THE ZEN AIR

The ZEN Air is a compact standalone DAC & headphone amp which weighs just 315g and measures 158mm in length, 117mm in width and 35mm in height.

At the front we find a LED used to display format and sample rate (Green for PCM 44.1/48/88.2/96kHz, Yellow for PCM 176.4/192/352.8/384kHz, Cyan for DSD 64/128, Blue for DSD 256 and Magenta for MQA), power match button for the one-step gain control (not to be used with IEMs), volume control knob (analog mind you), 6.35mm single-ended headphone jack and the Xbass+ button (analog bass extender).

Turning the device around we find an L/R RCA output, USB host port and a 5V in.

The ZEN Air sits on 4 small round rubber feet.

Even though my ZEN Air arrived with the latest firmware installed I still needed to upload the MQA version (you can download the firmware package from iFi audio’s support page seen above).