time waits for no one: 12/2013

I purchased ifi-audio nano iDSD to work with iPhone 5s and I found it's a perfect pair for listening Hi-res files (include DSD and DXD files) in mobile environment since it's a super versatile equipment.

This is the package I received. Looks like very resemble that of iPhone's (but bigger anyway). RCA cable, 2 rubber bands, USB cable (50cm), rubber shield, pouch is included in a box.

Other things you need to purchase is the followings;

1. Lightning to USB Camera Adapter, this is mandatory to enable USB connection with iPhone 5s.

2. ONKYO HF Player to extract and send music data to iDSD digitally.

3. USB cable or USB A male to B male adaptor.

I purchased very short length USB cables which are as a sampler of Japanese audio magazine (HIVI), but they're still too long for mobile environment, so I recommend adaptor.

SUPRA USB 2.0

Zonotone 6N-USB

Setting with iPhone 5s is like the following;

Looks not so smart, but I believe this is the best setting currently available.

I use Etymotic research hf3 and it's quite good (although I used ER-4S before it's broken, hf3 got more bass and better for popular music and it's better for me anyway).

iDSD is equipped with lithium-polymer battery (1400mAh) and said it works more than 10 hours.

Note: Use in battery power mode, you need to power iDSD on first and if power it on later after USB connection, it worked in USB power mode.
According to ifi-audio it takes around 3 hours to charge full of the battery, but blue LED is still on after that and it maybe a issue.

One thing I have to complain is that USB female port is so loose and I have to stabilize with damping stickers when to use with iPurifier.

In my audio set, I still use Apogee Mini-DAC and I tried to compare the sound of 2 DACs and found the sound of nano iDSD is reflecting very current favour of the sound, which means rather thin but edgy, speedy and higher resolution compare to Mini-DAC (thick and very studio monitor like sound, used to be the standard of the recording studio i the world) . As I've been accustomed with the sound of Mini-DAC for 3 more years, it might get sometime to get used to it, but I think I will and iDSD can be worked as DDC!

Anyway, the sound via iPhone with nano iDSD is superb (without nano iDSD, I feel something missing..), especially Hi-res files, but also much better with 16/44.1 files of mp3 (320kbps) or AAC (256kbps) files to playback.

Below is the preference of Audirvana Plus of MacBook Pro for your reference.

I purchased iPurifier as well for indoor listening and not quite sure it works fine since the difference of the sound is so subtle (in case the source is iPhone), but seems something effective in case the source is Mac (or PC) via USB port to reduce the noise floor but I'm not for sure it's cost effective anyway.

Note: I encountered iDSD can't work with iPurifier with my iPad (3rd gen) since when to playback a high resolution file which is higher than 24/88.2, frequent pop noise is on. So I forced to reinstall Onkyo HF Player (Flac Player as well) to resolve this issue. iOS apps are sometimes behaved like this and the only solution to address this kind of issue is to reinstall, it's totally a waist of time since reinstall apps means all uploaded hi-res files are needed to be upload again:(

So at this moment, I don't recommend to use iPurifier with iPad 3.