Echo Indigo

[I_Harf]

It seems like everyone is raving about this little device. I have a Dell D600 and have a pair of PX200's. I listen to all my music via iTunes, ripped @ 320kbps. I am wondering, are there any other better options out there for improving my sound out of my laptop besides just buying an Echo Indigo(people talk about the M-Audio Transit)? Right now all I got is the PX200's out of the headphone jack.

I mean I know I could get a SR-71, get a pair of HD650's, get a Cardas cable, etc. but I'm more on what we call...."The College Student Budget".

Ideas folks? Thanks, I appreciate all the help in advance. Oh and I should mention, I have somewhat asked this question before, but after hearing people tell me how they have an Echo Indigo and an amp, I was confused (isn't the echo indigo an amp in its own right??) so I figured I'd just start another thread.

Isaiah

 

[I_Harf]

I am about to purchase this little thing. Will it do me any good?

Thanks,

Isaiah

 

[Mr.Radar]

The Indego is an amp, but I'm guessing those people have an amp that's better than the one in the Indego. There are other options (mostly external USB devices like the M-Audio Transit) but I don't think any of them are quite as good as the Echo Indego. If you order it I'm sure you won't be dissapointed with the improvement in sound quality.

 

[bLue_oNioN]

I_Harf - You won't be disappointed

 

[I_Harf]

Thank you - that's just the encouragement i was looking for.

Isaiah

 

[Budley007]

I Harf, the only reason I mentioned getting an amp in the other threads was that some headphones are harder to drive than others. The Indigo is an amp and sounds wonderful all on it's own. The kernel streaming with foobar2000 is a flawless match. My only caution will be with your headphone choices. I just happen to own a pair of headphones that need a little help with the Indigo. The quality of sound from the Indigo is worth the purchase alone, so don't base your decision on the "amp or no amp" question. You won't regret buying this little gem. Enjoy.

 

[Vosper]

My reason for buying the Indigo was that it's PCMCIA and thus doesn't take up much space, or require any additional cabling. On the downside, it's pretty delicate & it doesn't come with any kind of carry case (ridiculous at the price) so you'll have to improvise one for yourself. I had an initial problem with the ENE CB1410 cardbus controller on my hp/compaq nx 7010 but they developed a patch that gets around this. My experience with tech support was excellent as well.

Oh, and it sounds fantastic. I havn't heard any other USB soundcards, but it's streets ahead of a Soundblaster Live and the onboard SoundMAX (my 0404's coming soon so I'll write a comparison then). I use a pair of HD280's which are low impedance and thus no problem to drive, but I can imagine that an amp might be necessary with a higher impedance.

 

[Permonic]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Budley007 I Harf, the only reason I mentioned getting an amp in the other threads was that some headphones are harder to drive than others. The Indigo is an amp and sounds wonderful all on it's own.

I have to mentioned, that Echo Indigo is a 24bit/96kHz soundcard (AKM 4393 DAC) with an Analog Devices SSm 2135 amplifier. It's not only an amp.

 

[Sisyphos]

You'll be very happy with the Indigo. It's a fine part of a semi-portable solution. As mentioned above, you only have to be aware that it doesn't have enough power for very power hungry phones such as the DT880. Anyway it's no problem to drive very excellent ones like the HD595.

 

[galiyosha]

I own and daily use the Indigo for more than a year now and must say I was very happy with it until...

There is one thing people buying Indigo maybe aren't entirely aware of. The volume knob on the card is an ordinary analogue pot. It is not a "control" knob working in cooperation with DSP or DAC or drivers or anything. It is directly in the signal path. That means it is just a matter of time when the knob starts to make trouble. And my time has already come...

Firstly, crackles, static and hiss started to appear only when I moved the knob. As they were getting more intensive, I tried to forget that the knob had been there at all and used solely the software console for adjusting volume. But now, the pot is probably so polluted with inevitable dust that even a slightest movement of the card or the notebook itself (or sometime even no movement at all) makes the knob add significant amount of hiss and static to the output...

The developers must have known that an analogue pot directly in the signal path will have a limited lifetime. It takes me by surprise even more as Echo Audio is by no means a novice player in the professional and prosumer audio world. It kind of reminds me of the battery problems with iPod -- similarly to the battery in iPod, the pot is AFAIK by no (ordinary) means user replacable. The iPod movement is fortunately so massive that pictorial guides for replacing the battery yourself are all around the Internet nowadays. But I strongly doubt that anything similar will appear for the Indigo card.

Maybe in US sending the card to Echo for repair is not a big deal at all. But I bought mine in Europe. The price was nearly double the one in US and I'm not sure whether there is any local after-guarantee repair service at all.

And who knows. Maybe I'm the only one having this problem. In that case, please ignore my pointless rant...

If there wouldn't be this nasty issue I would happily recommend the Echo Indigo to anyone. In terms of audio quality it is a really great product. The drivers are rocksolid and the virtual outputs are really useful when running multiple audio applications concurrently. (All the Indigo series has this feature as the drivers are the same for the "plain" Indigo and both the newer IO and DJ version.)

P.S. If anyone knows how to replace/clean/repair/anything the volume pot in the Echo Indigo, plase LET ME KNOW! Thanks.

And sorry for my English.

Greetings from Slovakia.

 

[thomaspf]

I would call up Echo Audio and ask for a replacement. The volume control is supposedly of very high quality.

The analog volume control is one key feature of this product. The fact that you can play your digital content at full resolution and not have to give up bits to do you volume control is considered a very desirable feature.

Many high end external DACs integrate an analog volume control.

Camelot Uther
MSB Platinum DAC

Cheers

Thomas

 

[Vosper]

Quote:

Posted by galiyosha: There is one thing people buying Indigo maybe aren't entirely aware of. The volume knob on the card is an ordinary analogue pot. It is not a "control" knob working in cooperation with DSP or DAC or drivers or anything. It is directly in the signal path. That means it is just a matter of time when the knob starts to make trouble. And my time has already come...

I've found the volume control to be a joy, smooth and responsive, with a well-weighted resistance. I'm outside US too so I'll have to lay off it and stick to software where I can.

 

[Romanee]

I just bought an Echo Indigo card about a week ago, for my TiBook G4 1.25GHz (and AKG K501). I just found on the Echo Audio site that the Echo Indigo DJ has one headphone output and one line out (not on the main specs page but on the "more details" page), which would be much preferred for use with a better amp, bypassing the (IMO) mediocre amp and just making use of the 24/96 DAC and Motorola 100MHz 24bit 128sx oversampling DSP.

The Echo Indigo works just fine with my TiBook and is a big improvement over the built-in sound chip and obviously drives my demanding AKG K501s better, though not adequately. It's also the most compact portable solution I can think of for a laptop. It works for me since I don't need to use the cardbus for anything else.

At our recent NYC Qualia mini-meet I tried Lan's Sonica USB DAC with the SR-71. That combo had significantly more detail, clarity, definition, dimension and overall quality of sound than the Indigo, though of course much more costly if budget is a prime consideration. Even the SR-71, however, had just barely enough power for the K501 -- similar SPL to the Indigo.

My volume control is also smooth, responsive and quiet.

 

[I_Harf]

I appreciate everyone who has responded to the thread I started. It seems like for what I am doing, purchasing an Echo Indigo is the right move. Even though I only have PX200's right now, the Echo Indigo will allow me to upgrade my headphones to something that does need a little push in the future, I mean nothing serious like HD580/600/650 or DT880, but maybe an upgrade to something like a HD595, Grados or HD25.

I'll be honest, after all the posts I have been seeing on the HD25's it seems like they just fit the bill for everything. I mean they are like closed, balanced, have bass and they don't need a lot of push (I have seen many portable rigs that are just iPod-->HD25).

For someone who listens to a lot of Rock - Zeppelin, Doors, Pearl Jam, and is currently happy with his PX200's, what headphone(s) just blow me out of the water with my source (Dell D600 and soon Echo Indigo) ?

Isaiah

 

[galiyosha]

Quote:

Originally Posted by thomaspf I would call up Echo Audio and ask for a replacement. The volume control is supposedly of very high quality.

I dropped them an e-mail describing my problem and they said I should give them a call and they will repair the card for me. Well, I'm curious what they will write me back when I replied I'm in Europe...

Quote:

Originally Posted by thomaspf The analog volume control is one key feature of this product. The fact that you can play your digital content at full resolution and not have to give up bits to do you volume control is considered a very desirable feature.

If I may be so bold I would disagree with this statement. Of course, an ideal analogue control is a lot better than a digital attenuator in the DAC. But that's the same "kind" of true as saying "ideal analogue recording is better than a digital one". The sheer inconvenience of the analogue format simply makes the digital format a better choice in lower-cost application. (At least I think that if comparing let's say a $300 CD player with a $300 turntable-pickup combo, the CD player would probably be a winner unless you're a warm-vinyl-distorted-sound addict Obviously, if the comparison would be done on a components with one or few zeroes added to the end of the price tag, it probably would be a lot harder to pick a winner -- if it would be possible at all...)

And the situation is similar here. I'm not familiar with the high-end DACs you mentioned, but I'm quite sure they will use precise stepped attenuators for the volume control. Price of a one channel stepped attenuator equiped with precise resistors is usually higher than the price of the whole Echo Indigo.

But a precise stepped attenuator is a really valuable upgrade for a higher-grade audio rig. For example the Czech company au/ra manufactures a really nice one -- the D7A -- that costs around $200 for the stand-alone version and something less for the "built-in" version. Comparing this with the price and specs of stepped attenuators I've seen in the DIY section, I think it is a really great choice. Some info and pics: http://www.auravos.cz/d7a_en.php3, http://www.auravos.cz/d7asym.php3 (balanced version).

Quote:

Originally Posted by Romanee I just found on the Echo Audio site that the Echo Indigo DJ has one headphone output and one line out (...)

That's true. If the DJ version would be available when I was buying mine, I would certainly go for it. On the other hand, the specs also say that the DJ version has slightly worse frequency response and lower dynamic range (and better THD). See: http://www.echoaudio.com/Products/Ca...goDJ/specs.php vs http://www.echoaudio.com/Products/Ca...digo/specs.php.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Romanee My volume control is also smooth, responsive and quiet.

So was mine -- for the first year of use. Recently I examined my Indigo a little bit closer and found that the "external" plastic case was slightly opened at the end I never get to see (as I put my headphone to the other one . As if the joint wasn't quite perfect (I don't know whether it is glued or just "snapped" together or whatever). So, as I said earlier, it is maybe just my single unit that is defective and your volume control will remain smooth, responsive and quiet for the lest of your Indigo lifespan...