I meant “lucky” in that the manufacturer only sold a limited number themselves but you knew who they were.
What is an Air Lens? Is that some mystical creature with a now limited market?
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DSD256 is 6 to 14 GB in my experience. DSD512 is absurd IMHO.
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When I bought my Pink Faun I needed some special I/O cards. Each came with three options of clock devices. “Insanely Good”, “Oh my God!”, and the highest priced clocks, “It Seems Nice”. I chose to go with the most expensive. No regrets.
The folks at Grimm, who before they were famous for the MU1, were known for their pro gear clocks. They put an insanely good clock in the MU1. It’s all about jitter. The way you know you are hearing less jitter is when you listen to your friends system, you can’t shake the “it sounds a lot better at my house” feeling.
DCS, Ideon, many others sell stand alone clock devices that reviewers say really give the stack some snap. It’s sad but true, ask anyone who has gone down that path.
I believe in the value of expensive clocks. Way, way more than fuses.
(I am not suggesting fuses don’t matter, they do)
In other news, with the BACCH a tap on the iPad switches between the Grimm MU1 and the Eversolo. My oh my oh my. It’s closer than I thought it would be. Yikes!
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All these Asian based DSD512, HDMI capable streamers that have come out in the last 6 months, I’m suspecting are all using the same “digital audio engine” for lack of a better term. If it isn’t Converse Digital’s, which is what the Air Lens uses, then just what is it? I find it hard to believe that so many of these are popping up with completely independent engine designs.
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Dammer. Now I suppose I am going to have to get one to try.
As soon as I have a stereo setup to plug it into. Which may be a couple more months.
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It is a really nice unit that trends well right now. Added benefit, I put my last two pair of Earth Shoes in the beautiful box for storage. Kind of a marvel I do like it and it sounds good.
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Not necessarily - through the wonders of open source software there are multiple software server and streamer sets of source code around (Moode, LMS/Squeezelite, Roopie et al) to do this, precisely because it doesn’t need custom hardware* to do streaming via the common ICs (e.g. USB, and even S/PDIF / AES) and multiple small form ARM-based computer boards are available (Raspberry Pi in it’s full and CM4 guises is just the best known one), OEMs just need to pick one, customise for their own use and brand, compile for their chosen HW platform (all of them small form computer boards of one sort or another) and put it out there.
This helps to explain the widely varying quality of apps and UIs etc. e.g. Holo made the Red interesting by adding a “DDC”(ish) on to a Pi4 compute module, but by some accounts the hardware control software (i.e. a web server and a bunch of scripts to manage settings) is not particularly polished.
…but also makes it interesting (and highly competitive, albeit within a small market).
Companies without the type of experience required (e.g. mostly-hardware-and-control-firmware companies such as PSA and many others) will go for more complete solutions like Converse supply, and there are some advantages to that too since Converse do a quite a good app within the limitations of DLNA/uPnP.
Edit, although you could probab;y say they are all using the same basic OS - Linux, but that is also in common with most of the computers on the planet e.g. smartphones, washing machines, all that smart IoT stuff, in fact just about everywhere except consumer desktop PCs.
* and it is free. Companies that use and customise Linux are supposed to release the source code for their changes, many break the law and do not release the source code of course.
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There is some truth to what Tony said. I had the Stack Link and Red in at same time to MKII. I could not tell a difference at all. Both Industrial RPI based solutions. Two different power supplies. But man I could not tell a noticeable difference. Now Airlens is not that. Not sure what the A6 is. I do have it on order as I think its a DDC too. I need that for attaching computer to system when I run a new room correction.
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The RPi is a popular one, for sure 
Stumbled into this, not in the market at the moment so I thought I’d share. Not a Master Edition.
Odd, two in one day?
Can someone explain the difference between the A6 and A6 Master. The eversolo site seems down.
Never mind:
Better op amps and clocks
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I read today that some are questioning the long term viability of the A-6 due to its app being windows based. They worry about support being discontinued five years down the road, or so. Eversolo has been offering very good support in the short time since its been launched. I would think this should be less a worry the greater its success in the marketplace- which so far has been exceptional.
I think for this kind of device, in less than 5 years it will be surpassed by something better and probably cheaper. Being Windows based won’t matter.
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perhaps more like 5 months or 5 weeks
stay tuned as they say
Windows based, how? It runs Android as an OS, comes with Android and Apple apps. I used no Windows anything to operate it.
I dont believe there is any Windows aspect to it other than you can connect to it to manage files on it with Windows, Mac, or Linux.
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I don’t know where you got that information from, but they’re wrong.
As aangen just mentioned above, the A6 is NOT Windows based at all, thank goodness.
And in case you haven’t noticed, nearly half the posts in this thread alone have been discussing Linux/Android this and that with this unit.
Thank you for your mini-reviews on the A6. I really like your findings so far on the A6. It’s really making me excited to getting my Master Edition, scheduled in mid-June though.
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I hope it pleases you! The non-Master version is quite good. It and the Master version could easily be endgame quality for many. I put it up against my Grimm MU1 and it stands tall!
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