Holo Cyan 2

[Moises]

32 minutes ago, lukeslens said:

Haha. Yes! For what feels like such a premium product, the packaging was extremely underwhelming. 

Yes! Totally agree same box 📦 for the Spring 3 KTE, they definitely need some branding 😂

[dericchan1]

31 minutes ago, Moises said:

Jo is a great guy! He’s a collector of many things! He’s showroom is a museum 
 

So happy for your experience and thanks for sharing about Jplay, love to test it! Although I’m married with Roon lifetime membership 😂

 

More pics of Wildism Audio 

 

 

Thanks for sharing these photos. Very interesting. I should definitely visit his place when I visit Hong Kong next year!!!

 

Cheers

 

Deric

[Dimettry]

I want to ask the owners of Cyan 2.  The manual describes that the inputs switch automatically to the one that is playing. But I heard from one user that it is physically blocked on the first one. connected input. Can you try and tell me how it is with you.  I am interested in usb i2s and optical.

 

[dericchan1]

4 hours ago, Dimettry said:

I want to ask the owners of Cyan 2.  The manual describes that the inputs switch automatically to the one that is playing. But I heard from one user that it is physically blocked on the first one. connected input. Can you try and tell me how it is with you.  I am interested in usb i2s and optical.

 

The cyan 2 does not have a multiple input switch - meaning it is locked on to the first input plugged in, plugging in a second input will not do anything. So there is no reason to plug in more than 1 input at the same time.

 

So let’s say you have i2s plugged in to the Red first but decided to use the coax input with a cd transport, you must physically unplug the i2s cable from the Red first then plug in the coax cable to the Cyan 2. BUT I have confirmed with Jo it is totally safe to unplug a connection and plug in another connection while the Cyan 2 is turned on so you don’t need to power off first.

 

Part of the cost savings to make Cyan 2 price competitive, which is fine with me.

[Dimettry]

1 hour ago, dericchan1 said:

The cyan 2 does not have a multiple input switch - meaning it is locked on to the first input plugged in, plugging in a second input will not do anything. So there is no reason to plug in more than 1 input at the same time.

 

So let’s say you have i2s plugged in to the Red first but decided to use the coax input with a cd transport, you must physically unplug the i2s cable from the Red first then plug in the coax cable to the Cyan 2. BUT I have confirmed with Jo it is totally safe to unplug a connection and plug in another connection while the Cyan 2 is turned on so you don’t need to power off first.

 

Part of the cost savings to make Cyan 2 price competitive, which is fine with me.

If the sound was the same level as that of Spring 3, then I would agree with you, but if this is a slight improvement from Cyan 1, then look at how much has been removed and the price remains the same. I think channel switching is very necessary. changing cables manually for a 1K device looks strange to say the least.

[dericchan1]

22 minutes ago, Dimettry said:

If the sound was the same level as that of Spring 3, then I would agree with you, but if this is a slight improvement from Cyan 1, then look at how much has been removed and the price remains the same. I think channel switching is very necessary. changing cables manually for a 1K device looks strange to say the least.

Sound quality and comparison with other Holo dacs in the line up would be subjective to say the least, Ron from New Record Day who's had the May KTE as his reference dac for years, now burning in the Cyan 2 thought Holo hit a home run to the park with the Cyan 2 and he will need a good few months to really settle down before he can confidently try to tell the difference between the two.

 

My 2 cents? It sounds great and I am happy with what I have, knowing that Hqplayer will take care of the rest!!!

 

I seriously don’t care or I should say I am actually happy that holo decided to cut cost like this, as I always only use usb for all my systems anyway yet I am paying money for a switcher. 
 

I hope they come up with a discrete dsd only dac that cut the cost of the Cyan 2 to say $600-700 and I will likely get a few more units!!

 

Cheers

[lukeslens]

Ya, to just follow up on what @dericchan1 said, it is very clear that the goal with the Cyan 2 was to try to capture the sound of the Spring 3 or even the May (I very much look forward to Ron’s official review) and put it in a form factor that strips away pretty much all additional bells and whistles to get to a price-point that’s affordable for someone like me — a dude who wants to experience the Holo Audio magic but can’t afford or even needs the other “stuff.” 

I’ll admit that, coming from an ADI-2, the complete and utter lack of literally ANY switches, filters, tinkering or bells and whistles whatsoever has been a weird experience. But the sound is the point and there is a certain level of zen that is creeping in by not having to worry at all about if I’ve got everything dialed in right or feeling like I’m going to just be chasing something simply because I can, which takes away from the music itself. 

 

I think the Cyan 2 is for people like me who need that simplicity, and I have one digital source I run everything through so I only need USB and that’s it. My CD transport is connected via it’s analog purely so that I can get a *different* sound and everything else is streaming, so personally I don’t need any input switching. If that’s a really important factor for you I would say the Cyan 2 may not be a viable device for your needs. 

[dericchan1]

As much as I like a even more stripped down version of the Cyan 2 (I wouldn’t mind Holo simply take all other digital input out and just left with USB, if they can offer the dac $100 cheaper), I would say manually switching the digital input is not that much of a pain…

[Dimettry]

Guys, you understand that determining the connection to the input and blocking activity on it is the input selection system. adding a button to it to change the inputs on the carousel is not a very expensive thing.  
I am very glad to hear that the sound is comparable to other Holo Audio products.
And I'm in this thread precisely because I'm thinking about buying it precisely because of the sound.  
But I fundamentally disagree with your position, if you are given less and less at the same price, it is wrong.
Even the design doesn't look like a 1K device.

[Dimettry]

That's how I'd like it to look. but it will suit me if they just add one button to the front panel with a change of inputs around.
 

[dericchan1]

31 minutes ago, Dimettry said:

That's how I'd like it to look. but it will suit me if they just add one button to the front panel with a change of inputs around.
 

Unfortunately then the Cyan 2 may not be for you. 
 

I don't know enough how expensive the Holo Audio input selection system is  but I am guessing is not cheap, otherwise they would not waste time and development effort to redesign a sensor system for input in order to cut it out. And to me it’s a welcoming idea, I much rather pay $1000 for the cyan 2 without the switch vs they have a reason to charge me $1200 per se 

 

And I do not know how the Cyan 2 compares with other Holo dacs. I have heard the May and the Spring 3 but they were in my friends’ systems not mine.

 

Ron did mention in his channel that the cyan 2 is like 97% compared to his May KTE (obviously he’s exaggerating, he simply meant to say they were close) but that’s his comments (which I value) not mine

[Cormorant]

Switches can definitely affect sound quality.  Perhaps the designer was thinking about how to have the best sound quality at the lowest cost.

[lukeslens]

50 minutes ago, Dimettry said:

Guys, you understand that determining the connection to the input and blocking activity on it is the input selection system. adding a button to it to change the inputs on the carousel is not a very expensive thing.  
I am very glad to hear that the sound is comparable to other Holo Audio products.
And I'm in this thread precisely because I'm thinking about buying it precisely because of the sound.  
But I fundamentally disagree with your position, if you are given less and less at the same price, it is wrong.
Even the design doesn't look like a 1K device.

You’re not necessarily wrong but only if your position that the Cyan 2’s sound is relatively the same to that of the Cyan. I have never owned a Cyan or a Spring 3 or a May but Holo’s own description specifically states that this unit utilizes trickle down technology to try to achieve the sound of its “older siblings.” That means the goal is to greatly improve the sound from the original Cyan. And Ron’s impressions seem to indicate that this is quite possibly just a minor step away from a May. If they are able to achieve near-May sound by limiting switching or other factors then I would say the cost is justified. 
 

BUT that statement is the crux because in this hobby, the justification of price and value is very subjective to begin with. Only you will be able to make the determination of whether the sound justifies the lack of a source switch. For many of us it is a non-issue so it’s very difficult to approach this argument from an objective standpoint at this moment in time.

[dericchan1]

Well I will be honestly here, it takes like 2 seconds to swap out a usb cable and swap in an aes cable - demonstrated by Jo at Wildism audio in the following link (he was testing with my Cyan 2 before he shipped out btw)

 

https://imgur.com/a/bcMq8IB

[bogi]

2 hours ago, lukeslens said:

I have one digital source I run everything through so I only need USB and that’s it.

Yes, many of us are playing all content from one software player so only one input type is needed. If that lowers the price then it is welcome solution for me. I would wish also to remove all other than USB inputs and to remove PCM DAC module (with prev. Cyan it was possible to buy only DSD module) if that would yet lower the price.

@Dimettry This is intentionally stripped down DAC model. If you don't like that choose some other model.
Otherwise, I like your front panel design. 🙂

[lukeslens]

45 minutes ago, dericchan1 said:

Well I will be honestly here, it takes like 2 seconds to swap out a usb cable and swap in an aes cable - demonstrated by Jo at Wildism audio in the following link (he was testing with my Cyan 2 before he shipped out btw)

 

https://imgur.com/a/bcMq8IB

The only problem with that, though, is that many setups, like mine, don't have as easy access to the back. For instance, the credenza my Cyan 2 lives in doesn't have much room for me to reach back and plug in or unplug a cable to make that a regular viable thing. 

 

Fortunately, I don't intend on ever doing that. I will stick to USB and USB only, but I can see how having to manually switch cables would be a dealbreaker for some. I think it's a good point to make in case you are looking for a dac that requires having switchable inputs and you don't or can't viably switch cables on the fly. 

[dericchan1]

39 minutes ago, lukeslens said:

The only problem with that, though, is that many setups, like mine, don't have as easy access to the back. For instance, the credenza my Cyan 2 lives in doesn't have much room for me to reach back and plug in or unplug a cable to make that a regular viable thing. 

 

Fortunately, I don't intend on ever doing that. I will stick to USB and USB only, but I can see how having to manually switch cables would be a dealbreaker for some. I think it's a good point to make in case you are looking for a dac that requires having switchable inputs and you don't or can't viably switch cables on the fly. 

An input toggle switch is not there, that's a fact. But the dac is more than made up for it with the best USB implementation amongst all dacs out there, and possibly the best i2s implementation as well (even though I don't use it). Nowadays I don't even bother connecting a cd transport by coax when I can simply use a $20 CD-rom to send the tracks to HQplayer for upsampling to DSD256 on the fly!!!

 

Lets just say in life, there's going to be trade offs in just about anything you buy. You can have a perfect dac that sounds great and has that input selector and everything else you can dream possibly in a dac, the only catch is it won't be for $1,000. 

 

Or you can have a dac that cost way less than $1,000 and comes with everything possible feature you can dream of in a dac, but it won't sound like a Cyan 2...

 

I do feel that for whatever compromises they had to do to make the Cyan 2 affordable, it seems to very well thought out and are compromises I am more than happy to accept.

[lukeslens]

5 minutes ago, dericchan1 said:

An input toggle switch is not there, that's a fact. But the dac is more than made up for it with the best USB implementation amongst all dacs out there, and possibly the best i2s implementation as well (even though I don't use it). Nowadays I don't even bother connecting a cd transport by coax when I can simply use a $20 CD-rom to send the tracks to HQplayer for upsampling to DSD256 on the fly!!!

 

Lets just say in life, there's going to be trade offs in just about anything you buy. You can have a perfect dac that sounds great and has that input selector and everything else you can dream possibly in a dac, the only catch is it won't be for $1,000. 

 

Or you can have a dac that cost way less than $1,000 and comes with everything possible feature you can dream of in a dac, but it won't sound like a Cyan 2...

 

I do feel that for whatever compromises they had to do to make the Cyan 2 affordable, it seems to very well thought out and are compromises I am more than happy to accept.

Completely agree. 

As far as I can tell, this DAC was made with someone like myself in mind. Give me high-end Holo Audio sound in a totally stripped down package I can afford. I don't need anything on the feature side, only premium and highly engaging digital-to-analog conversion.

[dericchan1]

29 minutes ago, lukeslens said:

Completely agree. 

As far as I can tell, this DAC was made with someone like myself in mind. Give me high-end Holo Audio sound in a totally stripped down package I can afford. I don't need anything on the feature side, only premium and highly engaging digital-to-analog conversion.

Even better, with the cyan 2 I won’t need an intona in that chain and I can sell one off for $2-300!!!  😂 

[dericchan1]

@Miska no issue so far with the cyan 2 playing pcm source to pcm or to dsd, sounds great so far.
 

When I play dsd source upsampling to dsd256, between the end of a track switching to the next track, in that few seconds, there are minor static, pop noise, almost like listening to vinyl… 

 

wonder if it might be my settings in hqplayer ?

 

I set xfi, fir2, medium noise filter, poly gauss long 

 

Actually when I unclick 48k dsd, and use 44.1k the pop is gone. It is only with Dsd source tho, no issues with dsd48k for pcm source

 

thanks

 

Deric

[Miska]

4 hours ago, dericchan1 said:

Actually when I unclick 48k dsd, and use 44.1k the pop is gone. It is only with Dsd source tho, no issues with dsd48k for pcm source

 

Are you converting 44.1k base to 48k base output? Maybe go with adaptive rate?

 

[dericchan1]

1 hour ago, Miska said:

 

Are you converting 44.1k base to 48k base output? Maybe go with adaptive rate?

 

Yes I was converting 44.1k base dsd to 48k base dsd output. I have adaptive rate “grayed” 

48k dsd box “checked” and sample rate set to “48x256”

[bogi]

I am using adaptive rate fully checked to avoid possible troubles of this kind with my 48k DSD capable DAC.

[CJH]

Here's my early feedback on the Cyan 2. Current DACs on hand are a Topping D90 (AKM) and a Holo Cyan (DSD only version) for the past 2-3 years. Both of these DACs sound best with DSD512 at 44.1k, so this is the majority of my listening. The Cyan basically retired my D90 to storage. I received my new Cyan 2 yesterday and gave it a quick listen for about 3 hours of DSD 512 ASDM7EC-Super512fs+ at 48k with Sinc-Gauss hires. Yes, the Cyan 2 retains the relaxed analog sound of the original model with improved extended high frequencies. It also has a deeper soundstage with better layering of instruments. For this alone, the new Cyan 2 is a winner and worth the price of admission. But of course, it does even more. 

On day 2, I tried PCM 1411/1512 with Sinc L filter and the sound was quite good (with an easy load on my server--5%). It had very good detail, tonal balance and mid-bass punch. It still lacked the soundstage depth and layering of good DSD. I also heard a slight lack of naturalness, ease or finesse. It was just more in-you-face than the DSD. I then tried DSD upsampled to 1024 at 44.1 or 48k. Filter was Sinc-Gauss hires with AHM7EC5L modulator. This was excellent with the best sonic qualities so far. FYI: All of these were done using a PC with 10850K and no GPU with no dropouts. I have lots of experimenting to do while the unit breaks-in, but so far, I am quite pleased with my purchase.

CJH

[dericchan1]

I am about 75 hours into burning in with the Cyan 2.

 

My impression remains the same as day 1.

 

Overall it's detailed, but not as detailed as say the chord mojo 2. The mojo 2 sound a bit better with great recording like jazz, and classical music with sharper transient, instrument more separate ... 

 

with the Cyan 2, it may be a touch not as detailed as the mojo2, but it’s all about organic, natural, coherency …..

 

It even managed to make bad recordings sound pretty decent!!! Last night I was playing some old school cantopop from the 90s in MP3s and honestly none of any of my other dacs sounded good with these but the Cyan 2 really sing well with these bad recordings !!!

 

it also has a much deeper soundstage compared to the mojo 2.

 

The mojo 2, while sounds great with really good recording, makes even half decent recordings sound really bad!!!

btw my set up is as follows: 

 

Hqplayer 5 -> rpi 4 NAA -> usb to intona -> cyan 2 -> Synthesis Soprano class A int amp -> focal Aria 906 and Sony dual 10” seal sub (30 years old!!)

 

dsd256x48

7EC super 

 

or 

 

pcm 20/1536 

lns15

1x gauss long 

nx gauss lp hires