AIR 3 Sound Quality Observations

[Confused]

I have noticed that the new AIR 3 thread has become very much dominated by the many and varied technical and set up issues that have arisen.  This is fair enough, and perhaps to be expected in the early days of a Devialet beta release.  The trouble is, the sound quality observations have become a little lost amongst all the technical stuff.

So, I thought it would be useful to have a new uncluttered thread to focus just on the sound quality observations.  (for those who have actually made AIR 3 work!)

As well as simple observations on sound quality, any comparative tests with the myriad of other 'input solutions' will I am sure be of great interest to many.

EDIT: I have been deliberately non-specific as to this being a Mac only AIR 3 beta thread, my thinking is this tread will get far less posts than many threads, so could in time roll on to cover the non-beta Mac version or the Windows version of AIR 3, both of which I believe may be coming 'soon' ......... (soon = between now and 2020)

[Confused]

Early reports in that AIR 3 is 'within spitting distance' of a Totaldac D1. Impressive!

Any more?

[NickB]

Seems to be somewhat better than my Raspberry Pi and HiFi Berry Digi+, not sure where that comes in any pecking order.

[blair.athol]

I have noticed that the new AIR 3 thread has become very much dominated by the many and varied technical and set up issues that have arisen.  This is fair enough, and perhaps to be expected in the early days of a Devialet beta release.  The trouble is, the sound quality observations have become a little lost amongst all the technical stuff.

So, I thought it would be useful to have a new uncluttered thread to focus just on the sound quality observations.  (for those who have actually made AIR 3 work!)

As well as simple observations on sound quality, any comparative tests with the myriad of other 'input solutions' will I am sure be of great interest to many.

EDIT:  I have been deliberately non-specific as to this being a Mac only AIR 3 beta thread, my thinking is this tread will get far less posts than many threads, so could in time roll on to cover the non-beta Mac version or the Windows version of AIR 3, both of which I believe may be coming 'soon' .........   (soon = between now and 2020)

Hi Confused,
More than happy to help you up to 2000.
For me the sound quality of Air 3 is just great and comparable to version 2 as it was always a wide soundstage and high quality in my set-up. The great advantage is that it now works flawlessly with Roon as well. A big step forward.

[baddog]

I had posted this in a different thread but shall add some additional detail here.

My setup is a Synology NAS where all my music files are located ( redbook, high resolution PCM, DSD ). This is connected via ethernet to a switch ( $20 D-Link 8 port switch )

Mac Mini running RoonServer, with AIR 3 installed. Connected via ethernet to switch.

D400 using ethernet input connected to switch.

Playback has been mostly flawless for me for quite a few days now. Maybe once a day over several hours there will be a brief drop out of less than a second.

For my DSD files I am having Roon convert to PCM files. As when I have them sent as DoP there is a slight background hiss present on music playback.

I compared this setup to using a microRendu in place of AIR 3. The microRendu was powered by an Uptone Audio JS-2, so what one would consider a very good power supply.

In my system, to my ears, the sound quality was comparable between the two and I would be hard pressed to identify a preference for one over the other. Thus I have since switched completely to AIR 3 in my setup.

I think Devialet did a bang up job here!

[GuillaumeB]

I must say I am looking forward to hearing from all the others with Melcos, Aurenders and the like. 

Guillaume

[Nightmare]

So do I

As AIR3 is already reported to be dead even with microRendu (maybe others can confirm that) and microRendu seems to be very convincing even compared to an Aurender N10 (klick), it would be very interesting to hear from users with Aurender N/X100, N10 or even higher!

Of course we are talking about soundquality - not usibility

[mdconnelly]

I had posted this in a different thread but shall add some additional detail here.

My setup is a Synology NAS where all my music files are located ( redbook, high resolution PCM, DSD ). This is connected via ethernet to a switch ( $20 D-Link 8 port switch )

Mac Mini running RoonServer, with AIR 3 installed. Connected via ethernet to switch.

D400 using ethernet input connected to switch.

Playback has been mostly flawless for me for quite a few days now. Maybe once a day over several hours there will be a brief drop out of less than a second.

For my DSD files I am having Roon convert to PCM files. As when I have them sent as DoP there is a slight background hiss present on music playback.

I compared this setup to using a microRendu in place of AIR 3. The microRendu was powered by an Uptone Audio JS-2, so what one would consider a very good power supply.

In my system, to my ears, the sound quality was comparable between the two and I would be hard pressed to identify a preference for one over the other. Thus I have since switched completely to AIR 3 in my setup.

I think Devialet did a bang up job here!

@baddog - can you correlate the infrequent drop-out with anything?  For example, does it seem to only occur on hi-res music?    While I'm excited to hear AIR3 when it makes it to a Windows platform, the occasional dropout would be annoying - even if just once a day.

[baddog]

@mdconnelly - Yes, will report back on type of music that causes the drop out. To be clear that dropout is very short in nature.

[mdconnelly]

@mdconnelly - Yes, will report back on type of music that causes the drop out. To be clear that dropout is very short in nature.

A couple years back, I used the Squeezebox environment to stream music and initially did so via wireless.  While the signal was very strong, I would get occasional drop-outs or slight stuttering, but only on hi-res music.  So I then installed ethernet cabling throughout and never heard another dropout or stutter again... that is, until I bought a Devialet and tried AIR.  

So I am a bit sensitized to it but have great hopes that AIR3 will finally be what I hoped AIR was when I bought my Expert.  Certainly reports on excellent SQ are very positive so I am optimistic.