CONCLUSION

   iFi audio is a name I’ve known for years now but it wasn't until quite recently and after many of you asked that i decided to reach out to them. Now i can't say that the ZEN Air was on top of my review list and its plastic housing didn't leave the best impression to me but in the end it all worked out. In regards to testing i used numerous uncompressed FLAC tracks (including some MQA ones) with the ZEN Air during the 2 weeks i ended up testing it (with the S1000DB speakers by Edifier and the SP3 speakers and FT3/FT5 headphones by FiiO - review soon) and even though i didn't have high expectations from it (obviously due to its low cost) i was genuinely surprised to see that it did very well across the board from bass levels to detail and even soundstage (alas limited at times). Yes, the ZEN Air may not come quite close to the likes of the FiiO R7 (unfortunately i don't have another iFi audio DAC here to compare it with) in liveness, detail, accuracy, separation, soundstage and even bass but for a budget oriented DAC the ZEN Air did very well indeed. Once again however not all is perfect and so there are 3 things that stood out in a negative way (at least to me), the lack of an 3.5mm output, DC charger (especially since the USB host cable is too short) and an on/off button. Yes, this is probably me nitpicking considering the cost of the ZEN Air (although i seriously doubt an on/off button would add to it) but these two are things I’d really like to have regardless of cost.

   As mentioned, many times in this review the ZEN Air DAC is an entry-level DAC & Headphone Amp and with a current price tag set at USD99 inside the USA (Amazon.com) and at 103.16Euros inside the EU (Amazon.de) it’s exactly that. Long story short the ZEN Air DAC might not be quite as good as it’s higher end brothers by iFi audio or its higher end competition but it does offer a very good price/performance ratio and since that’s exactly what it was released for it clearly deserves the Golden Award.

PROS

- Overall Audio Performance
- 16 Core XMOS Microcontroller
- PCM/DXD 384kHz & DSD 12.4MHz
- Power Match & Xbass+
- MQA Support
- Price (For Some)

CONS

- No On/Off Button & Power Adapter
- Short USB Host Cable
- Lack Of 3.5mm Output