New Dac the FiiO K13 R2R: Early Impressions

[Stuart.W.D]

I am thinking of the Fiio warmer RTR rather than the K11, K13 for hifi / rack use between my WiiM Ultra, NAIT 50 and my ATC SCM11 out of pure curiosity only, to add a touch of warmth.
Thoughts?

View: https://youtu.be/lTNFjqzkVe4?si=MGmOma5ZoMiJ4LXp

 

[Stuart.W.D]

@The_Lecht_Rocks
These three videos may help you make a decision!

View: https://youtu.be/NCIIbjtz_JA?si=rt6OIN7pKGsTNmBH

 

[nopiano]

View: https://youtu.be/8JL4RrNk-yo?si=8QAobh4hZFORA-d-

This is one where an analogy with photography makes sense. Darko is usually worth watching, even when sponsored by dubious cable companies!

 

[Juzzie Wuzzie]

I am thinking of the Fiio warmer RTR rather than the K11, K13 for hifi / rack use between my WiiM Ultra, NAIT 50 and my ATC SCM11 out of pure curiosity only, to add a touch of warmth.
Thoughts?

That's the one I would pick as the visual asthetic is lovely in my view. I think you'll get warmth to both the sound and the living room.

 

[RTHerringbone]

I am thinking of the Fiio warmer RTR rather than the K11, K13 for hifi / rack use between my WiiM Ultra, NAIT 50 and my ATC SCM11 out of pure curiosity only, to add a touch of warmth.
Thoughts?

Is there a perceptible lack of warmth with the Ultra versus the ICON (albeit different systems and rooms)?

I can't quite wrestle with the logic of adding another box out of curiosity. I love the look of the Warmer and itchy wallet syndrome would absolutely have me looking to get one, but I just can't picture the benefit sonically.

I guess it's about the same price as the Ultra so it should offer something, but then you end up wondering if just using the Ultra as a transport is wasteful if you get the Warmer. Not unlike me "wasting" the DAC in the Ultra in my upstairs setup.

 

[Integralista]

I am thinking of the Fiio warmer RTR rather than the K11, K13 for hifi / rack use between my WiiM Ultra, NAIT 50 and my ATC SCM11 out of pure curiosity only, to add a touch of warmth.
Thoughts?

Hi, this magic around DAC characters and combinations with streamer bridges... remind me on best days we had selecting and changing tubes in tube amps, tube amps in general, tube magic as such...

 

[Messiah]

For example, I was listening to O by Damien Rice (a CD I ordered from Discogs), and I could hear little things I hadn’t noticed before -- faint sounds of kids playing in the background, Damien taking breaths between lines, even subtle touches on the guitar touching the wood, and the body to the strings is nicely done. These are small details, but they felt very real. I didn’t notice them before with an older Rega DAC, or my iFi Zen DAC, or the DAC in my Cambridge CXN V2. I found that very interesting.

Out of curiosity (as this is what I would do), it would be interesting to swap back to some of the other DACs to see if you then notice those bits you didn’t before, now you know they are there.

 

[nopiano]

Hi, this magic around DAC characters and combinations with streamer bridges... remind me on best days we had selecting and changing tubes in tube amps, tube amps in general, tube magic as such...

Yes, it’s sort of DAC rolling!

 

[The_Lecht_Rocks]

Yes, it’s sort of DAC rolling!

Or TT Cartridge swapping !

 

[Stuart.W.D]

Out of curiosity (as this is what I would do), it would be interesting to swap back to some of the other DACs to see if you then notice those bits you didn’t before, now you know they are there.

 

[PieterG]

HD600 balanced cable?
Cambridge CXN looks like the recent model, so ESS chips inside, right?

Looks like an interesting mix of DAC "characters" on paper. I would be surprised if there is much between them, but do share your thoughts.

 

[Stuart.W.D]

Thanks for the replies and suggestions!

To answer the questions first: Yes, I am using a balanced cable with my HD600! To clarify, my Cambridge CXN V2 or Rega Dac lack headphone jacks, and none of my Marantz gear has balance connections for headphone duties. Because of this, all my previous headphone listening was done using my laptop into the iFi Zen DAC (playing Spotify or Qobuz).

When I heard those micro-details on the Damien Rice album, I was using my Marantz CD player as a transport (via coax) into the FiiO K13 R2R, listening through my headphone amp.

To the user who suggested swapping back to the older DACs, that was a great idea. I did a quick A-B testing yesterday via my headphone amplifier to see..

Here is my setup for the test:

Headphones: Sennheiser HD600 (Balanced)

Chain 1: Cambridge CXN V2 which has two Wolfson WM8740 DAC chips,
(Coax) -- FiiO K13 R2R (FLAC)

Chain 2: £600 Laptop (USB) -- iFi Zen DAC Burr-Brown DSD1793 DAC chip ( Spotify Lossless)

Chain 3: Marantz CD player (Coax) -- FiiO K13 R2R 📀

What I Heard:
R2R vs. iFi Zen DAC: Both sounded great, to be honest. I haven't replayed the Damien Rice album. However, going back to the Zen DAC balance output, the FiiO R2R/CXN combo was smoother and more "organic" in the mids. There were very minor differences in detail, bass weight. The Zen DAC definitely held its own and has a warmer rounded bass. I think what this proves is how good modern DACs actually are.

CD vs. Streaming: This was the biggest takeaway for me. The Marantz CD transport using the Fiio K13 and HD600's sounded noticeably better than streaming via the CXN V2/R2R or Laptop/R2R with HD600's combo. I don't know if it's down to the CD mastering, the transport mechanics, or just having less USB electrical noise, but CDs still have something special.

The 🎧: The HD600 is extremely honest. It doesn't fake a "wow" factor. Because of that, the differences I heard between the DACs were purely about refinement rather than big changes in the sound.

These are still early days for me, and I’ve only done small listening sessions so far. I haven’t put my Rega DAC back into my main hi-fi system yet to do a proper A/B comparison, so I’m just sharing first impressions.

In the past, whenever I used my Cambridge CXN (V2) as a DAC while running my Marantz CD player as a transport, I always felt the sound had a bit more detail in the treble. At one point, I considered changing my coax cable because it was made with silver-plated conductors, and I was contemplating purchasing a pure copper cable.

For clarity, the AudioQuest Cinnamon digital coax cable uses solid long-grain copper with 1.25% silver plating on the surface. It’s not pure silver, however it has a thin layer over copper, but since high frequencies tend to travel along the surface of a conductor, I did wonder if that slight silver content was adding a bit of extra sparkle up top.

Now, after switching to an R2R DAC in my case from the FiiO K13, even without a direct A/B test, the sound feels different. The Fiio gives acoustic instruments more weight and more texture in each note. It comes across more natural to my ears compared to the CXN V2, and the bass feels tighter, and the soundstage seems wider and more open on the Fiio.

It’s still early, and I’ll need more time and a proper comparison to be sure. But for now, I like what I'm hearing from this DAC. I don’t know the science behind it, but I trust my ears. If one DAC lets me relax and enjoy music longer, that’s enough for me.

 

[PieterG]

CD vs. Streaming: This was the biggest takeaway for me. The Marantz CD transport using the Fiio K13 and HD600's sounded noticeably better than streaming via the CXN V2/R2R or Laptop/R2R with HD600's combo. I don't know if it's down to the CD mastering, the transport mechanics, or just having less USB electrical noise, but CDs still have something special.

This is very triggering to me. I have a very basic Yamaha cd player that gets very little use (as a transport only). I've been streaming flac files in various ways for some time. I want to compare a cd selection to the Tidal source now 😉 (On a related note, i have thought on a few occasions that Spotify can sound different from Tidal too.)

Thanks for sharing your impressions. I was expecting good news about the Burr-Brown architecture in the Ifi, but i'm surprised the CXN lets you down a bit, even if it's the V2 and not the latest ESS based model.

 

[Stuart.W.D]

This is very triggering to me. I have a very basic Yamaha cd player that gets very little use (as a transport only). I've been streaming flac files in various ways for some time. I want to compare a cd selection to the Tidal source now 😉 (On a related note, i have thought on a few occasions that Spotify can sound different from Tidal too.)

Thanks for sharing your impressions. I was expecting good news about the Burr-Brown architecture in the Ifi, but i'm surprised the CXN lets you down a bit, even if it's the V2 and not the latest ESS based model.

You’re welcome Pieter. And for what it’s worth, I’ve spent a good amount of time myself with Tidal and Qobuz and to my ears, Qobuz sounds the best to me. That said, I eventually moved back to Spotify once they introduced lossless. Not because I think it sounds better -- I don’t -- but because it simply works better for our household. My partner and child use the smart speaker in the kitchen, and without Qobuz Connect support, it just wasn’t practical.
As much as I care about squeezing out that last bit of fidelity, I also can’t justify paying for two streaming subscriptions on top of still buying CDs. At the end of the day, the system has to serve the whole family and not just my listening chair in my main setup .

Do try comparing your transport via CD against the Tidal stream and see what you think!