Yeah, I saw a Brazilian reviewer talking about it and went to look. There are some sparse reviews as early as Nov 2021, but they are very few. It’s also good for us that Edifier do direct selling here (including Stax gear). So this may be a compelling option for folks in Brazil.
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That’s…very out of left field. Wonder why it’s not more common in the US yet. Supply chain issues maybe, or they haven’t even done a stateside launch yet?
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Someone who recently bought a Q5k said they really liked it, but also thought it was brighter than the BTR5, was that your observation? Nobody likes the buttons, so button cancer seems legit.
I own the BTR5, and was thinking about Q5k before all their supply issues got weird this year.
The BTR7 seems big, but maybe it will have better battery life or some other cool feature. The 4.4 is a win, so some of that size is used well already.
Yes the Q5k was brighter. So if you like a warmer sound you might want to choose the BTR5, but besides the brightness, it also seems to me that the sound reproduction gets more accurate/detailed on the Q5k and is more distorted on the BTR5. Nothing major and as I said: Only tested with the Mest… other IEMs may not have such a big difference.
Btw. I finally got a chance to listen to a Topping product today. The DX5 to be precise. It sounded great, but then again there was almost no difference to the apple usb c adapter if any. Also it glitched from -30db to -0db and almost destroyed my ears and Mest. I had my eyes on the NX7, but I guess I will stay away from Topping.
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Starting to inch towards basically being a small DAP in overall size, but hey got to fit a 4.4 in there somehow. Looks super interesting. $230 might make it a tough sell, there is a lot of portable Bluetooth dacs in that range.
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Seems like iFi is cooking something too. Smaller GO blu!? It says DAC in the article so I guess it will be a “dongle dac” without bluetooth. Front picture is not so clear but looks like format and sampling rate LEDs. Only judging from this picture the volume buttons look not so easy to find and push.
It even has IEMatch. On a quite powerful amp like the gryphon I guess it makes sense to reduce higher noise floor somehow but on a dongle DAC I would expect the noise floor to be lower anyway so that there is no need for IEMatch.
“Spring Headphones Festival 2022 mini” opens at Nakano Sunplaza with pre-registration system. At the booth of the Top Wing Cyber Sound Group, the iFi audio brand stick-type portable DAC amplifier “GO bar” was exhibited for reference. The release date is undecided, and the price is around 50,000 yen.It is the second in the GO series following the Bluetooth receiver “GO bul”, and is equipped with 3.5mm unbalanced output and 4.4mm balanced output in a small housing. It is a true balance circuit design with a symmetrical dual mono output stage. In addition to PCM and DSD256 of up to 384kHz / 32bit, it supports MQA full decoding.
Equipped with iEMatch and Turbo mode that increases the gain value, the optimum output adjustment can be performed even when using high-sensitivity earphones or low-efficiency headphones. It also has two types of iFi-specific sound quality correction functions: XBass + for bass enhancement and XSpace for sound field correction.
Edit: $385…Okay…
@sebastien_chiu_iFi
Tell us more.
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Not sure what the justification could possibly be to spend that much money.
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I don’t really understand the purpose of all these USB Dongle DACs. Many of them are above $200, have the same size and power output like a BTR5/Q5K (~220mW 32Ohm) and no battery, bluetooth, software / app. They might have some better SINAD measurements but…
Things I could think of
- It is iFi so at least not designed in China like everything else (I hope)
- DSD and MQA (if you really need it or want it is another thing though)
- iFi Features. xBass and xSpace. Guess you could count the IEMatch too but I still would say the noise floor should be low enough even without this feature, especially for this price.
- Maybe this one is going to be an exception from all other dongles and provide more power, like 400mW or so. The GO blu is a little bit different too from other devices with its 165mW over 3.5mm and 5.6V over 4.4mm.
Still, pretty pricey. Would buy a BTR5 / Qudelix 5K / GO Blu instead of this.
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I don’t see any point in getting those expensive dongle DACs.
Most of them (in the 100-200€ range) don’t have more than 250mW of power through balanced and they all measure perfectly already.
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Pro-Ject shares their new ‘budget entry-level’ players, the E series.
@juliangst just because these measure well doesn’t mean they will sound the same. it’s all got to do with the design and how the DAC / amp are implemented.
@syscrusher justify the cost? cause right now, silicon shortage. 
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Have used dongels for a good while.
So they are not bad.
You can travel light with them and they are usually sufficient.
And they improve the sound compared to the smartphone.
But I bought the Ifi Hip 2 Dac for fun and I have to say that for the money it is better than any dongel, especially if you want more and it is amazingly good.
Apart from that, it doesn’t affect the battery of the smartphone, which is also good, and it runs excellently on both Android/Apple operating systems.
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I have ogled that NX7 a few times, but I tend to like balanced if I have the option. From what I have read, I don’t think it has isolated circuits, just a 4.4mm jack. It seems like they just said, lets go with tons of power, but only single ended. That output glitch would freak me out too.
Interesting that the Q5K is clean enough that the BTR5 seems distorted by comparison, that makes me more interested, I don’t think of the BTR5 that way at all, but I don’t have a detail monster like MEST in my IEM collection either. I am going to guess it uncovers things in gear that you wouldn’t notice otherwise.
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NX7 is indeed single ended with a 4.4 for convenience.
That’s exactly why I bought it because I don’t really like balanced amps because not all my headphones can be used balanced
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when the time comes that I need a mobile DAC / amp, I’m gonna get the BX4…but that’s a ways away.
Maybe i misused the word “distorted” and that may leads to an exaggerated impression. I just think the Q5k sounded slightly cleaner. Not a whole lot and maybe one would need to pay attention and A/B. But I am confident that it’s not a placebo. At least between the BTR5 and the UP5 I could tell them appart in an ABx test. I thought the Q5k was inbetween somewhere.
With the Mest it’s just that all my usual sources don’t sound very good compared to the Apple dongle, UP5 and DX5. I never had the issue with any other IEM. I am currently testing some ThieAudio Tribrids and they seem to have the same issue. I am wondering if that has to do with the EST drivers of those IEMs.
With other IEMs (even the 7hz Timeless) I never cared about the source or noted much of a difference.
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some portable flavor comparisons from my mest mk2
BTR5 to me seems clean but smooth
L&P W2 clean and crisp
XD05 is more warm
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Just bought the Centrance Hifi Mi v2. It has Bluetooth but is a big heavy boy. I’ll be experimenting with its portability
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That makes a ton of sense, I tend to use the Apple dongle or the BTR5, and the Apple one is so neutral, it is hard to describe without relating it to other stuff. I guess that is what makes it a good reference, plus the fact that everyone has one, or can afford one.
I have always been sensitive to EST sound too, so the idea that you notice more with it good EST driver, makes a ton of sense to me. I have noticed something with the sound on a couple of the ThieAudio Tribrids I have listened to. I won’t pretend to understand the why. Maybe this is where you get to good enough IEMs that sources need to be better to take advantage of the potential sound quality.
Until November, I had only gone above $100 once, and I am still trying to decide what is next, for a tribrid probably KL or EJ07m, or if I want to avoid them and go for nice hybrid with Tea2 or Hekili.
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The Gee Stereo Bt speaker…
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Klipsch is releasing a Promedia Heritage 2.1 version of the Promedia PC speakers:
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