iFi Audio ZenDAC - Official Thread

Official AMP/DAC/DAP Model Discussion
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Hi mate,

As folks have kindly helped out here and mentioned, having channel imbalances at low volumes is unfortunately a trade-off for manufacturers like us that adore analog volume knobs. It’s something that is industry-wide.

Here’s a simple and detailed explanation to help you understand: Channel imbalance? | iFi audio

Folks have also already covered my suggestions as well - being grabbing an IEMatch/Earbuddy or finding the fine line with a comfy volume that’s above where the channel imbalance is.

I hope that helps! Let me know if there’s anything I can do for you or provide some more suggestions/possible solutions.

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At home I have the NEO idsd and I have not experienced such issue (really, really happy with it!)!
I really want to listen at low level, so not sure how to solve this :confused:

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Please feel free to open up a ticket with us as our tech staff may have more solutions:

https://support.ifi-audio.com/open.php

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Thank you for your support!

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Of course, do keep us posted!

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One thing, would using the Zen Dac solely as DAC and adding a Zen Can impact anything on this issue? Thank you!

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I don’t believe it would affect anything!

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I’ve owned the Zen dac version 1 for about a year now. Recently, I’ve experience line noise, making the dac unusable. Is there any way to salvage the unit or is it a lost cause?

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Welcome to the forum.

What type of noise? Hiss? Clicks? Static?

My first step with line noise is to move the device away from possible RFI interference such as a cell phones. Cell phones interference has often resulted in amp noise for me over the years. After moving away from other stuff, I then swap out the wires one by one (USB, interconnects, and headphone wires). The wires sometimes go bad or their connectors get cruddy, and unshielded wires can pick up noise from outside.

One of my amps routinely ticks if the headphone jack doesn’t make solid contact, so I have to pull some jacks out about 2-3 mm. Then it’s silent.

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Do you have a separate power supply, or does the DAC get its power from the PC?

Is the Zen near speakers, a cell phone, or a tube amp?

Or are the cables or connections damaged or near a magnetic field?

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This is all great advice and points of reference to double-check things after going through debugging.

After you’ve run through these, let us know if something fixed it, or if you’re still having the issue.

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The iFi published specs for the Zen Dac have the fixed line outs @ 2.1v for RCA and 4.2v for balanced but comparing the two - they are the exact same volume into an external amp. How could that be?

I am using iFi’s own 4.4 to XLR cable for the balanced output.

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What amp, the amp could easily attenuate the input depending on if it’s really balanced internally, or how it’s doing the SE → Bal or Bal → SE conversion.
Typically balanced amps have an inverter on the SE input and the actual amplification stage see’s 2x the SE input.

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Thanks - you are dead right :+1:

The amp is a Holo Audio Azure that I have always just used with the balanced inputs, so I never noticed that the output volume levels were matched. I just tested the ZD with another amp and the volume difference is there.

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fJust confirming as well that this is the correct answer as well!