This one's gonna be pretty long, so brace yourself
Before every each of my purchases, I am reading all I can find about particular piece of gear, to gather as much data as possible. All the pros, all the cons, all the angles I can cover to summarize the data and compare it to my needs and epectations.
I am myself writing reviews, mainly the portable gear but so far only in my native, polish language. I am nowhere near guys like
@Dobrescu George or
@twister6 but I'm trying
Anyway, I've owned only a few DAPs and few of them I had a pleasure to hear and/or review including Opus #1 and #3, iBasso DX200+AMP1, iBasso DX80 (
@lurker), AK300, Fiio X5-3, Fiio M3, AK380, XDP-100R, Shanling M1, iPod Touch 1G and 6G and maybe few others I don't remember.
I'm sticking to XDP-100R because of it's amazing SQ, near perfect sound characteristic, great battery (12-13h FLAC playback with ease) and amazing functionality. To be perfect it needs 3 things - Balanced output, USB-DAC function and MOAR POWAH! Just a tiny bit at least.
In the IEM departament my wet dream came true - Fidue A91 Sirius and this is the only thing that can't change in my rig. Everything else - Cardas A8 30th AE and CA Ei.XX - can be replaced. Even tho the latter with my custom 8-strand hybrid cable are on a whole new level comparing to the previous Linum Bax, which lasted whole 5 months of use
But, to the point. WM1Z is hella out of my financial reach and I am not gonna sell my kidney to get one. There are the boundaries of reason which I am not willing to cross. At least not for now.
WM1A and DX200 are the maximum I can financialy stretch myself for now and I cen get both for the same price. Sony will be 6 months old but the DX200 will be brand new straight from iBasso with AMP1. AMP3 would join me in next... well, at least few months.
WM1A is almost a legend with it's epic balanced output SQ, it looks damn sexy, has an epic battery and big enough storage to delay buying a memory card. And it comes with a Valentinum case
The cons are, it lacks streaming capabilities, USB DAC function and it's SE output is significantly weaker in terms of power and SQ from what I've heard.
DX200 is the beast I know and even with AMP1 I liked it more than... AK380 xD Kill me for it, they were playing in the same league, but somehow I liked iBasso more. It handles streaming, can work as a USB-DAC and practicaly it's a damn mobile powerhouse with it's 6V at BO and the AMP3 will make it even more suitable for my taste. It's battery is a joke tho, the software is known to change the sound characteristics between updates and the AMP3 is another expense.
ZX300A - cheaper, almost equally good with balanced as WM1A, works as USB-DAC, looks great, same functionality as WM1A (BT etc). It demands to buy mem card, case and I'm risking a customs and tax which all together place it like 200 USB away from WM1A I can get. Also it's SE is significantly worse than the WM1A has. At least from what I've read.
DX150 - damn sexy beast with replacable AMPs, near same functionality as DX200, has QC and costs as much as ZX300A with a Dignis Case (without those pesky taxes and customs of course), still has lots of power, it;s battery (on paper) looks good and comes with a spectacular case. Cons... same as DX200 regarding software, but we have
@Lurker0 It's sound performance is still some kind of a mystery for me because there are no solid reviews as of yet and Paul didn't have a unit for me to review
I've had an option to buy Cowon Plenue 2 for as much as 800$ but I dropped the idea due to BO giving no advantage over SE.
So... well. I'm like a woman in shoe shopwho wants to buy a pair of each kind of shoes but she can only afford one. I can go for the more expensive option, but there is this sick temptation to go for DX150/ZX300A and buy another pair of IEMs...