Joined in 2023 
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63 About this deal
The Zen Dac has enough power to fully amplify headphones like beyerdynamic dt150 without heating and always keeping at most warm even after long periods of use. I recommend pairing the zen dac to headphones and not much to sensitive iems because the volume wheel presents channel imbalance in low volume reducing the possibilities to achieve our desirable volume level. This volume wheel is placed in the center of the front of the zen dac and delivers precise volume control, also it is very responsive to minimal rotation.
Bass: presents itself well defined with good texture and control, the both Sub-Bass and Mid-Bass are respectively clean, nothing is emphasized until you hit that Xbass button.Mids have a natural sound, both male and female voices have a clear, enjoyable reproduction. The detail is average, the zen dac focuses on delivering richer tones and well textured instruments and voices instead of being analytical and ultra resolutive so the technical performance is pretty competent in this dac/amp but not outstanding.. Other than that, the two Zen DACs are basically the same. You get the same nice chassis, SE and Balanced connections, Truebass analog bass enhancement, and Power Match gain control.
Disclaimer: The iFi Zen DAC V2 has been provided to us on loan for this review. As of this writing, iFI Audio is a sponsor of Hifitrends, but all opinion in this review is solely our own, and no input has been given from the manufacturer. Build/Features
The Zen DAC has a balanced 4.4mm Pentaconn headphone output with a maximum power output of 380mW at 50 ohms. The single-ended side supplied by the 6.35mm plug supplies a maximum power of 280mW at 32 ohms. On the left side of the front panel, there are two buttons. One is for the Power Match feature and the other is for the TrueBass feature. LEDs indicate if the features are on or off. The metal knurled volume knob sits in the center and is very smooth to operate. This DAC/amp out performs both of my other, more expensive DAC/amp combos. I have the Topping NX4 and the Audioengine D1 24-Bit DAC/amp combos. And it does so being 30 dollars or more less in price. It has what most of us would understand to be a gain boost, although they call it a “power match”. It also has a “truebass” button that slightly boosts the sub base and base response without distorting any other harmonics. I’ve sold the previously mentioned two DACs and have kept the Ifi Zen DAC/amp. Fantastic-sounding (very neutral) DAC. Easily connects to your computer (PC and Mac in my case) and really makes the signal sing a lot more than the on-board soundcards. AAW AXH (balanced): Now i'm a b*tch and swap to the 4.4 connector. Audible hiss, no more silence at zero volume. I really should use this IEM unbalanced only.
The Zen DAC feels sturdy and is slightly heavy at a little over a pound. When I first held it in my hands I immediately said to myself this feels more expensive than the asking price of 129 USD at the time of this writing. It feels like a quality item. That concludes the headphones, i won't use it for them anyway 99% of the time. There are limits with higher demanding headphones one way or the other. On some of them you want a warmer source and on certain flagships more power.The midrange is softly reproduced by not being too forward. Again there is warmth in the midrange. I could hear a lot of detail and separation in vocals and instruments with good individual representation. I originally bought the 12V 1.8A unit because it was so highly recommended by those who are using tube pre-amps and DACs with cheap power supplies (I have several). I’ve spent a little time and money upgrading the internals of each one, so all that was really left to do was try an upgraded “silent” power supply to squeeze every last drop of clarity there was to get.
The two outputs have a switch in the center labeled fixed and variable. This switch either keeps the output voltages constant or variable with the use of the volume knob so it makes it possible to use the Zen DAC to control amplified speakers.
War nach Anschaffung meiner Sennheiser HD660s auf der Suche nach einem qualitativ hochwertig verarbeiteten DAC zu einem vertretbaren Preis um diese gut befeuern zu können. DSD256/128/64, Octa/Quad/Double/Single-Speed DSD DXD(384/352.8kHz), PCM(384/352.8/192/176.4/96/88.2/48/44.1kHz) MQA I really like it, and and the use case is perfect for me. I can absolutely see it as an easy, entry level first unit for not that hard to drive headphones. I have no medium to drive planar here like the Arya v2, so without testing, i would say that if you use something in that ballpark (more demanding), you get to its limits (Arya v3 Stealth should be totally fine, way easier to drive). It sounds clean and doesn't colour the sound. That's good for some headphones, but for others you may want to take the edges off. If you want to upgrade from it / spend more money, i would 100% go for a bit of a more coloured sound (either a clean tube amp (something like the Echo), or an entry level class A amp (like the rebel amp) ), a lot of headphones really benefit a lot from a warmer source. Both provided a somewhat warm sound with nice detail throughout the treble and midrange. Tonal balance is excellent on both. There’s really no part of the audioband that’s given undue attention, so they both get out of the way and let your headphones do their thing.
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