[normanl]

Has anyone listened to both R-28 and Ares and how they are compared to each other?

 

[Heavyboxer]

Excited that my R-28 will FINALLY be arriving tomorrow! (1 week in China with no updates.... EMS China sucks!)

 

[xenithon]

Has anyone listened to both R-28 and Ares and how they are compared to each other?

I used to own the Ares, and then subsequently the R2R-11 and now the R-28.

The Ares was very musical, and presented an incredible amount of detail in a relatively laid back manner. It had a wonderful ability to provide a smoothness to the sound without smearing or losing fine detail. The caveat was that it could be too laid back - so not ideal for anything rock, metal, or EDM related.

The R2R-11 was also musical but more dynamic. It was certainly a step up in terms of excitement, though at the same time it had euphonic character that was not as detailed as the Ares.

The R-28 seems to provide the best of both and hence is a noteworthy upgrade. It has the detail and articulation / refinement of the Ares (in fact, even more detail is extracted) while also being extremely powerful and dynamic like the R2R-11 (but again, even more so, so an upgrade in that regard too).

Granted these are different types of units (SE vs. balanced, DAC only vs. all-in-one) but the above was my findings in general with various amps in the mix.

 

[jerick70]

I received my Matrix X-SPDIF 2 yesterday. I have it connected to the I2S out on the R-28 -> X-SPDIF 2 -> iFi iDefender 3.0 -> powered USB hub -> Windows 10 PC. I definitely hear a difference with the X-SPDIF 2 in the audio chain. I have some more listening to do but it is very positive so far.

 

[Heavyboxer]

So the postman just dropped this off:



Packed very well:


And setup temporarily on my pc till I clear some space for this beast:

I had no idea my LCD-2 sounded THIS good!!!

 

[gLer]

So the postman just dropped this off:



Packed very well:


And setup temporarily on my pc till I clear some space for this beast:

I had no idea my LCD-2 sounded THIS good!!!

Congrats! You’d swear Audeze voiced their headphones on this amp. Try out NOS 3, my favorite setting by far.

 

[Heavyboxer]

Congrats! You’d swear Audeze voiced their headphones on this amp. Try out NOS 3, my favorite setting by far.

It's been only a few hours since the unit has been on. As per my experience with R2R DACs (R2R-11, Modi multibit), think I should give it at least 48 hours non stop power to stabilize.
(the Modi multibit was so bad that I had channel imbalance for 3 days after I switched off the unit when on holidays).

That being said, I did try the jumper thingy, cause I was super curious. The NOS 3 (S1 ON, S4 ON) seemed a lil weak to me. (Perhaps not burnt in enough or wrong jumpers?)

We really should get some proper chart to spell out exactly what's going on with what jumper, etc.

 

[gLer]

It's been only a few hours since the unit has been on. As per my experience with R2R DACs (R2R-11, Modi multibit), think I should give it at least 48 hours non stop power to stabilize.
(the Modi multibit was so bad that I had channel imbalance for 3 days after I switched off the unit when on holidays).

That being said, I did try the jumper thingy, cause I was super curious. The NOS 3 (S1 ON, S4 ON) seemed a lil weak to me. (Perhaps not burnt in enough or wrong jumpers?)

We really should get some proper chart to spell out exactly what's going on with what jumper, etc.

Yes I burned mine in for 500 hours before giving it a proper listen, but it was excellent out the box. My NOS 3 was broken (clipping and distortion at low volume levels) but the new fw (smooth) fixed that and now it’s superb. Put it this way, I’m not sure what ingredients Kingwa used for the new fw but anything that gives the Elear this much soundstage (width and depth) should be widely applauded! Good luck with yours!

 

[Heavyboxer]

Does anyone have issues with Foobar freezing up?

Unknown error code : 0x88880001

I checked online, and it said try changing output sample rate to a lower Hz.

Mine was on 32bit 384Khz and froze (windows bing and clicks were normal, as were media player, just Foobar)
and once I changed to a lower rate, it worked... till it didn't even with 352Khz, so lowered it to 192Khz and now
it seems fine.

Very strange!

 

[gLer]

Does anyone have issues with Foobar freezing up?

Unknown error code : 0x88880001

I checked online, and it said try changing output sample rate to a lower Hz.

Mine was on 32bit 384Khz and froze (windows bing and clicks were normal, as were media player, just Foobar)
and once I changed to a lower rate, it worked... till it didn't even with 352Khz, so lowered it to 192Khz and now
it seems fine.

Very strange!

Sounds like your PC can't handle the processing requirements of such high-res files?

 

[Heavyboxer]

Sounds like your PC can't handle the processing requirements of such high-res files?

Dude, I'm using a 3 month old $2k+ system!

 

[gLer]

Dude, I'm using a 3 month old $2k+ system!

Maybe that’s not the issue then

 

[jerick70]

So the postman just dropped this off:



Packed very well:


And setup temporarily on my pc till I clear some space for this beast:

I had no idea my LCD-2 sounded THIS good!!!

Welcome to the club my friend. You are going to love the R-28 even more as you let it burn in. I had a similar experience where my R-28 sounded terrible at first but I left it on for a few days and it sounded fabulous afterwords. I don't turn it off now.

 

[jerick70]

Does anyone have issues with Foobar freezing up?

Unknown error code : 0x88880001

I checked online, and it said try changing output sample rate to a lower Hz.

Mine was on 32bit 384Khz and froze (windows bing and clicks were normal, as were media player, just Foobar)
and once I changed to a lower rate, it worked... till it didn't even with 352Khz, so lowered it to 192Khz and now
it seems fine.

Very strange!

Try changing the R-28s default playback to something else beside the default. I think it is at 16 bit, 48000 Hz. Try 16 bit, 44100 Hz (CD Quality). You can do this in the control panel under sound.

 

[Heavyboxer]

Try changing the R-28s default playback to something else beside the default. I think it is at 16 bit, 48000 Hz. Try 16 bit, 44100 Hz (CD Quality). You can do this in the control panel under sound.

But wouldn't that lower resolution?

Ive heard that most people can't differentiate over 44khz cd quality but if my system can handle it, I want to utilize it and get the best results possible.

That bring said, problem did not reappear after I lowered it to 96Khz. Still sounds glorious to my 40 odd year old ears.