Headphone happiness with the AURALIC ALTAIR G1
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- Опубликовано: 26 сен 2019
- This video sponsored by Audirvana: audirvana.com/
Camera: Olaf von Voss | Editor: Jana Dagdagan
The ALTAIR G1 is a headphone amplifier with network streamer and DAC. US$2699.
ALTAIR G1 preview:
darko.audio/2019/05/auralic-a...
AURALIC:
us.auralic.com/products/altai...
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Also seen in this video...
Jarvis standing desk:
www.amazon.com/Jarvis-Standin...
Mytek Brooklyn Bridge:
darko.audio/2019/03/a-short-f...
Meze Empyrean:
darko.audio/2019/02/a-short-f...
MrSpeakers Aeon Flow Open:
darko.audio/2018/01/headphone...
Kii Three:
darko.audio/2018/08/a-short-f...
ELAC Navis ARB-51:
darko.audio/2019/03/a-short-f...
What is that thing on top of the hard drive?
darko.audio/2018/12/doorstop-...
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Playlists…
Spotify:
open.spotify.com/playlist/3Tt...
Tidal:
tidal.com/browse/playlist/3c1e7ee0-774f-4b8c-968f-4efefe2bdbdb
Qobuz:
play.qobuz.com/playlist/2460564
__________________________________________________________________
Darko.Audio is a web magazine covering new and exciting developments in the audio world and we aren’t afraid of indie rock or techno.
Web: Darko.Audio
Instagram: / darkoaudio
Twitter: / darkoaudio
Facebook: / darkodotaudio 
Развлечения
John. Your videos are flawless. Amazing quality and of course, amazing insights from you.
Thanks man.
Good video John. Nice to see the review videos released back to back.
Lovely.
You did it again ! Good wibes, great edit, and good humor. Have a nice weekend
John‘s the Best👍 Keep it coming John we love your Rew‘s .
Mahalo
Your channel is one of my favorites, jokes and all!
A cracking review as always John, might give this a listen
‘little drop of poison’ by Tom Waits is a great track - 1st heard it on the Shrek 2 soundtrack😎 i had the original Altair, the new box looks to be another very flexible & quality piece of kit. Great work Auralic
Thank you so much for the comparisons. The information is truly useful.
Awesome stuff! Top review as always. I hope to be plugging my Meze 99 Classics into one of these some day :)
That siren was the joke police coming for you! 👮🚨😂
Another cracking review. Honest and unbiased. Wish i could pluck up the courage to make the purchase.........
Another cracking review JD! I always click immediately when I see you've posted a new one. Do you have a review of the Forte's coming?
Quality review as always.....I think my savings are gonna take another hit!
Very good review as always. I loved the playlist. I hope it is the norm to include one from now on. Thanks !!
Have been including playlists for months but only recently explicitly pointing to their existence in the description box.
I would really like to see a comparison of this with the Lumin D2 - or really any review on any Lumin streamer/DAC's!
Hi John and thanks for the great review! A couple of questions:
1) So are you suggesting that streaming (wi-fi or Ethernet) gives the best sound quality versus attaching an external powered Hard Drive?
2) Are the XLR outputs fully balanced and if not, would there be there any advantage using them over RCA outputs?
Thanks again and look forward to your feedback!
Thanks, John. I was thinking about going for the Vega G1, but .. purely because of the price difference .. I ‘might’ go for this. ‘Game of Tones’, indeed! 😂
Hi John love your videos. Love your descriptions on how things sound. Could you comment a little more on how is sounds running it thru say the schiit Freya using full range speakers? I don't use headphones but would love your thoughts in the full range setup.
Nice video John...and funny! I still own an Auralic Vega and you made me think exchange it with the G1... :(
Once again your videos are sight for sore eyes. Thank you.
Great Vid as normal John
Great review, as usual! Can you please tell me who does the music during the very last part of the video? Thanks!
I have been wanting to say this to you,you have yet to make a bad video. Another great video review. So informative.
That dollop sound. More of that please.
Please include at least 1 ‘dad joke’ per video. Like it!
I’m hooked. After watching several of your videos I picked up an Audioquest Cobalt DAC, hooked up with Qobuz and Audirvana. This Auralic may be the next step up. Any additional thoughts on the headphone amp? I use sennheiser 600. A lot so would appreciate any additional information on the performance of theAuralic in that area. Thanks much.
Great review! 👏 One question: is there any chance that the USB port for external hard drives is also suitable for external USB cd/dvd drives (external laptop like ones)?
Your content is consistently interesting and useful. So why, with all the big name endorsement that you have, do you only have 210k subscribers?! It's a travesty.
Are there any mobile headphone amplifiers that are powerful enough to drive the Dan Clark audio aeon 2 closed back? If so, which one, for example?
As an Auralic Mini owner (thanks to John's review 3 years ago), I can attest to simple elegance of their Lightning DS software. Sure it's Apple only right now, but for a price of an iPad or iPod, you still come out quite a bit ahead of spending money on a Roon server/software license or using some other less competent UPnP software. I've tried the Roon software trial, and for me the 'free' Lightning DS is all I need to play my personal library (800 CDs ripped to FLAC on the Mini's internal SSD) and a TIDAL subscription. I do plan to upgrade to the Altair G1 and relegate the Mini to a secondary zone (den). As John stated, Auralic's multiple zone support is simple as well. Sadly, I wanted to purchase another Mini for multi-room, but they discontinued it. As I stated, for me the Auralic software is the tipping point for upgrading my main system to the new Altair G1. I'm a software engineer, so I appreciate Auralic's commitment to providing one great native interface as opposed to some form of one size fits all multiple platform interface. Thanks John for the review of the Altair and I liked the 'finger trick graphic' for supported interfaces. Keep up the good work, and your effort to provide professional level video reviews is outstanding.
Being an owner of the Aries Mini, could you by chance tell me if the Parametric Equalizer and room boundary settings are available on that unit as well, or if its strictly on the G1/G2 units...? Hope you're still enjoying the unit! I'm considering one for a very high end system, so just wan't to know what I'm getting :P
Add an SBooster power supply to the Mytek and you get better mid and low bass response and more dynamic range from high to low...the chips just run happier..the stock power suppl;y on the brooklyn is a bit cheap for pro gear applications. I run a DAC+ with SBooster...it takes 100-200 hours to break in and then its amazing. Then another trick is change the volume to analog instead of digital on tthe mytek and see which likes what song better...i ussually keep it on analog for my ZMF aeolus and on my dynaudio powered XEO 10 it likes digital volume.
Love the Lightening DS implementation, but to me, the casework looked a little 'off' when compared to Naim and NAD examples. No need to apologise for anything except for cream in tea. What are you thinking, Darko?
Have you reviewed the Aries G2 yet John? Curious to learn how it performs compared to other options. There don't seem to be many owners on the usual forums I frequent.
Hi John H. Darko,
Just a quick question, thanks for the review and moving things into this century...that said, whats your 2 cents using only AURALIC ALTAIR G1 VS Roon Nucleus+ with Chord Hugo 2 ( which own and have with my HD800...i know old school headphones) what would in your view best sound as I am on the border buying a streamer.....Bartok a bit to far away and I dont own a car......and not wife approved...
Great reviews, perfect lightning and editing. However, wished you did some more comparisons to other products, say Innous streamer with chord qutest DAC.
What I don’t get, the vid is sponsored by Audirvana, but not mentioned at all in the review. Does Audirvana run on the Auralic?
Audirvana runs on a PC or Mac. Not sure why I should mention it in the video? It's an ad that runs at the front of the video. I can't make that ad clickable so I put a link in the description box. And to pre-empt people asking "why is there a link to Audirvana in the description box?" I add the sponsorship message.
I wonder how the G1 will sound directly connected to my Mcintosh MC252 to my B&W Nautilus 805
Looks like I found my next purchase!
Nice review John 👍 Tidal link not working
Is there any difference in Sound quality indexing from an external hard drive or listening through the interlan one???
Hi just wanted to ask, but were you able to use roon seamlessly with the Altair G1? In addition, were you able to use the Altair's native upsampler to upscale the input from roon?
thanks.
I wonder wether the DAC in the new altair G1 is better then the dac in first version of "auralic vega dac"... otherwise i would do an upgrade and sell a preamp and a bluesound node 2
Thanks so much for this review. I'm looking to buy the Auralic Altair G1 or the older Cambridge Audio Azur 851N. This helped.
from 9.min.00.sec. - AURALIC ARIES G2 - ruclips.net/video/rIeI4Zr1J7Y/видео.html
Good job
Hi John, if you can help me out with this issue that would be great. I planning to get the Aries G1 and chord Qutest dac as you have. Would that be a better choice or just get the Altair G1? Im struggling to understand why Altair g1 costs the same but has inbuilt dac? Does that mean the streamer is better in the Aries g1?
Thanks
Hi John, don't get the same sound with direct to amp. Also top end seems harsh even with a tube amp any inputs would help I have tried all the dac sound pref should I play with eq
Does it support MQA decode and unfold ?
You can use low-impedance iem's with the auralic if you use an iem-match from ifi. That reduces the output-impedance of the headphoneoutput to less then 1 Ohm and also gives you more headroom for the volume. You should really check that out.
That's a GREAT tip!
stupid question, but what happens if you use low impedance iems on a high impedance output?
Great stuff, John. Although I can only give you an A- for this one: not because of the Dad joke, but because of the way you pronounced 'cache' 😂
ROWTER. CAYCHE. Blame Australia, not me.
Nearly had me pulling the trigger on this unit. Until the no digital output was mentioned.
I'm looking for a good quality server that will feed directly into my Cyrus 8 DAC QXR digitally. I simply want to plug a HD into it, index, and control it via an app. Anyone out there in JD land have any suggestions..?
Does anyone know if the EQ and room boundry settings are available on all Lightnint DS devices, or only the G1 and G2 units?
What is the difference in sound performance between the altair G1 and vega G1?
Hi John,
and first of all, thank you for your excellent content.
I´m coming from a crappy kind of highres streaming solution :) An Daphile installation on an old notebook, using a standard USB cable and the DAC of an Oppo 105 BD Player. The Oppo 105 as an preamp, or also via XLR to my Marantz AV preamp (direct mode for stereo audio). I used the internal HDD of the notebook as my storage and it sounded "o.k" for me. Mainly lossless FLAC, highres FLAC, WAV and some DSD files. Then, with an update to the Daphile Kernel, for some reason the Oppo 105 DAC disappeared as an player option on Daphile!?! I don´t know why, but I don´t get it working again. So now, I´m looking for a better sounding, easier to use, Streaming DAC solution. My plan is to use an easy streaming/DAC (one box) solution like the Altair G1, the Mytek Brooklyn Bridge or the Cambridge Audio CXN V2. The streaming software is important, also XLR L/R analog out and support for Roon (although I didn´t tested Roon yet). I´m not sure, but maybe I´m going to use the streaming/DAC as an preamp, playing on two Burmester stereo amps (Bi-Amping) I own. Well, I have to listen to the different chain options first.
I´m not yet into streaming service like Tidal. I´m still buying CD`s, SACD´s or highres files as an download :)
So I´m planning to test streaming services, but my HDD storage ist extremly important to me.
I don´t like the Mytek Brooklyn Bridge appearance so much, the Cambridge Audio CXN V2 is o.k, but the Altair G1 would fit perfect with his appearance.
I will only we be able to listen to the Cambridge Audio CXN V2 and Altair G1 at my dealers place.
Do you think the AURALIC Altair G1 will offer what I´m looking for?
I mean it´s 2100,- € (+500-700,- € for a used iPad), against 1070,-€ :)
Do you have any additional tips, for the listening session?
Anything I should take note off when I´m testing those streaming/DAC´s?
Thank you and best regards,
Keep up the good work !!
Nice review as usual. Yeah ... don’t comment on the MControl, it can be frustrating.
Most correct that the Mytek is very clear and transparent and that it does lack that slight bit of refined lush sound. But it’s a nice all in one though.
Lush! That's the word I should have used.
John Darko ... naaaaaah ... Game of Tones is better! 😂🤣
I love it when I use the Cary SLP-05 with the Mytek. Sounds very very nice.
John what are the weights that you put ontop of your equipment ? I wonder why you use them and how are they helping? Is this some secret audiophile trick?
Please watch the video all the way to the end.
@@DarkoAudio Oh there it is! 😂 Thank you!
You can get them at Amazon:
smile.amazon.com/dp/B07RFQVDCP/ref=sspa_dk_detail_2?psc=1&pd_rd_i=B07RFQVDCP&pd_rd_w=5tbjM&pf_rd_p=45a72588-80f7-4414-9851-786f6c16d42b&pd_rd_wg=wTmTO&pf_rd_r=G50X8D9PZK3KTABHR4B0&pd_rd_r=c759e5e6-ce24-452e-aa71-ee2c8df1750d&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUEyNFFRN0NXVkVKRU1PJmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwOTIyNDk1MTNOQzk1WVk0QkZYNSZlbmNyeXB0ZWRBZElkPUEwNDQ5NTIzUzVYRkVJR0hNVEEzJndpZGdldE5hbWU9c3BfZGV0YWlsJmFjdGlvbj1jbGlja1JlZGlyZWN0JmRvTm90TG9nQ2xpY2s9dHJ1ZQ==
At last a review that everyone can associate with.
And that's my aim with these videos: to make oft-complex hardware more relatable.
They run out of black volume knobs or something?
So how does it compare to the Qutest or Hugo 2?
👌
Can you also provide Apple Music playlists?
This would have been a front runner for consideration but the lack of Android support is a deal breaker for me.
I love 2 channel stereo as a hobby including DACs but fail to see value here in streamers. Perhaps I will some day.
Tea with cream? Never tried it. I will give it a chance.
Not bad
"I have to listen to music at my desk" Was that comment to get a sympathy subscriber? :)
So, comparing this to your aries G1 review .... The core functionality difference between the two are: the aries is a streaming transport, whereas the Altair is a streamer, DAC, headphone amp and can hold a HDD .... So why are they priced the same ....?
Your assessment is solid - the Aries has digital outputs - but on pricing you'll have to ask Auralic.
How it compares with VEGA G1
Different product entirely. From a DAC POV, highly unlikely that it will be as resolving. I'm guessing tho.
Excellent review as usual. Any chance you could explain the headphone impedance comment? I currently use Senheiser Momentum 2 cans, wired when at home. Thanks.
hey, just want you to know, there's no difference in sound quality between wifi and ethernet. All digital files sent via these medium will be checked for errors (cyclic redundancy check (CRC)). If it contains error (because noise or collision with other connection in the same freq), the source will resend the corrupted part again. Both wifi and ethernet won't use the data part that has any kind of error in transmission, hence the receiver always get the exact same file from the source.
And yeah you are absolutely right that ethernet has better stability than wifi.
source: thats what I learnt in uni :)
You're right. Data isn't an issue with Ethernet. But did uni teach you about electrical noise, how it hitches a ride down Ethernet cables to disturb the analogue circuits of a hifi system? Or how Ethernet and WiFi receiver chips themselves can create electrical noise with a similar negative effect on analogue audio circuits? I'd wager not.
@@DarkoAudio ah, never thought about that. So it's up to the manufactures to implement the best way to isolate the analog parts from all those noise I think
What are the metal sort of pucks you put on top of some devices and what is the purpose?
Oh boy I posted right before the end of the video do I feel stupid now
Please watch the video all the way to the end.
@@DarkoAudio Yes I saw that haha ^^
Yea but have ya heard JLab Studio on ear headphones?!
Having done audio and video mixing and including working in the tech and electronics manufacturing business... I have a really hard time believing DAC/Streamers running $1K+.
I have A/B’d so many DACs ($50-20K) and while there are differences in sound, it doesn’t mean one is better than the other. The sum of the parts and engineering don’t add up.
However I do think the BorderPatrol DAC SE is pretty good and just a bit over $1K. Thinking of pulling the trigger on it... but seems a bit much.
Know that the Border Patrol and Audio Note DAC's will measure quite poorly yet produce an enjoyable sound. If you want to explore the multibit realm then either the Denafrips Ares or the Schiit Bifrost 2 (both about $700) measure and sound very well.
Can someone help me, what does it mean for driving headphones capabilities that the output impedance is 5ohms, I mean I know its not for iems but I am interested in headphones. Does that mean I cant drive headphones with big sensitivity or the opposite? Thanx
See my other comment.
@@DarkoAudio I did, thank you very much John! great video as always
Really bizarre title to this video. I just got a G1 and discovered that plugging a pair of headphones in doesn't stop the sound coming out of my active speakers. So it's everything except headphone happiness!
Man what’s up with everyone using Sabre dacs . There are other chips out there .i always feel that Sabre dacs are a little on the clinical side
Remember: a DAC's (the box) sound does not fall to chip choice alone. Power supply and output stage also matter.
Say Sabre DAC's sound clinical is like saying all curries spiced with a certain type of cumin will taste bitter.
John Darko I agree , but still most Sabre based dacs I have tested or heard were still on the clinical side vs other chipsets like Akm for instance , So I’m thinking that the Sabre dacs regardless of implementation has some sort of digital hardness . Not a bad sound just not the most Smoothest .
Crap joke, great video; you’ve got your priorities right 😂 Any video you’d care to make around Amazon HD Music would be good, especially how best to stream the HD bit (no pun!) in a cost-effective way. I use the little Chromecast with a toslink to a Modi 3 - if I plug in from my phone it’s HD, whereas wireless is not. Maybe that’s just a limitation of the Chromecast.....
No android i will stick with Matrix Audio Element X .
Hi there.I Found you a few months ago and just wanted to let you know you're one of the few HiFi guys that has managed to hold my attention, really appreciate your angle on stuff and also musical taste. I mainly listen to electronic music so it's cool to find someone like yourself, I also just wanted to fire this over to you to listen to sometime , Modeselektors superb latest live Dj set in place of the gig they where supposed to be doing, also includes social distancing in true mode style 😜
. Some new gems in there for you, especially track 3 Rom. ANZ3 by Alex.Do 😁👌 ruclips.net/video/rtZw-UJTK1Q/видео.html
I'd take it if it had an android remote.
It doesn't seem the best idea on Earth for an electronic engineer to set the headphone output impedance at 5 Ohms...
It is absurd, no matter how good and/or costly the Auralic can be.
These details must have been kept in mind before launching a product to the market. No one would consider acceptable this in a mass product AND so called "audiophiles" will raise their noses and smile in condescendence.
Why is it not good? Can you explain because I am new to headphones
Thank you
It only means that you might hear strange frequency response distortions with headphones below 50 Ohms. Might. Low Z IEMs increase that might to a probably.
@@DarkoAudio Thank you :), did you experience something like this with Aeon or meze, because they have impedence below 50ohms. Altair's or mytek's is the strongest headphone amplifier?
Thank you again
Confused. Why does your Intel NUC music server running Roon ROCK have Windows? Windows is not required. 🤔 Nice standing desk. Sitting is horribly unhealthy.
Did I say the NUC runs Roon Rock? I don't think I did. It's Roon running on Windows 10.
@@DarkoAudio Gotcha. Clarified. You may like a dedicated Roon OS better.
Higher end streamers support Android...
SUPPPORT MQA ?
Up vote purely for the dad joke!
Laughing at your own jokes John? Goodness me :)