[PopZeus]

This device has been making the rounds on some of the 2-channel reviewers I follow, and frankly, it's getting raves. As someone who dislikes what Audirvana has become (also not exactly excited to dive into the Roon ecosystem either), and mostly listens to local FLAC files with some Tidal streaming, the A6 feels like it was made for me. Which is probably why I'm posting a hype thread like this for the first time. Also a reason why I'm posting this? It's currently sold out on Amazon US.

• Solid aluminium alloy chassis, brushed panel.
• Quad-core ARM Cortex-A55 professional processor.
• 6" large LCD colour touchscreen, easy control.
• Based on Android 11, deeply tailored system.
• 4GDDR+32GeMMC large memory for masses of applications.
• Support M.2 NVME 3.0 SSD (not included), up to 4TB.
• 2xES9038Q2M DAC for independent stereo decoding.
• Support DSD512 Native, PCM768KHz@32Bit, MQA full decoding.
• The 3rd generation XU316 for higher performance and processing speed.
• Low-jitter dual clock synchronous processing with higher accuracy.
• Fully balanced circuit, XLR balanced and RCA single-ended hi-fi pre-out.
• 2x DOH chips, support HDMI DSD Native and D2P multi-channel output(Up to 5.1).
• Qualcomm QCC5125 Bluetooth 5.0 module with APTX HD.
• Low noise, high quality power supply, providing pure power source for audio circuits.
• Support mastering audio formats DSD (.dsf/.dff/.ios/.dst), APE, FLAC, WAV, MQA, etc.
• Support 2-channel and Multi-channel Gapless playback(FLAC,WAV)
• Personalised music management, lyric matching and music data matching.
• EOS audio engine developed by Eversolo, globally bypassing SRC restrictions.
• Support Direct audio in 3rd party APPs (Apple Music hi-res direct output).
• Full decoding and rendering support for MQA on Optical, Coaxial and USB input etc.
• Support USB, Optical, Coaxial, HDMI digital audio Bit-perfect output.
• Support external USB optical drive for CD disc playback and CD ripping.
• Music services Tidal, Qobuz, Highresaudio, Amazon etc.
• Support Tidal Connect, etc.
• Support music playback from DLNA.
• Support NFS, SMB, Web DAV, UPnP protocols to access storage devices shared in the LAN.
• Support built-in SMB network media sharing service for easy local media sharing.
• Exclusive mobile APP for Android/IOS mobile phones and tablets.

Source: https://www.eversolo.com/Product/index/model/DMP-A6/target/7abWHw++oHhKKmVViAFMcQ==.html

 

[betula]

This is the only and official thread for this streamer right? I can't find any other threads or product page...

I think, soon we will be hearing a lot about the EverSolo DMP-A6. I have got one on order arriving in about two weeks. The demand is so high, retailers can hardly keep up. The retailer where I bought mine from in the second batch ordered 112 units and as of now 103 is sold already before arrival.

 

[PopZeus]

Yeah, I was surprised I couldn't find a thread considering the unanimous praise the A6 is getting. Then again, the head-fi community understandably seems to be infatuated with the FiiO R7 right now. Since I'm looking at a dedicated living room source component as opposed to a desktop AIO device, the head out from the R7 is less essential than the 4TB SSD slot of the A6.

 

[betula]

Yeah, I was surprised I couldn't find a thread considering the unanimous praise the A6 is getting. Then again, the head-fi community understandably seems to be infatuated with the FiiO R7 right now. Since I'm looking at a dedicated source living room component as opposed to a desktop AIO device, the head out from the R7 is less essential than the 4TB SSD slot of the A6.

Yes, I am surprised as well. The A6 is receiving so much praise everywhere, retailers can't keep up with the demand. Yet nothing on Head-Fi. I am sure, the R7 is a good little AIO, but I doubt it is even close to the A6 sonically. I am mostly interested in the streamer part of the A6 which is said to be way better than the Zen Stream, better than some £1000+ streamers and very close to some multi thousand dollar streamers. The reviews so far are raving.

 

[betula]

 

[4LoveOfSound]

I have one on order. Currently using a Zen Stream and Neo Stream.

 

[hakunamakaka]

I have one on order. Currently using a Zen Stream and Neo Stream.

Really interested how it pairs against zen stream. Might pull a trigger here, zen stream is good in terms of sq, but have it’s quirks.

 

[betula]

Really interested how it pairs against zen stream. Might pull a trigger here, zen stream is good in terms of sq, but have it’s quirks.

I very happy with the sound of my Zen Stream, but the lack of a usable interface and some connection issues/quirks make everyday use a bit frustrating sometimes, or at least not the smoothest. Bluesound (N130) has good software, but Zen Stream sounds better. All the reviews I read say this EverSolo sounds even better than the Zen Stream plus its user interface is even better than Bluesound's. If this is true, I am more than happy to pay that couple hundred extra. My A6 is arriving in about 2 weeks.

 

[hakunamakaka]

I very happy with the sound of my Zen Stream, but the lack of a usable interface and some connection issues/quirks make everyday use a bit frustrating sometimes, or at least not the smoothest. Bluesound (N130) has good software, but Zen Stream sounds better. All the reviews I read say this EverSolo sounds even better than the Zen Stream plus its user interface is even better than Bluesound's. If this is true, I am more than happy to pay that couple hundred extra. My A6 is arriving in about 2 weeks.

Perfect keep us updated once you will get time to compare both. I think eversolo can be used just as a streamer which would give good starting point.

 

[betula]

Perfect keep us updated once you will get time to compare both. I think eversolo can be used just as a streamer which would give good starting point.

Yes. I mostly buy the A6 for its streaming qualities and ease of use. I will probably keep using my R2R DAC.

 

[4LoveOfSound]

I haven’t had many issues with the Zen Stream. I leave it powered on all the time. The Neo Stream on the other hand gives me issues constantly. The multi function knob is very glichy, along with some other issues.

 

[JjB067]

Been enjoying the Eversolo DMP-A6 streamer DAC for 2 weeks now, thanks to Keith at Purite Audio London for handling the order very efficiently. Overall impression is that it is an excellent device and delivers well as both a streaming transport and combined with it's internal DAC. Previously I used an iFi Zen Stream as streamer, then upgraded to the iFi Neo Stream. Had some hardwired Internet related issues with the Neo so eventually I had to return it. Then tried the Cambridge Audio MXN10 streamer and liked it and thought it a bit better than the Zen Stream, especially as regards the software aspects. However the Eversolo DMP-A6 just upps the game again and is definately the best of all these streamers just as a digital transport. The USB Audio Out from the A6 is very good and beats the MXN10 coaxial output, no USB Audio Out available on that streamer unfortunately. Now I normally use a Denafrips Pontus 2 12th ed as my main DAC and so I was not thinking to use the A6 internal DAC when I ordered the device. However just comparing the A6 internal with the Pontus and another external DAC, the RME ADI2 FS, is quite revealing. The Pontus is still the best overall DAC, but the difference is not very large compared to the dual ESS chips in the A6. Just a bit better in soundstage depth, little difference in details and clarity which surprised me somewhat. The RME ADI2 FS takes a respectable third place in this test, still a remarkable DAC in my opinion. So very happy with the A6 and Pontus 2 12th ed combination for overall sound quality, but the internal DAC is quite good.

Some miscellaneous points that might help others thinking about the A6 :
1. Fitting an M.2 NVME SSD max 4 TB is very easy, I formatted it in the A6 as exFAT format, named it and copied over a 300 Gb FLAC library of CD rips from an external portable SSD using the inbuilt file handling facilities of the A6. I did the transfer in chunks of about 25 Gb and all happened OK although not super fast. You connect any external drives via the top USB3 OTG port and make sure the setting for that port is set to mass storage not the option for direct PC connection.
2. I also tried connecting an external optical CD/DVD drive to this same OTG port for CD playing and ripping. Again leave the port setting on mass storage for this function. The drive was from Hitachi-LG Data Storage model GP57 and is just a USB2 device which takes its power from the A6. If you view the Zidoo Eversolo Forum for the A6 you will see lots of reported issues with external CD drives, but I have had no issues with this setup. Ripping to FLAC is quite fast and even if the CD is unrecognised or if no album art available, it is easy to enter all this using the A6 interface. The online manual for the A6 could do with lots more detail for these functions however. The ripped files get stored to the internal SSD, you can nominate a subfolder destination if you want.
3. The large touchscreen on the A6 is very impressive, and it can be directly cast to your phone or tablet just pressing one button on the Eversolo App. You can use the App for all interactions or just the cast version of the touchscreen, it is very well designed and easy to navigate and use. Also of course the VU meters are then both on the A6 display and on your control surface, for those who like that sort of stuff.
4. One slight drawback is that you have to select specific input and output ports, multiple or simultaneous selections apart from analog outputs are not allowed. So if you choose any of the digital inputs even including Bluetooth, you can only hear the result via the analog outputs of the internal DAC, you cannot send it out again on a digital output for example.
5. I was confused initially about the volume settings on the A6. The volume pass through setting should be ON if you want to stream at fixed digital max volume to an external DAC, assuming you have volume control externally of course.

Overall very impressed with the A6 so far and Eversolo are rolling out lots of firmware updates fixing bugs etc. I have had no glitches or any unexpected behaviour with the device to date.

 

[PopZeus]

4. One slight drawback is that you have to select specific input and output ports, multiple or simultaneous selections apart from analog outputs are not allowed. So if you choose any of the digital inputs even including Bluetooth, you can only hear the result via the analog outputs of the internal DAC, you cannot send it out again on a digital output for example.

Oh I need to hear more about this quirk. I hope this can get fixed in a later update.

 

[JjB067]

Oh I need to hear more about this quirk. I hope this can get fixed in a later update.

Seems to be a definite choice by Eversolo in forcing particular routing options only. So you can only pick a single input option from a selection, then the allowed output options will be displayed but only a single one can be picked. Only exception is that you can choose both of the analog outputs (RCA + XLR) at the same time, this only occurred after the first firmware revision incidentally. So any digital input chosen can only be output via the internal DAC analog output, cannot be output by any digital output . There is no simultaneous output of digital and analog either, something the considerably cheaper MXN10 streamer managed to do. I suppose the A6 could end up in a logical mess if there were no routing restrictions, but I hope some evolution on the current situation can occur.

 

[MGbert]

Seems to be a definite choice by Eversolo in forcing particular routing options only. So you can only pick a single input option from a selection, then the allowed output options will be displayed but only a single one can be picked. Only exception is that you can choose both of the analog outputs (RCA + XLR) at the same time, this only occurred after the first firmware revision incidentally. So any digital input chosen can only be output via the internal DAC analog output, cannot be output by any digital output . There is no simultaneous output of digital and analog either, something the considerably cheaper MXN10 streamer managed to do. I suppose the A6 could end up in a logical mess if there were no routing restrictions, but I hope some evolution on the current situation can occur.

Concur. My system setup currently uses a digital DSP for room correction EQ. There are Android EQ apps which, if one could be loaded into A6, would eliminate the need for that DSP. So my question: could such a 3rd party app be loaded into and used by the A6? Thanks in advance.