[wood1030]

There's a user over @ AVSFORUMS that received his today and has it set up. His user name is TERRY.P.
 
He's been posting in the "Oppo Sonica DAC Hi-Fi Networked Music Player Announced" thread. You can maybe jump over there and ask him. He's probably listening to it as we speak. 

 

 

[rigo]

I'll take a look over there and the Bluesound suggestion.

 

[soundman414]

 
Yes. It does look very, VERY tempting.
 
I'm waiting for reviews to come in before making a decision. I'm not sure if it would be enough of an upgrade/addition over my HA-1 DAC to drop 8 bills just on spec.

I am also curious how the Sonica is different from the HA-1. I'm wondering if they got rid of the op-amps for direct coupling of the output stage.

 

[PitBul34]

GOT IT !!!
 

 

[dawktah2]

  GOT IT !!!
 

anxiously waiting...
 
I'm hoping this will pair well with a balanced tube amp.

 

[wood1030]

There's a user over @ AVSFORUMS that received his today and has it set up. His user name is TERRY.P.

He's been posting in the "Oppo Sonica DAC Hi-Fi Networked Music Player Announced" thread. 
You can maybe jump over there and ask him. He's probably listening to it as we speak. :bigsmile_face:  

Just to bump this topic, I know many of you have questions...over @ AVS Forums, there's an Oppo beta tester named Bob P. answering questions you might have about the Sonica DAC if you wanna lurk on over there or feel free to join in the discussion by joining (if you haven't already).

My username there is cwglideman.

The thread title is in my quoted post above.^^^ You can do a quick search for it once on the site.

 

[dawktah2]

I think I am going to go ahead and pick up one of the Sonica speakers, my Bose wave radio (showing my age) needs to be retired. At least if I do acquire the Sonica DAC I'll be able to see how they work together.

 

[Urma]

ESS ES9038PRO SABRE DAC chip has eight preset and programmable filter types.
How many and what type of filters are user-selectable in Oppo Sonica DAC?
Thanks for the answer.

 

[Andrew Rieger]

Any owner impressions?

 

[Hifi59]

Any owner impressions?

Mine comes in Wednesday. It will be paired with the Wells Audio Milo Amp. Currently using the Dac out of my Burson CV2+ amp. It uses the Ess 9018
Dac and Burson has implemented it well. I like it a lot. I have its signature as my reference point to judge the Sonicas Ess 9038 Dac. I will post impressions
as soon as I'm confident of what differences I'm hearing, if any.

 

[newtophones07]

According to the thread from AVS forums, it seems you have to physically change the inputs from the unit. Can anyone confirm this?? Seems odd at this price point not to have a physical remote or ir sensor. Smartphone controls are great, but having to get up off the coach like an old CRT television seems odd

 

[mike7898]

Does anyone have the Sonica DAC with the Sonica WiFi Stereo Pair speakers yet? If so what is your impression & how different can it sound compared to using USB with High Res music using the Sonica APP from our phone? In March me & the wife are going to vacation in San francisco & plan on stoping in the Oppo store to pick up another Sonica for Stereo Pair. Plus to look around. It will be my very first time going into the Oppo store. I can't wait! BTW love the SQ of the Sonica it's very amazing for it price & size. Sounds so much bigger then it's size! Well worth the money!
Sincerely,
Mike

 

[Hifi59]

So today is day one with the Sonica Dac.

I had this sucker up an running for what I want it to do within 15 minutes. I d/l the Sonica app to my iPad. Set the Dac up to find network. I intend to stream Tidal and Spotify via AirPlay (lossless compression) vs Bluetooth (lossy) . So now my iPad is completely untethered as I lay in bed and surf. I cannot hear a difference between being hardwired via USB and AirPlay. I went back and forth for a good hour. I cannot detect any diffference. I initially set volume to "fixed" instead of "variable". It has very high output.( using se output to amp.It would be more using xlr) Too much so in my case because my Wells Audio Milo already has plenty of power output low on the volume control. So I decided to use variable output with the volume set to -20. Btw, the iPad volume control is disabled when using it with AirPlay.

The Sonica has a pretty good weight to it physically and is rether deep. It looks great. As far as sound goes vs the ess9018 Dac that was in my Burson CV2+ Amp, at this point I honestly cannot hear any thing different. It's only been a few hours so if there are any notable sound differences, I'll let you know. I'm confident that any differences between the two will be subtle. A song that I'm familiar with just may expose any differences in time.

Bottom line, I'm very happy with it. It's a real looker. Flawless setup and has a nice feel to it and is quite refined imo.

Image dark, I know.

 

[wood1030]

So today is day one with the Sonica Dac.

I had this sucker up an running for what I want it to do within 15 minutes. I d/l the Sonica app to my iPad. Set the Dac up to find network. I intend to stream Tidal and Spotify via AirPlay (lossless compression) vs Bluetooth (lossy) . So now my iPad is completely untethered as I lay in bed and surf. I cannot hear a difference between being hardwired via USB and AirPlay. I went back and forth for a good hour. I cannot detect any diffference. I initially set volume to "fixed" instead of "variable". It has very high output.( using se output to amp.It would be more using xlr) Too much so in my case because my Wells Audio Milo already has plenty of power output low on the volume control. So I decided to use variable output with the volume set to -20. Btw, the iPad volume control is disabled when using it with AirPlay.

The Sonica has a pretty good weight to it physically and is rether deep. It looks great. As far as sound goes vs the ess9018 Dac that was in my Burson CV2+ Amp, at this point I honestly cannot hear any thing different. It's only been a few hours so if there are any notable sound differences, I'll let you know. I'm confident that any differences between the two will be subtle. A song that I'm familiar with just may expose any differences in time.

Bottom line, I'm very happy with it. It's a real looker. Flawless setup and has a nice feel to it and is quite refined imo.

Image dark, I know.

 

 
 
Congrats and thanks for the initial impressions, Hifi.
 
I'm still debating on whether this would make a noticeable difference in sound quality over my HA-1 (ESS 9018 DAC). The more I hear, from you and other member impressions, the more it's getting to be a harder sell because of negligable differences. Although, the more info I get, the better judgement I can make and I'm still open to the idea of adding one to the rack.
 
Please keep us posted if you are noticing any changes after extensive use  

 

[dawktah2]

I ordered a Sonica Speaker for my wife and daughter, this "is" Head-Fi, LOL.  So hopefully, once the two are paired they can still control the speaker independently or the control is seamless so they won't notice the DAC has been added.