WiiM Ultra Streamer Preamp Review

[shuppatsu]

It’s definitely the HDMI . Happens even when TV is unplugged. So could possibly be from the satellite coax cable , but none of my other setups do it and they’re all using HDMI ARC and all are on same Dish system. Didn’t have this problem when a AVR was in use .

It could definitely be the satellite coax. That will definitely run through the TV’s HDMI. Had this happen at my dad’s house. Super loud, but hilariously my dad has a fancy home theater but he’s so deaf he couldn’t hear it!

Easy way to check is just unscrew the coax from the wall.

 

[Joffy1780]

Curious about this. What practices are you referring to?

+1

 

[Burnside]

Curious about this. What practices are you referring to?

Delivering great products at great prices? I know, it's absolutely shocking - hi fi is an elitist hobby, they're letting the riff-raff in now with those sorts of business practices

 

[TimW]

A little disappointed with the screen saver options, it either shows a simple time with cheesey slideshow pictures behind it or a bulbous pink and purple time. I wish there was a more understated clock option. Anyone know if this is on the roadmap?

 

[Burnside]

A little disappointed with the screen saver options, it either shows a simple time with cheesey slideshow pictures behind it or a bulbous pink and purple time. I wish there was a more understated clock option. Anyone know if this is on the roadmap?

WiiM Ultra Roadmap

Updated on Oct 4, 2024 What we're working on … We want to give you visibility into some of the features we are working on. For a complete list of released features, please refer to our official release notes. If you would like to make a f...

faq.wiimhome.com

 

[shuppatsu]

Looking at the roadmap, it's pretty incredible how much they have added in the past year and how much more they plan on unveiling in the near future.

 

[pogo]

Too bad, they are not yet thinking about integrating Dirac Live.

 

[Raxumit]

Looking at the roadmap, it's pretty incredible how much they have added in the past year and how much more they plan on unveiling in the near future.

I'm with everyone complaining about the clock and UI displays, but when I check the roadmap I'm sympathetic to their priorities for the most part. Adding Plex integration has to be more valuable in user base acquisition than UI refinements.

Whenever I see a bunch of "Fixing XXX and YYY music service issues" in the release notes, same thing. It's no good if it looks pretty but doesn't play.

 

[Petrushka]

I'm with everyone complaining about the clock and UI displays, but when I check the roadmap I'm sympathetic to their priorities for the most part. Adding Plex integration has to be more valuable in user base acquisition than UI refinements.

Whenever I see a bunch of "Fixing XXX and YYY music service issues" in the release notes, same thing. It's no good if it looks pretty but doesn't play.

I’m so old I can remember when Parasound cancelled an AVR project after the hardware was ready, because they couldn’t get the software right. At the time, I thought that was silly. Since then I find that getting software right is a big deal.

 

[himey]

I’m so old I can remember when Parasound cancelled an AVR project after the hardware was ready, because they couldn’t get the software right. At the time, I thought that was silly. Since then I find that getting software right is a big deal.

What were the issues?

 

[Petrushka]

What were the issues?

They hired a software company for the project and they never produced an acceptable product. Lots of money wasted.

This was some time ago, ten or 15 years.

 

[harkpabst]

This was some time ago, ten or 15 years.

We call that "recently" or "the other day" ...

Too bad, they are not yet thinking about integrating Dirac Live.

Being mainly a software driven company I don't see how licensing 3rd party software would fit WiiM's/Linkplay's business plan.

Also the majority of customers (leaving out us nerdy geeks hanging around in HiFi forums) wouldn't even consider spending another $200 for a software license and more money on a microphone and stand for a $329 device that comes with some kind of room correction, for free.

So no, I don't think this is ever going to happen.

 

[EJ3]

We call that "recently" or "the other day" ...

Sort of like some people here (James Island, SC, USA) call the American Civil War the "recent unpleasantness"?

 

[harkpabst]

Sort of like some people here (James Island, SC, USA) call the American Civil War the "recent unpleasantness"?

Not exactly like this, I hope.

 

[EJ3]

Not exactly like this, I hope.

Well, most of those people do seem to have gotten over it.
They seem to be ones that had family on both sides of the conflict.
Having family fights is one thing, having armies to do it with is another.

 

[pogo]

So no, I don't think this is ever going to happen.

Bluesound could do with a little competition at this point.

 

[GXAlan]

So you agree that TOSLINK doesn't max out at 96 kHz officially?

Because it doesn't. Even if some devices are limited to 96 kHz.

Toshiba offers different TOSLINK(TM) products with different bandwidth.

https://www.tme.eu/Document/3363e65f4c705941469014401686faf2/TOFC100-xx.pdf

And if you do the match, you run out of bandwidth.

That said, Toshiba makes stuff with 125Mb/s bandwidth.

While the patents are long expired, TOSLINK(TM) is still trademarked and refers to Toshiba optical product as opposed to “optical digital.” For all we know, third parties are what are enabling 24/192.

We talk a lot about which IC DAC is used (AKM, ESS, etc.). Looking at this, I bet the different transmitters and receivers play a role in what actually syncs.

Maybe TOSLINK(TM) officially maxes out at 96 kHz but Toshiba is conservative with their rating which is how you get 192 kHz. Maybe it’s third party optical tx/rx ICs that offer the higher bandwidth parts in their audio line.

 

[PatriceA]

Hello,
Within a month, I will be receiving a pair of Genelec 8361. My setup will be pretty simple: ROON (Qobuz and Synology NAS): digital output into 8361s; nothing more. Ultra is obviously a "good" solution in this context. I recently noticed that a FiiO streamer (S15) was due to be released soon. It will have digital AES out (Genelec recommended connexion) and analog XLR out (that I may use as well with FOSI amp). Room correction and bass management will come from GLM Genelec. Therefore, no use for ULTRA sub out / room correction / ... I will be waiting for S15 detailed specs. All comments welcome.

 

[shuppatsu]

Hello,
Within a month, I will be receiving a pair of Genelec 8361. My setup will be pretty simple: ROON (Qobuz and Synology NAS): digital output into 8361s; nothing more. Ultra is obviously a "good" solution in this context. I recently noticed that a FiiO streamer (S15) was due to be released soon. It will have digital AES out (Genelec recommended connexion) and analog XLR out (that I may use as well with FOSI amp). Room correction and bass management will come from GLM Genelec. Therefore, no use for ULTRA sub out / room correction / ... I will be waiting for S15 detailed specs. All comments welcome.

The S15 looks like a seriously beautiful piece of kit. However, I personally would vastly prefer the Wiim. Fiio describes the upcoming product functionally as a landscape mode version of the R9. The R7/R9 are Android based touchscreen setups that simply run the regular smartphone apps of various streaming services. It has a phone app, but it is extremely rudimentary. Looks like people like it with Roon so you might be fine, but it seems like it is centered around you manipulating things using the touchscreen rather than by phone.

People in this thread claim that so long as the run is short, you can use an rca coax to AES adapter like this without a transformer and it should work fine. It's crazy to me that Genelec doesn't include Toslink and Coax. I know they market to the pros but still I'm sure there's many a pro who has found that a limitation.

 

[Pritaudio]

It's one and the same thing. Room Correction creates a set of 10 PEQ filters. You can use them as they are, you can manually modify them, you can make your own. There's nothing secret inside WiiM RC.


Not sure what you mean. Sub integration is always manual in that you have to select a crossover frequency (low pass to sub and high pass to mains by default), subwoofer level and delay in ms (for either mains or - more likely - the sub).

The filters (high and low pass) are 4th order Linkwitz-Riley. There's a new option to bypass either the low pass filter or the high pass filter or both.

Automatic RC doesn't do anything specific to the subwoofer output. It just corrects within the defined frequency range (default: 40 Hz to 4 kHz).

1. How many profiles of eq can this thing store for quick access.
2. Regarding the new option to bypass high or low pass. This would be useful for listening at different times of day.
If combined with eq profiles, it could mean listening without the subwoofer when required.
3. With the sub out, Can the sub be eq’d seperately from the main stereos.
Otherwise the only advantage of the sub out is high/low pass in the software compared to using the back of the subwoofer manual settings.