[NickedWicked]

Too bad they tosses balanced mode, I thought I read somewhere they beefed up the extreme power output though.

Might pick it up to hear it alongside it’s older brother after I’m done with comparisons between the ADI-2 Pro, Mytek Brooklyn+, Hugo 2 and Benchmark DAC3 HGC.

Needless to say the headamp on the ADI is quite impressive and meets itself with pretty much all 1 or even 2k stand-alone giants with some very slight detail missing here and there.

 

[chungjun]

Will be interested to read what your impressions are comparing these DAC giants... would be interesting also to know which is a keeper, if you have no other choice but to keep only one of them.

Do share your impressions here when you have the chance.

Might pick it up to hear it alongside it’s older brother after I’m done with comparisons between the ADI-2 Pro, Mytek Brooklyn+, Hugo 2 and Benchmark DAC3 HGC.

 

[Malcolm Riverside]

Anybody know where you can get one of these things delivered quickly? Seems like they’re not available until February or March on zenproaudio.com and www.thomannmusic.com.

 

[cardeli22]

Anybody know where you can get one of these things delivered quickly? Seems like they’re not available until February or March on zenproaudio.com and www.thomannmusic.com.

I was wondering the same thing.

 

[Luckbad]

You could ping Synthax, which is the US distributor: http://www.synthax.com/index.php/contact.html

 

[imblub]

Can anyone comment on how the crossfeed implementation on this compares to other DAC/amps that do crossfeed like Soekris stuff, SPL Phonitors, or even just dsp?

 

[NickedWicked]

Will be interested to read what your impressions are comparing these DAC giants... would be interesting also to know which is a keeper, if you have no other choice but to keep only one of them.

Do share your impressions here when you have the chance.

Will do! Got the Brooklyn+ as well as the ADI-2 Pro at the moment, the week I've spend with them so far the Brooklyn+ seems the warmer of the 2, very musical as well, there is slightly more microdetail too compared to the ADI-2 Pro. Although there is a somewhat fuzzy sound going on, most likely the power supply that's just not cutting it.

Although the Pro sounds a quite a bit cleaner and a more balanced sound. Not surprising since the power gets filtered through a battery as well as a near flawless USB implementation. It seems there are ways to improve the Brooklyn further such as a linear power supply as well as a good USB reclocker and if you want some customization like the ADI-2 Pro you're gonna need a Schiit Loki as well, but I think that would put the price well over 3000 euro, compared to a mere 1400 euro for the ADI-2 Pro.

Of course the Brooklyn has things like MQA, Apple remote and a phono preamp and slightly more juice, 4-ish watts on the Pro vs 6 watts but then again the Pro has a very nice ADC and a lot of stuff for monitoring. It's just a extremely well thought out and executed amp/dac in general.

I would give the cake to the ADI-2 Pro so far, bit of a no brainer really comparing the prices, both are very feature rich, but if you want some upgradeability the Brooklyn+ might be a better choice as there seems to be a lot of undiscovered potential but then again spend a little more and you got yourself a Manhatten 2 which is most likely in a somewhat different ballpark.

This has been tested with a brand new burned in LCD-X CE as well as a HD 650 which got about 300 hours on it, I will try to get my hands on a Focal Clear this week.

I will probably return the Brooklyn+ end of this week but I still need to try some things. Next up is the Chord Hugo 2 and from what I've heard here on HF it seems to be pretty close to the ADI-2 Pro, although the sound signature will differentiate quite a bit.

 

[lowvolume]

First firmware update for the RME DAC:

https://www.forum.rme-audio.de/viewtopic.php?id=26630

 

[chungjun]

Thanks for sharing... don't let irrelevant stuffs like work and real life slows you down here. Hahaa! Rather interested to read about your impression compared to Benchmark DAC3.

Next up is the Chord Hugo 2 and from what I've heard here on HF it seems to be pretty close to the ADI-2 Pro, although the sound signature will differentiate quite a bit.

 

[Malcolm Riverside]

You could ping Synthax, which is the US distributor: http://www.synthax.com/index.php/contact.html

Thanks for the tip! Here’s the response I got:
“Thanks for your interest! The ADI-2 DAC has just begun shipping and we are out of stock until the next delivery in February. I don't know about Amazon but US dealers should have stock in a month or so. Sorry for the delay.”

Thanks,
Jeff Petersen
Product Specialist
Synthax Inc.

 

[NickedWicked]

Pretty certain the DAC chip is still a AKM 4490, I wish they would've delayed the DAC version just a few months to implement the AKM 4493. Would've made more sense as it is more HIFI oriented amp/DAC from RME. The upgrades should be relatively substantial as is but still...

 

[lowvolume]

AKM announced the 4493 in December 2017. The DAC was obviously already in production at that time (first units were shipped in December, as can be read here and elsewhere). Your proposal would have caused the unit to be available not before June 2018. Yes, these times manufacturing has a long pre-phase, and that's a global problem. Also note the 4493 is not pin compatible. So the price of the DAC would have been higher, as everything around the PCB and even the programming would have to be made new, rasing the development costs and with it the sales price.

And then - for what? I am pretty sure that the DAC has the better analog output stages than upcoming alternatives. They won't beat the DAC. They could offer DSD512 and another filter to play with, but the first is useless, and the second not a life saver either...

 

[cardeli22]

Jeff from Syntax gave me a similar response:
Sorry for the delayed reply, we were at the NAMM Show last week and still catching up.
We are currently out of stock in the US, but expecting our next delivery towards the end of February. Reseller orders will be fulfilled first come, first serve.
So far, ZenPro Audio has been stocking, but selling through the units quickly.

Can't wait for them to be back in stock.

 

[Malcolm Riverside]

These are in stock from a couple of dealers online now. Somehow just managed to snag one from a dealer on eBay for a really good price. Can’t wait to get my hands on it! I’m counting on the sound quality and multitude of features to cure me of my recent bout of upgrade-itis.

 

[cardeli22]

These are in stock from a couple of dealers online now. Somehow just managed to snag one from a dealer on eBay for a really good price. Can’t wait to get my hands on it! I’m counting on the sound quality and multitude of features to cure me of my recent bout of upgrade-itis.

I understand there is no cure, only very expensive treatments.