HiFiBerry DAC+ Pro

This little thing is an overachiever in more ways than one. Assembly is simple, depending on the case. (It does include with plastic screws, nuts, and stand-offs if you want to go case-less). I chose to go with the latest DietPi for O/S on the RPi3 and used the provided menus to install Roon Bridge for the media player. I did the initial setup over wifi, but the metal case that I selected to go with it limited wifi signals to 30%, so after using it for a while on wifi, I switched to wired Ethernet, which proved to be necessary for streaming high-resolution content. I found that the card was the most stable when I set "Soundcard" to "none" under "DietPi - Audio Options". As long as "aplay -l" displays the card correctly (eg., "card 0: sndrpihifiberry [snd_rpi_hifiberry_dacplus], device 0: HiFiBerry DAC+ Pro HiFi pcm512x-hifi-0"), you're good.When I went to setup the device, I was surprised to see that Roon detected that the card (or driver, at least) supports bit-perfect playback up to 384kHz. The specs on the HiFiBerry site indicate that the card is limited to 176.4/192kHz PCM sampling rates. Just for fun, I played the only album that I have with a 352.8kHz sampling rate, and not only did it work...it sounded great! I currently have Roon DSP set to do sample rate conversion with the "Max PCM rate (Power of 2)" setting. As a result, the DAC is getting a 32-bit 352.8 or 384kHz stream. I'm not a big fan of upsampling, but it really seems to suite this little DAC well. I have not bothered to research the specifications of the specific DAC chip used to confirm that it can actually process PCM above 192kHz. It could be that the driver is downsampling the bits before sending them to the DAC. Regardless of what is happening under the hood, it sounds really amazing.As I've suggested, the other area where the DAC+ Pro overachieves is in sound quality. I've done some listening comparisons to a DAC that's nearly 10x the price in my main listening room, and the DAC+ Pro gives up very little if any resolution. The soundstage is huge and well defined. Honestly, blindfolded, I would struggle to identify which is which. I have read that breaking the power connection between the DAC and the RPi below and running it from a dedicated high quality 5v source further improves sound. That's difficult for me to imagine, but I may experiment at some point.If you're looking for a high performance Roon Output and are not prepared to spend ~$700 for a microRendu and a few hundred more on a quality USB DAC just to get started with streaming digital audio, this is the device you want. Even if you later find the need to upgrade to something more elaborate, you'll have a blast with this incredible sounding little device.

Physically, plug n' play easy installation on pi3 B. On the software end, takes *hours* of fiddling to get it working successfully. It only works for me on pi3 right now with hifiberry's own in-house flavor of Raspbian, fully updated in every way. Without all the newest updates, their custom distribution is *broken (stereo channels constantly switching back and forth with audible click) on the pi3*Does not work with latest Jessie/chromium distribution without altering OS at command line level.Don't buy this if you want something easy, or are a noob.Sounds really freaking great, like amazeballs great, achieving super-low latency and lush sound with Sunvox, a synthesizer/tracker program you should try.Update: the clock in this thing doesn't work with the pi 3, causes lots of issues. You need to edit the config file so everything runs off the clock in the pi. Then it works just like the Digi+ (not pro). You might want to consider buying the not-pro version of this board instead of this board, if you are using a pi 3. It's 8 bucks cheaper. That said, now that I fixed all the issues in the config file and everything agrees on latency and is on 48000MHz, it sounds more epic. Seriously towering sound. Worth the cost and effort, highly recommended, but what a pain in the butt.Photo shows board installed on a Willow Electronics Flat Pi, which will allow me to power the DAC's 5v with a separate power supply without voiding the warranty. Pretty dope looking too right?

Talk about value for money! This little champ provides unbelievable sound. It's smooth, extremely detailed, not at all fatiguing. Amazing sound stage. More or less perfect. You listen to a familiar song and you hear details, nuances, you've never heard before. Literally on every single familiar song. It's like hearing them for the first time. One thing is for sure, this decisively outperforms the (I'm assuming relatively decent) DAC in my mid-range Denon receiver circa 2016.I arrived at this product after I became enamored with the idea of a headless music player for my living room. I wanted to get rid of the need to have my TV involved with playing digital files. Researched, looked at Volumio etc. before settling on Rasplex. This is a Pi operating system that is a Plex client. I knew I wanted a "real" DAC. Thought I'd have to pay much more. Once I attached this DAC, and installed Rasplex on a micro SD card, and got it up and running (you have to change a couple of lines in the config file on the boot drive of the PI in order to be able to select the Hifiberry as an output in the Rasplex settings), it it an absolute dream. The Pi with the hifiberry plus sits behind some books on a shelf. RCA cables from it to the receiver. I control the Rasplex music player with the Plex app on my phone. The Rasplex wirelessly accesses the music files that are actually stored in another room on my media server PC. TV stays off. I'm amazed at how seamlessly it all works.In case this information is useful, I have my Pi hooked up to a Denon AVR-S910W receiver, Polk Signature series S55 speakers (which offer absolutely gorgeous sound AND looks BTW - if you want a fairly compact, nice looking floor stander with breathtaking sound that you won't have to take out a second mortgage to acquire - they should be on your short list), and a Polk PSW505 sub (the weak link, musically - I do a balancing act of keeping it low to add a bit of oomph while minimally effecting the actual audible sound).With that set up, I have absolutely incredible sound. Lots of people say this product can go toe to toe with much more expensive DACs - I totally believe it. For a Pi and this you're at less than $100. A bargain at twice the price.