs, then you get a pop sound)

It is fair to say that products reviews without measurements are lacking but there is a place for reviews to discuss operational issues and a wider variety of uses. Product may measure well here but a small portion of the functionality is tested.

For the most part, Stereophile includes measurements so their reviews are generally good.
They fall down on recommended cables and reviews of products with abysmal measurement costing multiple thousands that are recommended.

- Rich

 

[infinitesymphony]

Pops and clicks coming from the speakers and sub when no music playing.

P.S. what seems to be the problem with the digital inputs exactly? Mine are functioning OK. The same goes for the HDMI module. If they cant sync, how are they functional and play music w/o a problem (except when the sample rate is changed between songs, then you get a pop sound)

Pops and clicks can indicate a clock sync issue, which is what the review revealed on the digital audio inputs. Do you get the pops and clicks when streaming over the network?

 

[TimW]

I bought an SHD without even knowing the C 658 existed. When I learned about the NAD I wondered if I should have gotten it instead. It looks like a handsome high quality product, whereas the miniDSP looks like a piece of industrial equipment that should be hidden in a rack. The specs of the C 658 are mediocre but I wondered if maybe NAD was just conservative with it's ratings. Seeing that the performance is indeed mediocre and hearing about all the software issues has made me very glad I went with the SHD.

 

[martijn86]

Auch. This was precisely the product I was aiming for. The DAC+streamer+pre-amp is all I need and many either include an amplifier or don't include a pre-amplifier. I've ordered a Yamaha WXC-50, that offers the same feature set, just to play around with until something ~€1000,- comes along on ASR that's a top 20 performer.

 

[amirm]

P.S. what seems to be the problem with the digital inputs exactly? Mine are functioning OK. The same goes for the HDMI module. If they cant sync, how are they functional and play music w/o a problem (except when the sample rate is changed between songs, then you get a pop sound)

It syncs enough to generate audio (i.e. recover audio samples). It is just that it is not stable, jumping back and forth on what rate it thinks the input is. So your music is constantly getting modulated by this.

 

[Dj7675]

It syncs enough to generate audio (i.e. recover audio samples). It is just that it is not stable, jumping back and forth on what rate it thinks the input is. So your music is constantly getting modulated by this.

Wow. If this is what all units are doing when they are hearing pops and clicks etc, that would be quite the defect. And if our past experience shows us anything... NAD will say:
-All our customers say it sounds great
-As a company policy we do not comment on 3rd party reviews.
It is really unfortunate too, because their new products have fantastic features and I love the look of their new products.

 

[jam]

The only feature missing that should be there is the unit acting as a USB DAC. It has a USB connector but that is it acting as a host, playing content from external storage.​

A glaring omission from a company like NAD considering the resources at their disposal. They tend to jam pack their products with all kinds of bells and whistles and then omit the most obvious feature that a cheap little DAC from a small Chinese company will incorporate.

 

[bluefuzz]

Subwoofer output is almost silent.

I recently set up a sub on mine. Output seems perfectly fine with plenty of headroom (going from sub-out to line in on a DIY Hypex FA251 based sub).

Pops and clicks coming from the speakers and sub when no music playing.

I experienced some popping at first when it was sitting idle for a while. But I haven't noticed it the last month or so. Possibly since last update.

Audible hiss if you get closer to speakers

Not here. I can put my ear on the tweeter at -16 dB (way louder than I normally listen) and not hear any hiss.

Very large latency on analog inputs (500ms).

I don't use the analogue inputs. I have an AppleTV connected to the optical input and an Oppo on coax – both inputs also function fine here. I watch a lot of movies through the C658 and have not noticed any latency issues - certainly not 500 ms - and I'm quite attentive to latency issues. Obviously there's an additional AD conversion going on with the analogue inputs but I'm surprised it's 500 ms. The latency of the DAC including Dirac processing is under 50 ms. I would expect 100 ms at worst. How did you measure the 500 ms?

It's interesting how different people's experience of this device is. The biggest issue with it seems to be quality control if there is such variation in performance. While the SINAD score is somewhat underwhelming (although Amir's test mule is an obviously broken example) I'm on the whole very happy with mine. It does all that it says on the tin without issue in my experience.

 

[jam]

Thanks for the tip!
It looks interesting.

- Rich

Rich, as far as the miniDSP SHD goes, knowing how you've shown a preference through the years for the higher end gear and considering the less than stellar measurements that Amir reported from the review of that unit, I would look more into the miniDSP SHD Studio version. That unit has no analog outputs and costs $300 less, so you can take that money and use it to buy any number of good and affordable DACs that should arguably yield better performance than the analog section of SHD. An issue to consider with both of these miniDSP SHD units is that they don't offer USB input if that's important to you.

 

[mhardy6647]

No interest in evaluating the analog aspects of the preamp?
e.g., maybe the phono stage?

 

[jackenhack]

Why aren't there any decent audio streamers with Dirac Live or other corrections? I refuse to buy a unit "blind" without a thorough measurement by @amirm. After finding this site, I only purchase equipment that's been tested here. I haven't been disappointed yet, every piece of gear works great. I mostly listen to several headphone setups, but It would be nice to be able to enjoy music through speakers once in a while.

I just installed a MiniDSP with Dirac Live, and it does really improve my speaker setup, which used to be abysmal, but now it's quite nice. I want a streaming pre-amplifier with Roon and Dirac Live support.

Here's hoping for a good and not too expensive unit shortly.

 

[RichB]

Rich, as far as the miniDSP SHD goes, knowing how you've shown a preference through the years for the higher end gear and considering the less than stellar measurements that Amir reported from the review of that unit, I would look more into the miniDSP SHD Studio version. That unit has no analog outputs and costs $300 less, so you can take that money and use it to buy any number of good and affordable DACs that should arguably yield better performance than the analog section of SHD. An issue to consider with both of these miniDSP SHD units is that they don't offer USB input if that's important to you.

That is an interesting option that I have considered as well.
Then, it becomes a matter of volume control which if controlled by Roon would be digital with DAC at maximum volume.
The SHD is interesting in that it includes bass management and I have a sub. Hopefully, there is a DSP bypass option for comparisson.

- Rich

 

[RichB]

Why aren't there any decent audio streamers with Dirac Live or other corrections? I refuse to buy a unit "blind" without a thorough measurement by @amirm. After finding this site, I only purchase equipment that's been tested here. I haven't been disappointed yet, every piece of gear works great. I mostly listen to several headphone setups, but It would be nice to be able to enjoy music through speakers once in a while.

I just installed a MiniDSP with Dirac Live, and it does really improve my speaker setup, which used to be abysmal, but now it's quite nice. I want a streaming pre-amplifier with Roon and Dirac Live support.

Here's hoping for a good and not too expensive unit shortly.

This option appears to do everything you want.
From what I read, Roon endpoint is supplied by the Volumio software.

https://www.minidsp.com/products/streaming-hd-series/shd

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...nts-of-minidsp-shd-dac-dsp-and-streamer.4286/

- Rich