The CEntrance Hi-Fi M8 V2 Thread
- Thread starter schalliol
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The CEntrance BlueDAC has a very good bluetooth implementation that actually does a very good job of upsampling and re-clocking the data stream from iPhone to retain a lot of the sound quality of the music if it starts out with either a very good mastering or is lossless. It won't make a brick-walled or crappy mastering sound good, but it won't make a very good recording sound bad at all.
It also supports AptX BT on my MacBook, but at that point I just plug it into the Mac and listen to the USB DAC. Regardless, I expect the HiFiM8 V2 to sound extremely good with Bluetooth.
SupperTime
500+ Head-Fier
I can't find this player anywhere
MikeyFresh
1000+ Head-Fier
Pretty cryptic post, but how hard did you look?
If the "player" you are referring to is the forthcoming CEntrance HiFi-M8 v2, it isn't a player, it is a DAC/Amp.
SupperTime
500+ Head-Fier
I'm. Sorry, dac Amp is what I meant, I guess it's not released yet
BasilFawlty
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Just received the Mixerface R4R with microphones EXCELLENT quality and the CEntrance Serene as well even them EXCELLENT! Selling my Sennheiser HD700 now. My only concern is that Michel Goodman never is off! Happens that I get an answer on a Saturday late, an early Sunday morning etc. Everyone needs to be off sometime 
.
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Just received the Mixerface R4R with microphones EXCELLENT quality and the CEntrance Serene as well even them EXCELLENT! Selling my Sennheiser HD700 now. My only concern is that Michel Goodman never is off! Happens that I get an answer on a Saturday late, an early Sunday morning etc. Everyone needs to be off sometime
Michael took his family on a weekend holiday to the warmer south, and still answered my email to him today. Truly a gem with impeccable work ethic.
Also, I need to make note of my impressions of the Cerene dB headphones that were mentioned here earlier. I bought these with my own money this past September with the discounted pre-orders, but through a miscommunication I got tracking in September and they didn't ship until the end of October.
I found that upon arrival that they had a somewhat loose and boosted bass that was overshadowing the treble, but when I came back to them after just 4-6 hours of burn-in they clearly sounded much better. So I set them down and ran a total of 24 hours of music through them before I picked them up again. At that point they sounded even better and just about right, where at 36 hours the sound hadn't changed a lot more and I stopped the burn-in so that I could evaluate them. The Cerene dB are one of those few headphones that have the biggest changes with burn-in vs some others, so please DO NOT go by 1st impressions and first put 1 or 2 days of music through them before you judge them.
I listened to them right out of my late 2014 old MacBook retina 15" headphone jack, as well as thru my iPhone Xs Max with lightning adapter, CEntrance BlueDAC and HiFi-M8 V1, plus through my HiFiMan R2R2000 DAP. They sound great un-amplified, but they also scale up with a better source and amplifier. I have not tried them yet with my desktop PS Audio DAC and ZDT amplifier yet.
After burn-in the sound was very good with clean but strong and punchy bass, plus a rich midrange and crisp treble detail with no fatigue. There is an ever-so-mild midrange bloom on some male vocals from being a warm sounding headphone, but it's not excessive or too intrusive (Chris Jones "Roadhouses and Automobiles"). And with female vocals like Diana Krall "Live in Paris" they're a real treat - her piano is replayed with fast response and realism, and the string bass is full sounding down low while also being able to hear they player's fingers brushing the strings as they are plucked, while I get a front row seat to hearing her vocals.
While these are intended to be a studio reference headphone, they are no way a neutral or cold headphone like many of the Beyer Dynamic headphones I have heard - They are a warm and rich headphone with good detail and efficiency, and remind me more of a current Sennheiser HD-660s (don't have one yet to directly compare to, but I've enjoyed trying the 660 at RMAF). The transparency and lack of coloration remind me of an open headphone, while the bass is deep and full like with a closed headphone. They can be realistic and exciting/fun at the same time. Overall frequency balance is good, and I think these play well above their pay grade. Listening to them via the R2R2000 portable DAP, you might sometimes think that you were listening to a $400-500 headphone.
At this point I am very impressed for the street price being about half the cost of it's competitors, where $199 on sale gets you the Cerene dB + a DacPort HD USB DAC/amp! They simply kill my other small closed headphones such as my Sony MDR-6, Shure 840, modded ATH-900, Sennheiser HD-25, V-MODA M-80, and V-MODA XS. And they're also better than my old $300 V-MODA M-100 V1 wired, where the Cerene dB has better treble presence and detail, and it's mids are more intimate and rich sounding.
Isolation is decent too, about the same as the V-MODA and there is minimal sound leakage when playing at normal volume levels (can be distantly heard across the room when playing loud volumes). The upgraded V-MODA Crossfade Wireless II Rose Gold are fairly close in sound to these headphones, whether wired or wireless, and had cost about $350 (AptX version). I'll need to listen a lot more before I could declare which is better, although the Crossfade Wireless II are clearly better than the older M100 and first Crossfade Wireless, and similar to the Sennheiser Momentum Wireless when using bluetooth (compared at RMAF 2019 in September).
Next, Michael might want to try to make a Cerene BT with wireless capability in addition to a removable cable for wired listening, where it would justify doubling the price and at the same time become a Crossfade II Wireless or Momentum Wireless competitor, which are also very good portable phones. I'd planned to get the Sennheiser in the near future for the excellent active noise cancelation feature.
PS: While I wrote this review I was listening to "Live in Paris" on the Cerene dB through my R2R2000 DAP - I made it to song #8 "Maybe You'll Be There" while on the last paragraph, and I had to just stop and lay back and finish the song before finishing the review.
PPS: They sound great at low volumes at night, with good bass presence even without cranking up the volume, so no "loudness" EQ is needed with these.
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ruthieandjohn
Stumbling towards enlightenment
(Formerly known as kayandjohn.)
Are the Cerene headphones open or closed? Thanks!
jstachowski
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They're closed. And they sound very nice. Just the thing to use when recording with live mics in the room.
Yeah I am after the Aux in function in which the dac is bypassed. Hopefully they will still include it so I can connect not just handphones but DAP as well.
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Thread seems silent lately. Any news?
Recent update from Michael. January prototype:
First Impressions
I was given the prototype you see in these pictures and have been listening to it over the last several days. I noticed several things.
The side with the most controls is the "Cool Side". It contains 2 outputs (balanced and unbalanced), suitable for IEMs and more sensitive headphones. It contains volume and meter brightness controls. It contains the USB audio input, mode switch, EQ, gain, and several other useful controls. Yes, it's jam packed, but also, very practical.
he other side ("Hot side") has a USB C jack for power/charging, 1/4" unbalanced headphone jack and 4-pin XLR jack for balanced high power output.
The "Hot Side" is best for powering overhead and hard-to-drive headphones, requiring additional power. Please don't plug your sensitive IEMs into the Hot Side. We have included a warning: "Caution: No IEMs" on this side to serve as a reminder. We want you to maintain great hearing into your golden years!
Notice that the individual LED circles feature a very uniform lighting pattern, something we worked very hard to achieve. These meters represent some pretty cool eye candy and we find that they are a joy to watch. They are very bright, visible in sunlight at the brightest setting, but you can also dial their brightness down to "off" on the other side of the adjustment range. We have found ourselves reaching both for the volume control and meter brightness control, as we moved from room to room while testing the unit. Both volume and brightness require adjustment, depending on the environment, and having the controls located next to each other is a big plus.
LED color
Notice that all LEDs are white. We had a long internal discussion about this and came to the conclusion that since this is a playback and not a recording device, there is no need to alert the user with color red. After all, there is absolutely nothing the user can do about overloads, so we might as well have 0dB FS LEDs light up in white, just like the rest of them. Red only belongs on the gear where you can reach over and adjust something to prevent overload (such as recording gear), but here you are just playing back something that's already recorded, so there is really nothing to do but enjoy the music
Next Steps
We are planning to build HiFi-M8 in the middle of February. We are finalizing the BOM now, will be buying components and sending them to our factory for PCB assembly. I will likely go to China in mid February to supervise the build process. Hopefully the virus will be contained by then. Final assembly and testing will be performed in Chicago as soon as I return.
One more thing
I've been a little quiet over the last month because we've been brainstorming with our pro audio friends about something new. The thing is, our factories have minimum order quantities, so we cannot just make 100 pcs of HiFi-M8 V2. We need to make hundreds of units at once! So we’ve been working to see if we can create a family of products based on the HiFi-M8 V2 that would: 1) Be useful 2) Be innovative as to fill gaps in the market and 3) Let us order many units at once.
We spoke with a number of producers, live sound engineers and installed sound professionals about what they needed in a portable device and came up with four new CEntrance products based on the same platform. We will be making an announcement soon, but think you may be interested in this, too, so we will give you a sneak peak. The 4 products are:
First Impressions
I was given the prototype you see in these pictures and have been listening to it over the last several days. I noticed several things.
- Sound quality is impressive. Noise is pitch black on the Cool side and Power is abundant on the Hot side, just like we wanted it. The unit is lightweight and built-tough. Nothing sticks out the sides, so you can easily slip it into your cargo pants pocket or a backpack. The Volume knob won't be accidentally bumped because it’s recessed.
- Stamina control works well. When engaged, it turns off the Hot side and the meters, giving you another 3 or so hours on the USB input and extending total play time to about 15 hours on the Bluetooth input. These are not final measurements, but expectations based on what we know about this battery so far (same battery has been shipping in the MixerFace for a couple of years, so we have plenty of data.)
- Looking at the back panel, the left hand side USB C jack can be used to both charge the battery and play USB audio, OR to only play USB audio. This depends on whether the unit is connected to a phone (in this case you'd use audio only, as you don't want to drain the phone's battery) or a laptop (in this case you could both play the audio AND charge M8 from the laptop, if you want). A switch lets you determine this. There is another USB C jack on the Hot side that can be used for charging. Very convenient.
- The meters have true VU ballistics and use full-wave rectifiers on their inputs. This costs us more money due to extra circuitry, but compared to cheaper solutions such as a half-wave rectifier, gives you a truthful representation of what's being played. These meters are a joy to watch and you don't have to strain your eyes, because the brightness is adjustable. But I already said that.
- We noticed that the 2.5mm jack needs to protrude a little more, probably by another .5mm to ensure perfect fit with all plugs. We will make that happen before production, it's not a big change. We also noticed that we can improve Bluetooth performance, so we are making some changes while China is off celebrating the New Year. When they are back, we will make our suppliers busy.
The side with the most controls is the "Cool Side". It contains 2 outputs (balanced and unbalanced), suitable for IEMs and more sensitive headphones. It contains volume and meter brightness controls. It contains the USB audio input, mode switch, EQ, gain, and several other useful controls. Yes, it's jam packed, but also, very practical.
he other side ("Hot side") has a USB C jack for power/charging, 1/4" unbalanced headphone jack and 4-pin XLR jack for balanced high power output.
The "Hot Side" is best for powering overhead and hard-to-drive headphones, requiring additional power. Please don't plug your sensitive IEMs into the Hot Side. We have included a warning: "Caution: No IEMs" on this side to serve as a reminder. We want you to maintain great hearing into your golden years!
Notice that the individual LED circles feature a very uniform lighting pattern, something we worked very hard to achieve. These meters represent some pretty cool eye candy and we find that they are a joy to watch. They are very bright, visible in sunlight at the brightest setting, but you can also dial their brightness down to "off" on the other side of the adjustment range. We have found ourselves reaching both for the volume control and meter brightness control, as we moved from room to room while testing the unit. Both volume and brightness require adjustment, depending on the environment, and having the controls located next to each other is a big plus.
LED color
Notice that all LEDs are white. We had a long internal discussion about this and came to the conclusion that since this is a playback and not a recording device, there is no need to alert the user with color red. After all, there is absolutely nothing the user can do about overloads, so we might as well have 0dB FS LEDs light up in white, just like the rest of them. Red only belongs on the gear where you can reach over and adjust something to prevent overload (such as recording gear), but here you are just playing back something that's already recorded, so there is really nothing to do but enjoy the music
Next Steps
We are planning to build HiFi-M8 in the middle of February. We are finalizing the BOM now, will be buying components and sending them to our factory for PCB assembly. I will likely go to China in mid February to supervise the build process. Hopefully the virus will be contained by then. Final assembly and testing will be performed in Chicago as soon as I return.
One more thing
I've been a little quiet over the last month because we've been brainstorming with our pro audio friends about something new. The thing is, our factories have minimum order quantities, so we cannot just make 100 pcs of HiFi-M8 V2. We need to make hundreds of units at once! So we’ve been working to see if we can create a family of products based on the HiFi-M8 V2 that would: 1) Be useful 2) Be innovative as to fill gaps in the market and 3) Let us order many units at once.
We spoke with a number of producers, live sound engineers and installed sound professionals about what they needed in a portable device and came up with four new CEntrance products based on the same platform. We will be making an announcement soon, but think you may be interested in this, too, so we will give you a sneak peak. The 4 products are:
- Professional USB DAC with dual male XLR output
- Professional Bluetooth DAC with dual male XLR output
- Professional SD card player with dual male XLR output
- Professional Vinyl amp with dual male XLR output
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nsk1979
100+ Head-Fier
Is there any updates about production, or it is on hold due to corona virus?
jmills8
Previously known as bmiamihk, jmills2
Are you a great audio gear chase ?
Was just checking in on this. I owned the original M8 so it's good to see a successor. I use the Mixerface for my Youtube videos, so I shot a single-take video review of it:
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