This is a review and detailed measurements of the NEOHIPO ET30 VU meter and 2 in, 2 out speaker selector. It was sent to me by the company and costs US $160 but is on sale for 20% less on Amazon.
Let me tell you: you are not a hifi nerd if your heart did not melt as mine did the moment I saw the gorgeous, large VU meters!!!
What's more, they are lit via very uniform lighting RGB LEDs. Above is set to yellow-green but you can change them to almost any color with the middle knob. Each color was stunning in how intense and beautiful the shades were.
The good story doesn't end there. There is acceleration with damped return. You set the range for the VU meters with the left knob. The right knob programs how fast they act, from very slow on far left to quite nimble (for their size).
The case is made out of solid metal giving the unit a nice feel and ability to hold on to speaker wires without getting pulled. Switches feel very good as well. A microphone is also provided if you want to use that as the pick up instead of wires:
A USB-C cable is provided which I connected to my PC for testing. You can of course use any USB-C adapter.
For my testing, I used the unit parallel to my amplifier. In other words, I did not test it as a switcher but VU meter. Speaking of "VU," I tested it for accuracy. As you would guess, it is not very accurate. -3 dB for example would show -2 dB. So this is really for fun and visualization that there is a signal there, not as an instrument.
I did find one minor limitation. If you push more than 30 volts RMS (225 watts into 4 ohm), the meter pegs to max but may not always return to zero if you remove the signal. Power cycling fixes this. Something is saturating and latching.
Neohipo ET30 Measurements
For testing, I fired up the Purifi reference design amplifier so that we have a high-performance instrument to measure the impact of VU meter. This is how it performs by itself (one channel is a bit distorted due to loose speaker connection which I fixed for later tests):
Now the same but with both channels wired in parallel with speaker wires to ET30 (and rather long cables at that):
As you see, there is no impact at all. Same story is true for both frequency response and crosstalk:
To make sure it can handle high power, here is our sweep to clipping:
We can be sure that there is no impact on the amplifier.
Conclusions
We finally found it: a near perfect VU meter to warm our hearts and feed our eyes as we listen to our music! It has no impact on the connected device which is as it should be but has not in other VU meters we have tested. The build quality is excellent and looks are exquisite. Controls for such things as bandwidth are a great icing on the cake. Go ahead and order one for your holiday present. You will be happier for it!
I am happy to recommend the Neohipo ET30 VU meter.
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As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
Let me tell you: you are not a hifi nerd if your heart did not melt as mine did the moment I saw the gorgeous, large VU meters!!!
What's more, they are lit via very uniform lighting RGB LEDs. Above is set to yellow-green but you can change them to almost any color with the middle knob. Each color was stunning in how intense and beautiful the shades were.The good story doesn't end there. There is acceleration with damped return. You set the range for the VU meters with the left knob. The right knob programs how fast they act, from very slow on far left to quite nimble (for their size).
The case is made out of solid metal giving the unit a nice feel and ability to hold on to speaker wires without getting pulled. Switches feel very good as well. A microphone is also provided if you want to use that as the pick up instead of wires:
A USB-C cable is provided which I connected to my PC for testing. You can of course use any USB-C adapter.
For my testing, I used the unit parallel to my amplifier. In other words, I did not test it as a switcher but VU meter. Speaking of "VU," I tested it for accuracy. As you would guess, it is not very accurate. -3 dB for example would show -2 dB. So this is really for fun and visualization that there is a signal there, not as an instrument.
I did find one minor limitation. If you push more than 30 volts RMS (225 watts into 4 ohm), the meter pegs to max but may not always return to zero if you remove the signal. Power cycling fixes this. Something is saturating and latching.
Neohipo ET30 Measurements
For testing, I fired up the Purifi reference design amplifier so that we have a high-performance instrument to measure the impact of VU meter. This is how it performs by itself (one channel is a bit distorted due to loose speaker connection which I fixed for later tests):
Now the same but with both channels wired in parallel with speaker wires to ET30 (and rather long cables at that):
As you see, there is no impact at all. Same story is true for both frequency response and crosstalk:
To make sure it can handle high power, here is our sweep to clipping:
We can be sure that there is no impact on the amplifier.
Conclusions
We finally found it: a near perfect VU meter to warm our hearts and feed our eyes as we listen to our music! It has no impact on the connected device which is as it should be but has not in other VU meters we have tested. The build quality is excellent and looks are exquisite. Controls for such things as bandwidth are a great icing on the cake. Go ahead and order one for your holiday present. You will be happier for it!
I am happy to recommend the Neohipo ET30 VU meter.
----------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
