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Holo Cyan 2

SwissBear

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SwissBear

SwissBear

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Hello,

 

The Holo Cyan 2 seems about to land in our listening rooms. 

See here for Europe: https://magnahifi.com/holoaudio-cyan-2-dac-nos-r2r-dsd1024/ 

and there for the US: https://www.kitsunehifi.com/product/holo-audio-cyan-2-dac/

 

Characteristics are very impressive to me.

This looks to be a very affordable way to enjoy all the benefits of HQPlayer, including its most advanced features 🙂.

Looking forward to reading your listening impressions and measurements.

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Zauurx

Zauurx

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I'm not even sure that an external power supply would improve the result.

 May just be internal EMI isolation due to proximity to the transformer.  Too bad..

 No possibility of connecting a power supply is not provided.. especially with a consumption of 20w.. an upgrade LHY, Kitsune or just a cable and a Ferrum ?

ROON + HQP / Hdplex H3-i5 + 400ATX >Gustard A26 (NAA twk) > SQM > Benchmark AHB2 / Recital Audio Illumine HEFA

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davide256

davide256

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1 hour ago, Zauurx said:

I'm not even sure that an external power supply would improve the result.

 May just be internal EMI isolation due to proximity to the transformer.  Too bad..

 No possibility of connecting a power supply is not provided.. especially with a consumption of 20w.. an upgrade LHY, Kitsune or just a cable and a Ferrum ?

 

Pictures show a toroidal power supply with no physical isolation. Not as good as Holo Spring 3 but also not $2100 for base model. Cant say I’ve ever owned a DAC other than RPI kit that didn't restrict you to mfr power supply. PS seems to matter most in analog domain so I’d be curious to see if they did offer a version with PS improvements for headphone section

Regards,

Dave

 

Audio system

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SwissBear

SwissBear

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There are three things I find particularly exciting about the arrival of the Cyan 2 at Holo:

 

1. the price/performance ratio: with the Spring 3, we already had, as testers agree, 90% of the May's performance for 50% of its price. With the Cyan 2, we're likely to get 90% of the Spring's performance for half the price, i.e. 80% of the May's performance for just 25% of the price. In my opinion, this is a fantastic step forward in the accessibility of quality musical reproduction...

 

2. with this type of device, you retain total control over digital signal processing. If you want to listen to PCM in 44.1kHz without touching it at all, you have an R2R network that reproduces PCM without passing through a DSP, as do most DACs on the market (very few DACs reproduce the PCM format without touching it, see here: https://audiophilestyle.com/forums/topic...nt=1254269). If you have software like HQPlayer, or any other software with the same functions, you can choose the digital processing you want to impose on your music; choose your filter for upsampling, choose your noise-shaper for PCM and your modulator for DSD. There's absolutely no need to be bound by the choices made by the DAC manufacturer in this respect. And you don't have to change your DAC, at the cost of significant economic losses, to change your sound presentation, within the limits of R2R technology. You can make settings adapted to each type of music you listen to, or change presentation according to your mood.

 

3. you don't need a degree in computer science or an in-depth interest in computers to get a taste of all this. As I have personally observed, the latest 'classic' HQPlayer modulators allow you, on a 2020 Mac Mini M1, to go comfortably up to DSD256 and in most cases up to DSD512. With HQPlayer's 'experimental' modulators, you can even produce DSD1024 on this little machine, which is also very environmentally friendly (approx. 50w in operation). You can connect the DAC directly to the Mac's USB port and output in DSD/DoP256. Or, if you're more resourceful, you can use a small NAA, such as an RPi4 with a Shanti power supply, and get a taste of DSD1024. Finally, with time, and still without changing equipment, you can add an optical bridge to isolate the DAC perfectly, etc...

 

To sum up, this DAC, and no doubt others to come with the same external DSP concept, opens up a space of access to very high-level music reproduction, freedom in music presentation, and evolution without changing equipment, which is both economically efficient and eco-responsible. Admittedly, it is of Chinese origin, which will make a few people cringe, but that's okay...

 

For laziness purpose, I used DeepL.com (free version) to translate most of this content. I apologise for that 🙃

 

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davide256

davide256

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8 hours ago, SwissBear said:

.....

. Admittedly, it is of Chinese origin, which will make a few people cringe, but that's okay...

...

 

I think the main cringe factor is the stated 4-6 week build  + international shipping to US delay for Holo products. Really need to see at least

2 "glowing" separate reputable reviews before I can stomach that kind of wait. Less angst in the near term for a prospective purchaser to pull the trigger

on something like the Gustard R26 which will be there in a few weeks and already has good reviews. Hard to see chinese origin as a problem given

how the market has so many positively reviewed Chinese choices across the price spectrum

Regards,

Dave

 

Audio system

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semente

semente

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2 hours ago, davide256 said:

I think the main cringe factor is the stated 4-6 week build

 

Does it require that much effort to wait 2 months for a DAC?

"Science draws the wave, poetry fills it with water" Teixeira de Pascoaes

 

HQ Player Desktop/ Mac mini → HQ Player NAA/ CuBox-i → Intona 7054 → RME ADI-2 DAC FS

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Miska

Miska

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15 hours ago, dericchan1 said:

I suppose I will likely still need my Intona USB isolator for the Cyan 2 since only Spring KTE and the May KTE have that insane Holo Titan USB module built-in...

 

From the pictures it seems like it has the older model USB interface. None of my Holo DACs have the new USB module. The older one has isolation to, so likely you won't need Intona. But it doesn't hurt either.

 

Signalyst - Developer of HQPlayer

Pulse & Fidelity - Software Defined Amplifiers

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Miska

Miska

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29 minutes ago, SwissBear said:

@Miska : any comment on the architecture of this DAC which would help us understand whether you believe this will be a good pick for HQPlayer fans in search of a "reasonably" priced application HW ?

 

It is similar to Spring/May. More info when I get my hands on one!

 

Signalyst - Developer of HQPlayer

Pulse & Fidelity - Software Defined Amplifiers

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Eric Rosenfield

Eric Rosenfield

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On 12/4/2023 at 12:51 AM, SwissBear said:

Or, if you're more resourceful, you can use a small NAA, such as an RPi4 with a Shanti power supply, and get a taste of DSD1024.

 

Is there instructions for how to do this? I put DietPi on my Raspberry Pi but for the life of me I can't get it to output audio from the SPDIF connection on my Digi Pro HAT. I posted about this on the DietPi forum but got no responses. There is an image for NAA OS for Pi that I found and installed on a different SD card, but there's no instructions for how to access it or configure it to use the HAT or connect to Wifi. Any pointers in the right direction would be useful! Thanks.

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dericchan1

dericchan1

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3 hours ago, Eric Rosenfield said:

 

Is there instructions for how to do this? I put DietPi on my Raspberry Pi but for the life of me I can't get it to output audio from the SPDIF connection on my Digi Pro HAT. I posted about this on the DietPi forum but got no responses. There is an image for NAA OS for Pi that I found and installed on a different SD card, but there's no instructions for how to access it or configure it to use the HAT or connect to Wifi. Any pointers in the right direction would be useful! Thanks.

I have been using RPI4 as NAA for years. It’s pretty intuitive, that you burn the image to a sd card, connect your rpi4 to your dac through usb, turn on the RPI4, make sure the rpi4 is connected to the same network as your computer running hqplayer.

 

Hqplayer should automatically detect your dac through the NAA.

 

Deric

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Eric Rosenfield

Eric Rosenfield

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5 minutes ago, dericchan1 said:

I have been using RPI4 as NAA for years. It’s pretty intuitive, that you burn the image to a sd card, connect your rpi4 to your dac through usb, turn on the RPI4, make sure the rpi4 is connected to the same network as your computer running hqplayer.

 

Hqplayer should automatically detect your dac through the NAA.

 

Deric

 

Hi Deric, thanks for this. What I'd like to do is have the output go through the superior SPDIF coaxial output of the Hifiberry Digi Pro HAT that I put on the Pi, not USB. I also need to connect the Pi to wifi since I don't have a way to easily get an ethernet cable to where I want to use it. Are you saying there's no way to configure NAA OS at all? That at least answers the question of why I wasn't able to configure it.

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stefano_mbp

stefano_mbp

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21 minutes ago, Eric Rosenfield said:

What I'd like to do is have the output go through the superior SPDIF coaxial output of the Hifiberry Digi Pro HAT that I put on the Pi, not USB

Once HQP NAA is up and running and connected to the network HQPlayer (desktop o embedded) will allow you to choose the NAA output (usb or coax), there is non need to configure NAA for this

21 minutes ago, Eric Rosenfield said:

also need to connect the Pi to wifi since I don't have a way to easily get an ethernet cable to where I want to use it.

The easiest way is to get a Wi-Fi extender and connect the rpi to it using an Ethernet cable

Stefano

 

My audio system

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dericchan1

dericchan1

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17 minutes ago, Eric Rosenfield said:

 

Hi Deric, thanks for this. What I'd like to do is have the output go through the superior SPDIF coaxial output of the Hifiberry Digi Pro HAT that I put on the Pi, not USB. I also need to connect the Pi to wifi since I don't have a way to easily get an ethernet cable to where I want to use it. Are you saying there's no way to configure NAA OS at all? That at least answers the question of why I wasn't able to configure it.

As Stefano suggested re: Wi-Fi extender and connect the rpi to it using an ethernet cable might work.

 

There should be no issue with using the SPDIF coaxial output of the Hifiberry Digi Pro Hat other than that you are limiting yourself to 24/192. I had in the past connect my PI2AES coaxial out to my dac and that worked with HQplayer upsampling to PCM 24/192.

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davide256

davide256

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31 minutes ago, dericchan1 said:

As Stefano suggested re: Wi-Fi extender and connect the rpi to it using an ethernet cable might work.

 

There should be no issue with using the SPDIF coaxial output of the Hifiberry Digi Pro Hat other than that you are limiting yourself to 24/192. I had in the past connect my PI2AES coaxial out to my dac and that worked with HQplayer upsampling to PCM 24/192.

The PI2AES makes sense... but doubt that the Digi Pro hat is in same league as digital out solution?

Regards,

Dave

 

Audio system

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Eric Rosenfield

Eric Rosenfield

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4 minutes ago, davide256 said:

The PI2AES makes sense... but doubt that the Digi Pro hat is in same league as digital out solution?

 

Don't think PI2AES solves my problem. My DAC doesn't have an AES input, so I don't think upgrading the HAT helps me in this situation.

 

The Wifi extender could certainly work, but it's unfortunate that I'd need it since the Pi has Wifi support... Oh well. I'm going to take another crack at making DietPi work and if I can't I might make do with the extender.

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