* No decoder? You donāt need a decoder to enjoy our āstandardā sound quality ā which is now widely agreed by mastering communities to be superior to CD.
* Authenticated: Where the hardware is limited to single rate playback (44.1 or 48 kHz) the decoder prepares the signal to give the maximum sound quality from generic D/A converters.
* MQA Core: The first unfold of the Origami recovers all the direct music-related information and makes it available for either analogue or digital output at 88.2 or 96 kHz.
Sound quality is higher than from āNoā or āAuthenticatingā decoders but lower than a āFullā decoder. Products containing an MQA decoder may provide a digital output of either the undecoded stream or the Core output ā providing they are passed with bit accuracy. The MQA Core signal is also preconditioned for generic DACs.
* Full Decoder: A full decoder includes: stream Authentication, Origami unfold to Core and then further unfolds with precise file and platform-specific DAC compensation and management according to the hierarchical target. This is the highest possible sound quality.
* MQA Renderer: This new class of device can take a bit-accurate signal from a Core decoder (containing buried information on how to proceed) and complete the final unfold in its analog context.
An MQA Renderer will indicate āstream lockā but is not able to decode an MQA stream or Authenticate it.
This type of device is available for portable applications (such as active headphones or portable amplifiers) and for silicon integration.
MQA Renderers provide analog output only through their managed D/A conversion.|
With 600 ohm loads you will get sound, it will even get loud at certain frequencies, but it will likely lack control. Even the Zen CAN amp which was rated for 15V at 300 ohm loads struggled in the low end with 300 and 600 ohm loads. I have more detailed thoughts on the CAN amp here:
edit: i should throw this out there as well. your pc is an mqa decoder. thats typically the first decoding step for an mqa setup. pc decodes and sends to mqa device renderer. what that means is, you get to keep the ifi zen sound with the first fold of mqa with version2, but not full on mqa.
i find the zen can has enough juice for 600ohm headphones at moderate or less listening levels. my h600ās sound great until i go to about 70% on the dial(i would guess mid 80ās db levels), louder then that and the bass starts to get sloppy, but everything else is fine. i enjoy listening to my 600ās on it as i never ācrank it upā anymore.
I didnāt use it much as an amp. For most full sized headphones itās underpowered. IMO iFi struggles with power delivery in their lower tier amps. The Zenās built in amp works fine for IEMs and easy to drive planars (my Hexv2 sounded pretty good on it) but I wouldnāt get it to use as a primary headphone amp.
Itās been awhileā¦pretty sure I tried both. It stands out that the overall trend held up either way but that using a dedicated psu just delayed the bad things happening by 2-3 dB of sound intensity. I know for the CAN amp I tried both the generic psu that came with the second batch released and the fancier iPower unit that came with the batch 1 release, same trend.
So I guess Iām not really missing much if I have the v1 rather than the v2 other than the MQA snake oil, since power for 600 ohm headphones is still not enough.
