They do work for me, after using a similar product from Audioquest I notice thatmy notebook has horrible USB connections. But I can understand if someone already have a clean path trough USB say that the device doesn't work. The problemis when this comment comes from nowhere or without chdcking the signal path.
Well, Im looking forward to hearing iPurifier 3 impressions from those who buy in the first run.
Actually, glad this was brought up; I am a fan of a few of the iFi technolgies, and their trickery at this level is apart of why their products have such great potential (I would further that their design team must be an assembly of people who have been doing this for a long while and know what they are on about). Seeing hat the Diablo was going a step further (towards purity) and removing additional circuits from the crucial sound chain (such as Xbass and 3D) made me even happier.
So, regarding the iFi iPurifier? I placed up a mini review on the addicted to audio (australia) webpage for the version 3 product, which has proven a ‘night and day difference’ vs the version 2 product for some internet reviewers.
My case use shouldn’t have performed as admirably as it did, I suggest, based on having several expensive (filtered) powerboards, and having seperated most of my two pin parts from my three pin parts (with earth), and running my line level cables away from power cables, where they may ‘briefly cross’ (at 90 degrees), in a house with little wifi /bluetooth / wireless -we moved from apartment living to get away from all that; are presently in a nice big block ‘leafy suburb’ where wifi scans usually only show two or three ‘distant’ networks. (a best case scenario by modern ’first world’ living), with no fluorescents and dimmer switches etc..
I wanted to feed from a gaming console into a Cambridge Audio DAC magic (I use as a converter to turn USB into spdif audio my surround preamp can take), and even with a nice $400 (second hand) USB cable the difference was huge.
Due to feeding a surround encoded two channel feed into a dolby processor (ie further digital processing), no doubt having clearer black and white (rather than ‘grey‘) digital reads had a cumulative effect that quite noticably helped the processor.. Using Dolby with DSX, the imaging across the eleven sound points was much more precise, or weighty. Most discernible that a change had happened (steering and sound stage width could easily be resultant to ‘more critical listening’) was the sound of some manta ray enemies in Demon Souls, that throw glassy tail bolts with a ‘not so nice’ shatter sound when they hit hard surfaces.. the glassy sound was clearer, and noticably less harsh. That one feature showed the difference repeatedly, and reinforced what could be felt during every moment of gameplay. Heck from the minute the iPurifier3 lit up when the Playstation turned on, the ‘system start sound’ sounded noticeably cleaner/clearer.
When I went hunting for differences.. I loaded up Zen Pinballs Empire Strikes Back table, of course most of us are familiar with John Williams iconic score, but Zen tables often come with compressed soundtrack (certainly in the case of Star Wars), and hearing the sound feel musically transparent was odd. Hearing extra instruments clearly separated during complex moments, given nice layering and having ‘air space’,.. showed what typically happens when jitter rates (that can not be heard, but that ARE contributing to poor sound) are fixed.
No doubt the resultant digital pass being tighter,.. more consistant reads ‘in a row’ were making it through the chain ‘without everything having to guess what the last packet was, based on the next one’; dynamics felt noticably better (to the point where I left the preamp volume down by 5dB for ‘near equal sound /music swings’) and clarity was pronounced. Dialogue was ‘less grainy’ as well as a range of other instruments.
In fact my Addicted to Audio web page write up on the part furthered that Dirt 5, which previously sounded nice but ‘average‘ as CD music went, started to sound like actual CD music as would be played into a 2 channel setup (seldom do surround amps sound equal to nice two channel unless they are flagship parts), to say that the console sound was vastly improved is fair.
It allowed improvements to all ‘downstream’ DAC parts, equivalent to raising a tier or ‘buying a better product’ in the cheap /consumer-fi parts we mostly all buy.
Again, this was a pretty tight system with no observed noise.. but knowing how tricky USB audio is to ‘get right’ and the electrical noise in a massmarket console, I took a punt to see what would happen.
Was how I happened to find the Diablo (I had gone back to buy another iPurifier for a ‘PC gaming’ friend).
I knew I wanted the Diablo, but thought they hadn’t released yet (the Addicted to Audio webpage still listed them as preorder at the time).
I can certainly vouch for the iPurifer. they might not bench well on an analyser.. but then most stuff that hardware can measure doesn’t line up with human phenamological experiences. A master musician might spend decades to nail a tricky breath movement or hand flick that doesn’t change the resultant audio feed by .1dB, and most ‘Audio Science’ sites would call the number inconsequential.
jitter that is inaudiable still destroying ‘musicality‘ is a thing. Most people want to argue that zero and ones are binary and that USB cables are all equal (even if they believe that other cables MIGHT effect sound).. but as my write up on the iPurifier went to detail to explain, and Hans Van Beekhuyzen project covers better; jitter is huge, and grey reads are ‘very detrimental‘ to hifi playback.
As someone who has owned Denon DCDS10 (with 18 blackgates mods and DAC section disconnected) and other high end ‘transports’,.. the passing of clear/clean zeros and ones is paramount to DACs doing a ‘decent job’.
When I upgraded my DAP to a higher tier unit, its digital output was so much more accurate I had to tune the subs down by 5dB.
These are my experiences. I know what I am doing and have been doing this for decades, have been a pro installer, consider my self a scientist, and have retailed ‘a lot of consumer electronics’.
I understand spec sheets, and the need for empirical data..
I also have ears/eyes, and am willing to have an open mind.
It is amazing how often the world isn’t ‘scientific’. (generally that our tools are not looking in the right places) People are seldom 100% consistent, so naturally we have a lot of stuff that evades us.
Digital zeros and ones down a USB cable hahahahahahh (maniacle laugh out loud) mwhahahah
Audio deserves better. The iPurifier is a ‘no brainer’ product, and it can help people at all levels of audio kit. low quality stuff probably needs it bigtime, but for esoteric high end kit, the resultant improvements from cleaner ‘true’ zero and ones is often so substantial that the paultry asking price nets much bigger rewards (often unobtainable or price unrealisitc to attempt via other means, eg like in my case, would require replacing a flagship preamp that might net me a better sound, like I got inside of 30 seconds with a ‘night out on the town’ pricepoint and a little dongle hidden away behind my present setup).
tl:dr iPurifier works well. verion 3 works better again. your mileage may vary.