you just contradicted yourself. please clarify? 
Did I contradict myself? Ok. What I meant is that the Zen CAN is performing very well in terms of sound quality, output power, noise floor, and even in the âXbass/3Dâ modes but not driven to its full potential when using the ZenDAC as DAC.
Donât take me wrong; the ZenDAC is a nice DAC/amp for desktop use etc. but as DAC not on par with other DACs I own.
The Zen CAN sounds really great with many of my headphones when fed by better DACs.
I wonder then if the Signature DAC would be different in any way.
I am not an expert but this emphasis on âbetter parts usedâ for the ZenDAC Signature Drop version actually implies that the circuitry itself is the same as the normal ZenDAC and thus presumably very similar in sound performance (probably just measuring a bit better). But I might be wrongâŚ
As I already mentioned, I do like the ZenDAC for light desktop use but I would not buy a âsignatureâ DAC for 250 USD (plus tax etc.) with USB-input only. There are better options out there.
I am always wondering why a company like ifi which is selling lots of products for âcleaningâ the digital transmission is not offering SPDIF/Toslink connection for electrically decoupled devices for this âbetterâ signature DAC. I do own (and like) other ifi products besides the two Zen products (ifi Micro iDSD and the iDSD Nano ⌠neither micro nor nano but that is off-topic) so I am not bashing the company but I am afraid to say that the ZenDAC Signature looks like not really worth it - unless you are a fan of the iPower-X power supply.
The ZenCAN amp however is a great product and the ZenCAN Signature 6xx version might be really great for owners of the HD6** series (I also own the HD660s and the HD6xx).
This is back on Drop for anyone interested and willing to wait till Nov. 11th for it to ship.
In case you want a balanced ZEN DAC+CAN stack but not to spend 90 USD for the interconnect, you find cheap (and available) alternatives from DELOCK on amazon DE and UK (10EUR/19GBP):
and
I have the 0.5m and 2m ones and a 2m extension and all 5 poles are connected in all of them (i.e. the ground/shield is linked as well) and they work with the original ZenDAC and the ZenCAN.
Of course, they are just cheap cables and nothing fancy but they work as they are supposed to.
EDIT: the UK one is out of stock already⌠but they are available on ebay as wellâŚ
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I donât know if it was mentioned already, but the 4.4mm balanced OUTPUT on the back of the ZenCAN is not a line-out but a pre-out with all gain and EQ settings effective on it. I.e. if you really wanted to you could add a balanced EQ or 3D effect for your 6xx or whatever headphone you have by including this amp in your (balanced) signal chain to another amp. Of course I do not recommend it since this would have all the disadvantages of double-amping, noise, distortion, saturated signals, etc. ⌠but some might want to play around with it this way.
The pre-out is also not muted when a headphone is plugged in the ZenCAN - hence it is a bit of limited use for active speakers in my opinion.
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I appreciate what youâre saying here, @theFritz, I just want to clean up one linguistic thing so we donât confuse people:
Using the pre-out is not double-amping. âDouble-ampingâ refers to connecting the output stage of an amplifier to the input stage of a second amplifier. This way of connecting can be very dangerous for both amplifiers. If you connect the Zen CAN to a second amplifier by using the Zenâs pre-out, you are not doing this, and itâs perfectly safe. However, your points about potentially adding extra noise, distortions, etc. still stand because the signal chain has been complicated. I hope iFi has a ZenCAN dac on the way that adds their bass boost and 3D feature on just a DAC so you donât have to route signal through their amplifier if you want to try out those features on an external amp you already have. 
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You are perfectly right; It is not really double-amping and you will not blow up your amp(s) that way but it is still not the best idea to do it this way if you are looking for âimprovedâ sound quality.
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the 4.4 balanced connector on the Zen CAN is not outputâŚitâs balanced input for the Zen DAC or Signature DAC, whoâs 4.4mm connector is actually balanced out.
Zen CAN also has RCA input for pairing with a non-balanced DAC.
Zen DAC / Signature DAC has RCA output as well, which can be used as a pre-out or to a single ended amp.
mmmâŚI just realized why the Signature CAN and DAC are so expensive. I knew they came with a power supply, which is an add on for the original Zen DACâŚbut itâs not just the iPower they included with them, itâs the iPower X, which is twice the price of the non-X iPower.
so with the added cost of premium components and the iPower XâŚexplains the cost differential.
alas, even though the price is now justified based on a cost equationâŚthe performance difference between the Drop Signature and IFi non-Signature versions isnât enough to give the Signature versions an edge to warranty real consideration.
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The CAN does have a balanced output in the back as well. 3 rear inputs (RCA/4.4mm/Aux), as well as an 1 output - bal 4.4mm.
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I used the capital letters for 4.4mm âOUTPUTâ on purpose ⌠as already clarified; the Zen CAN has 3 inputs and 1 balanced pre-out (also in 4.4mm format).
I apologizeâŚI wasnât thinking of the actual 4,4mm Pentacon headphone connector.
Now you are confusing me a bit with the âheadphone connectorâ. The use of the 4.4mm Pentacon is a bit exotic however⌠Probably I try to summarize it a bit more systematically:
ZenCAN Inputs (all on the back):
1 = RCA (cinch) Single Ended
2 = 3.5mm Single Ended Aux
3 = 4.4mm Pentacon Balanced (uses all 5 rings - incl. the Sleve for ground)
Input is selectable by a switch on front
ZenCAN Outputs:
Front:
- 6.3mm Single Ended amped headphone out
- 4.4mm Pentacon Balanced amped headphone out (typically only the 4 TRRR rings of the 5 TRRRS are used for headphone cables)
Back:
- 4.4mm Pentacon Balanced Pre-Out (i.e. variable output); uses all 5 rings - incl. the Sleve for ground
Headphone outputs and the pre-out are simultaneously active.
The balanced pre-out puts out also the filtered and volume-controlled signals of the single ended inputs .
Hope that helpsâŚ
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oh heckâŚyouâre right. I totally missed seeing that 4.4mm Pentacon out entirely.
The 4.4mm for Line-In/Pre-Out is an odd choice indeed but it has the potential to completely replace the bulky 2-times-3pol-XLR connectors (m and f) for all balanced connections between active components since the ground connection is also provided (TRRRS = L+/L-/R+/R-/GND).
I guess it lets you share the DAC with another balanced amp.
how does it perform in left right seperation with only -50 db crosstalk ?
I guess that is a typo on the Drop page (or the âSignatureâ CAN is worse than the normal one - which is unlikely). According to the technical specs in
from the ifi web site, the crosstalk in the ifi ZEN CAN is -90 dB
Which seems to be correct.