AudioEngine D2 Wireless DAC - Impressions ?
Mar 20, 2012 at 3:51 AM Thread Starter Post #1 of 2

estreeter

Headphoneus Supremus
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Not sure if anyone has this DAC, but I tried the search function here and checked Google - nothing on HF, it would seem. 599 USD, 24/192 over SPDIF yada yada - I guess its a familiar tune here. Seems like there is a new DAC released every week.  
 
http://audioengineusa.com/Store/Audioengine-D2
 
I appreciate that a 'me too' DAC from a speaker manufacturer isn't going to excite some Head-Fiers - throw in wireless operation and many will be wondering what I'm smoking. Trouble is, the few impressions I can find online seem to be positive, and not just a rehash of AudioEngine's marketing. Granted, wireless operation is going to have more appeal to those with speaker rigs, and is probably overkill for a desktop system, but it makes sense for AudioEngine to have a DAC receiver mounted atop a speaker amp driving (hopefully) a pair of their passive speakers or straight from the RCA outputs into a pair of their active speakers (my assumption - I've never owned active hi-fi speakers). In either case, you can have your source well away  from your speakers without needing to run metres of cable - how well that works in practice is a question for the early adopters here :)
 
Compared to something like the DACMini (any DACMini ..), this is a pretty ugly pair of black boxes, particularly with those aerials extended - again, unlikely to excite many here - but I rarely look at the mantlepiece while my music is stoking the fire - YMMV. 
 
Ken Rockwell has run some measurements, and seems to be living in the belief that he can survive from writing reviews (nice to see a reviewer using Stax phones - unusual). Ken, I wish you every success, but if they wont pay for Linux .....  
 
http://kenrockwell.com/audio/audioengine/d2.htm
 
There is no software, no firmware, and no baloney: just plug-in and enjoy.
 
 
 
Nov 15, 2014 at 12:50 PM Post #2 of 2
I'm very interested in this setup. Has anyone here tried it? Or tried it and reviewed it?
 

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