Icon Mobile Upgrade Recommendation

You list it in your sig as part of your portable setup. Do you need it to be USB-Bus powered? Small as possible on the go makes that a probable yes.

Uhhh, the Pico USB DAC-only is highly rated, but a bit out of your range, iirc.

IIRC, the NuForce uDac and the Nuforce Icon Mobile use exactly the same DAC chip, so you'd get no change on that end; you'd only be changing the headphone amp circuitry. (someone please correct me if I'm wrong)

I went from the Icon Mobile to the uDac and to me the uDac is better than the icon as a DAC.

The Hotaudio DAC-Extasy fits the bill perfectly. The people in the uDAC thread say the Pico DAC isn't even much better than the uDAC, if at all better, while the DAC Extasy is a definite upgrade over the uDAC. I would go with that one- in fact, i have.

I don't think so. They don't have the same DAC chip.

Ok, sorry, I must have been thinking of something else.

cant give a review on it yet but i just pulled the trigger on the ibasso D4 dual dac chips and a good amp and pretty portable. Should be here this week. 240ish shipped.

I've never heard the icon mobile, so I can't really comment on that, or how bright it is. My impression of the Extasy, however, is that it is very well balanced across the board, very neutral, neither warm nor bright, neither forward nor laid back. It's just "even." I wouldn't call the mids especially "lush" or the bass especially "deep" -- to me, it all just sounds extremely natural and accurate. That neutral signature might sound "bright" to someone coming to it from the standpoint of liking artificially boosted bass, etc. But as far as I can tell, it's just extremely neutral and accurate. Very nice.

The uDAC, otoh, doesn't sound that way. By comparison, there is a slight bump in the mid-bass, a slight recession in the upper mids, and the highs are more rolled off, "sizzly," and definitely thinner in comparison. The highs on the Extasy sound much more natural and realistic than the uDAC, and also much more balanced with the rest of the frequencies.

Even though the highs are more rolled off with the uDAC, because they are a little bit "sizzly," the DAC as a whole tends to have that kind of "U"-shaped sound, with that bump in the midbass and the slightly recessed upper mids all contributing. Usually that is done for "wow" factor, which is great if that's the sound you prefer. But from your description it sounded like you were going for something more like the Extasy, which is ruler-flat by comparison, has more even mids and better highs, and overall is just better balanced throughout.

Those are my impressions, at least, once again coming from the standpoint of *neutrality,* or of valuing neutrality. If you are coming from wanting a more bass-boosted sound, or more of that "wow" factor sound as opposed to neutrality, you might very well prefer the uDAC, if you could overlook the fact that the highs quite frankly are just not as good. To me, that was a flaw with the uDAC that goes beyond mere preference, so it was hard for me to get beyond that, but for some people having that slightly colored or artificially "warm" sound is more important and they can overlook the flaws with the highs. I like balance and neutrality more, so I went with the Extasy.

bah, I think that's probably just there for legal reasons, so people don't blow their ears out or blow their earbuds and sue him or something.

I've listened to the Extasy with both my PK3s and KCS75s directly out of the HP out with no problem. It's just like the HP out on anything. You just have to take the usual precautions with your volume that you would with anything else.

The uDAC with its built in amp has at least 1/3 more power and you can use IEMs with that. Maybe hotaudio will write in with some super technical reason not to do it, but otherwise I wouldn't worry about it too much, personally.