Yulong DA9 Balanced DAC/Amp

The Yulong DA9 combines a DAC, a powerful class A headphone amplifier, and a high-current preamp in one high-end, fully balanced unit. The DAC supports DoP64 and DoP128, and up to 384kHz/24bit PCM and native DSD256. The headphone amp has a single-ended and balanced headphone out, with the balanced amp delivering 3 watts at 32 ohms. Complete with a gold-plated front panel, the aluminum and steel housing provides excellent isolation to interference and vibration. Key components are hand-paired to ensure linearity, and the variety of connection options includes USB, Toslink, SPDIF, and AES/EBU inputs, along with RCA/XLR outputs. To learn more, check out this review. 

The Yulong DA9 features three different customizable sound modes. Mode 1 is balanced, while mode 2 is at once delicate and firm, making it a possible preference when listening to classical music. Meanwhile, mode 3 is laid-back with a stronger vocal presence, great for jazz and other vocal-heavy tracks. Working with these filter modes, users can get a new level of enjoyment from their favorite songs.

• Fully balanced decoder topology
• Fully balanced high-current preamplifier
• Fully discrete and balanced JFET-input, DC-coupled class A headphone amplifier
• AK4497 decoder chip paired with 1.7nV ultra-low-noise regular at reference voltage and analog supply
• OPA1611 with ultra-low distortion for LPF and high-current OPA1622 for output buffer
• Dop64 and Dop128 supported through SPDIF, optical, and AES
• PCM 384kHz 24bit supported through SPDIF, optical, and AES
• USB supports DoP64, DoP128, native DSD64, 128, 256, and PCM 16–32 bit, 32–384 kHz
• Ultra-low-jitter PLL clock
• Highly user-customizable digital filter
• Customizable sound mode
• Plitron 50VA toroidal transformer
• 99-step volume control to pair with headphones of different impedance and sensitivity
• Gold-plated front panel and aluminum/steel housing with claw-style suspension feet
• Universal 110–240V mains power