 |
Free home audition now available. Call for details . . . FAQs | Forum | Bargains | > Email or call 0(044) 1782 621225
|
|
 |
||
Calyx 24/192 DAC
NOW AVAILABLE FOR FREE HOME LOAN Both the computer and the DAC are entirely battery-operated. Going off-grid is not only beautifully simple and energy efficient, it gives an unprecendently low noise floor combined with an uncommon sense of smoothness and great dynamic range. The £250 Dell Mini netbook we're bundling with the Calyx can be configured with Windows, Linux or Apple operating systems for local playback of your music library, or can operate equally happily as a network streamer / internet radio. The DAC is another ESS Sabre chip implementation (like the mould-breaking Wyred 4 Sound models), but Calyx have set this cutting edge 32-bit converter in quite a different architecture. Power (5V) can be delivered down the USB wire to a highly sophisticated filtering and storage network, or enter the DAC via an off-board supply: the machine comes with a stock switching PSU, but inevitably the forums are abuzz with user reports of upgrades to higher quality external PSUs . . . There are separate dedicated clocks for 44.1 and 48-based sample rates, and properly state-of-the-art Windows XMOS ASIO/USB drivers by Thesycon for seamless sample-rate switching. Used with Apple machines, Audirvana's integer mode is recommended, but no additional drivers are required for all sample rates up to 32/192. This machine is the purest kind of USB specialist: if you can pair it with a computer that doesn't foul up its USB supply too badly, it will reward with performance at the very top of this year's class. REVIEW EXTRACTS: “Clean power to the computer, and a fairly low noise computer is a must, otherwise sound quality will be affected. We began by listening to the Calyx DAC via its coaxial digital input replacing the Weiss DAC 202. The Calyx sounds smoother and a bit less immediate compared to the Weiss, although it isn’t soft or unfocused. While the Weiss has a bit more attack, the smoothness of the Calyx is quite deceptive. It’s just as detailed and dynamic, but with a relaxed and rounder quality. Music is refine, open and articulate but never calling attention to itself. “Neutral” and “Natural” sums up the sound of the Calyx DAC. It’s not an instantly impressive DAC – doesn’t wow you with bells and whistles. Iit just gives you music in a balanced and refined form. The more I listen to the Calyx, the more apparent that I really enjoy it. The high frequencies sound airy and open, yet with excellent detail. Midrange is very integrated with the highs creating a realistic portray of the music. Bass is quite deep and full, and gives good fundamentals to music’s rhythm. The Calyx is also dead quiet. the background is so black that all the little low level details are rendered very clearly. One can hear not only those details, but can also place them with precision in the sound scape. We then moved on to USB input. I am happy to report that computer USB playback takes the Calyx to a different level altogether. a very good DAC is now an extraordinary DAC! The naturalness and tonal presentation is the same, but everything becomes “bigger”. Sound stage now extend both width and depth, and the speakers “disappear” better than before. there is a strong sense of involvement with ease and effortlessness. Spatial resolution is now the best we have ever heard from any DAC period. With the Calyx/Mac mini/Audirvana trio, it is now a notch better with greater openness and detail. the improvements were unambiguous and consistent from track to track. We also did a comparison to the Weiss 202 via firewire, and there were not large differences between the two at this point. the Weiss’s tonality is still more immediate and “live”, but spatial cues are better reproduced by the Calyx. For the Calyx, it is a very good S/PDIF performer in its own right, but when driven through USB from a carefully set up computer rig will give you the sound that approaching state of the digital art.” – Digital Audio Blog |
|
|
|
||
Currency conversions updated daily by coinmill.com |
||
