[antdroid]

I posted a review here: https://www.audiodiscourse.com/2023/04/eversolo-dac-z6-review.html

 

[George Hincapie]

Is there a separate thread for the EverSolo DMP A6?

 

[JohanE]

Anyone compared the Z6 to the Z8? Heard both?

 

[JohanE]

Ah well ordered a Z8 yesterday.

 

[corgifall]

Ah well ordered a Z8 yesterday.

Hope you like it! I've not heard the Z6 myself.

 

[JohanE]

Today it arrived. Sounds fantastic!

 

[delfin150]

Guys, do you think z8 is able to drive audeze lcd2c? I’ve heard that the amp inside is pretty midrange and wonder if it’s going to be enough for lcd2c, or it will be a miss without an external amp.

 

[KhalBrando]

I bought the Z6 to try out for curiosity. I did want something better than my small SMSL stack at work, so I did bring in the Z6 to the office this week and have been using it there.

The Spring 3 is my primary DAC at home, along with the newer SMSL DO300 ES9039 PRO dac.


Yea I wouldnt be surprised. I quite like the ES9038 Pro DAC chip implementation in my DX240 DAP and so I wouldnt be surprised the Z8 is an upgrade over the Z6. It does also cost more. If it came in a silver, I may have gotten it instead.

I have the Z6 as well and had a Z8 to test which one was superior. I don’t use it as a headphone amp, purely as a dac. I haven’t touched the volume pretty much ever. Only sometimes before I start listening just to ensure it’s in dac mode. Anyhow, I picked the Z6 over Z8. The Z8 might have a better, slightly, headphone amp. But blind testing I couldn’t figure out which was which better than 50 percent of the time. I listened to 10 songs. One at a time. With a friend doing all the controls. I chose the Z6 8 out of 10. They honestly sounded so close I just decided silver and saving $200 was 100% the choice. I think a lot of people that say the Z8 is better are defending their purchases or like many reviewers online they are swayed by more money meaning better. Then some might just honestly like it more which is also ok. I think I’d just buy the streamer if I was spending that much. Notice there’s not a streamer in silver. Very clever in a way, but dumb on the other side of the coin. I assume people with the z6 would appreciate a streamer that matches it. I would possibly consider it. It just seems like a lot for a streamer. I have a wiim pro. Might consider the ultra when it comes out. On a side note, I matched the Z6 with a Topping A70pro in silver, they’re identical in the same shade of silver and man do they make a sweet pairing. The A70pro also is wonderful as a headphone amp for my TT. Fed by a Schiit mani 2. I’ve got some Hifiman Arya Stealth planars and Sennheiser HD490pro dynamic drivers, I’m really enjoying what I’ve managed to build. A little dot mk2 is probably a purchase I’ll be considering soon. Just to dip my toes in the tube pool some more.

 

[x7007]

Please help with a question.

I just bought the Z8 Ever solo, still didn't arrive. I plan to use another device for VSS like
SoundBlaster X4
or Titanium
or Asus U7 MKII

All of them have optical.

What do I need to set in the Z8 Ever Solo as DAC/AMP so it will transfer the optical sound through the device ? and only the VSS

 

[Moonglum]

I have the Z6 as well and had a Z8 to test which one was superior. I don’t use it as a headphone amp, purely as a dac. I haven’t touched the volume pretty much ever. Only sometimes before I start listening just to ensure it’s in dac mode. Anyhow, I picked the Z6 over Z8. The Z8 might have a better, slightly, headphone amp. But blind testing I couldn’t figure out which was which better than 50 percent of the time. I listened to 10 songs. One at a time. With a friend doing all the controls. I chose the Z6 8 out of 10. They honestly sounded so close I just decided silver and saving $200 was 100% the choice. I think a lot of people that say the Z8 is better are defending their purchases or like many reviewers online they are swayed by more money meaning better. Then some might just honestly like it more which is also ok. I think I’d just buy the streamer if I was spending that much. Notice there’s not a streamer in silver. Very clever in a way, but dumb on the other side of the coin. I assume people with the z6 would appreciate a streamer that matches it. I would possibly consider it. It just seems like a lot for a streamer. I have a wiim pro. Might consider the ultra when it comes out. On a side note, I matched the Z6 with a Topping A70pro in silver, they’re identical in the same shade of silver and man do they make a sweet pairing. The A70pro also is wonderful as a headphone amp for my TT. Fed by a Schiit mani 2. I’ve got some Hifiman Arya Stealth planars and Sennheiser HD490pro dynamic drivers, I’m really enjoying what I’ve managed to build. A little dot mk2 is probably a purchase I’ll be considering soon. Just to dip my toes in the tube pool some more.

Whatever works for you is good, I'm sure the Z6 sounds great too ! Just out of interest, how many hours had you used the Z6 vs Z8 roughly ? \and which inputs were you using and what source and source material?

 

[KhalBrando]

Whatever works for you is good, I'm sure the Z6 sounds great too ! Just out of interest, how many hours had you used the Z6 vs Z8 roughly ? \and which inputs were you using and what source and source material?

They were both new. I used tidal through a wiim pro with coax as my connection. And used the A70pro amp. I didn’t have time for burn in. All of it is moot, because I eventually came to the conclusion that the Z6 had to be returned as well. Too much of a good thing. My system was too neutral, it needed some thickness, richness, more of a tubey sound, I wanted it to work so bad, because it’s a pain in the ass for one, and man they looked good together, so in the end, who knows, maybe the Z8 would have been better. The blind test was as good as I could manage but not perfect, I don’t have the equipment for that. And there wasn’t any way I was sending the amp back. That thing is spectacular. What it did for my vinyl cannot be understated. Now I’m trying to figure out what dac to get. Quite honestly I’d probably keep the one I’ve been using as a substitute if it could do more than usb. The zen dac 3. It sounds great. In this setup, it smokes the Z6 and the Z8. On sound. The design is polarizing of course, I happen to like it but some think it’s ugly. There’s another possibility, I could get the wiim ultra when it releases, it has usb out as far as I know, and if that’s the case, I can make a strong argument for just using the Zen Dac 3. I could get new headphones instead! Which we all know, or if you don’t know now you do lol, changes the sound more than a dac all day. But unfortunately none of my headphones like the combination of the Z6 and A70pro. I prefer a coax connection if at all possible. But usb is coming around in some cases. In closing, it’s quite possible the Z8 would have been better in the end. I just didn’t have time to properly finish all that. And I didn’t do the test with the balanced connection, I used a Sys to switch back and forth between the two dacs so as not to wear out my connection points. I would have preferred a balanced connection. I started out trying to do that but just found it tedious and I’m very ocd about my stuff and keeping it nice, so decided on using a Sys over switching xlr back and forth like that…

 

[Moonglum]

They were both new. I used tidal through a wiim pro with coax as my connection. And used the A70pro amp. I didn’t have time for burn in. All of it is moot, because I eventually came to the conclusion that the Z6 had to be returned as well. Too much of a good thing. My system was too neutral, it needed some thickness, richness, more of a tubey sound, I wanted it to work so bad, because it’s a pain in the ass for one, and man they looked good together, so in the end, who knows, maybe the Z8 would have been better. The blind test was as good as I could manage but not perfect, I don’t have the equipment for that. And there wasn’t any way I was sending the amp back. That thing is spectacular. What it did for my vinyl cannot be understated. Now I’m trying to figure out what dac to get. Quite honestly I’d probably keep the one I’ve been using as a substitute if it could do more than usb. The zen dac 3. It sounds great. In this setup, it smokes the Z6 and the Z8. On sound. The design is polarizing of course, I happen to like it but some think it’s ugly. There’s another possibility, I could get the wiim ultra when it releases, it has usb out as far as I know, and if that’s the case, I can make a strong argument for just using the Zen Dac 3. I could get new headphones instead! Which we all know, or if you don’t know now you do lol, changes the sound more than a dac all day. But unfortunately none of my headphones like the combination of the Z6 and A70pro. I prefer a coax connection if at all possible. But usb is coming around in some cases. In closing, it’s quite possible the Z8 would have been better in the end. I just didn’t have time to properly finish all that. And I didn’t do the test with the balanced connection, I used a Sys to switch back and forth between the two dacs so as not to wear out my connection points. I would have preferred a balanced connection. I started out trying to do that but just found it tedious and I’m very ocd about my stuff and keeping it nice, so decided on using a Sys over switching xlr back and forth like that…

Does the zen DAC use Burr Brown chips ? If so they do have quite a different presentation to ESS Sabre chips in the Z DACs. Personally I really like my Z8 but I use USB and also my system has a tube buffer to warm up the sound a bit