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iFi iDSD Valkyrie: Two-minute overview
iFi is an organization that seldom goes something apart from ‘all-in’ – and with the brand new iDSD Valkyrie headphone amp/DAC it’s determined to attempt to make one of the best ‘moveable’ headphone amp/DAC it probably can.
‘Transportable’ is a relative time period, in fact, and never solely is the Valkyrie’s portability debatable when contemplating together with it in our roundup of the best portable DACs, however the concept that you’d wish to carry round a tool you’ve spent £1699 (or equal) on is probably an odd one too. However for desktop or full system use, this iFi has an terrible lot going for it.
And that’s the case regardless of in case you’re speaking about design, construct high quality, the usual of end or the best way it sounds. It’s a person looker, for certain, and it’s unquestionably constructed to final. And when it’s working in your uncooked digital audio information, the outcomes may be nearly humbling – that is a very detailed, exact and but entertaining hear. It’s actual ‘iron fist in velvet glove’ stuff the Valkyrie trades in – it’s managed, energetic, insightful and, above all, musical. And that final phrase particularly is not at all a given, even in case you’re spending an arm and a leg.
For some, the seemingly limitless choices to fiddle with the filtering, upscaling and processing of digital audio info may appear a bit daunting. For others, the concept that iFi is leaving the tip consumer to have such a giant say within the final sound will seem to be an admission that it doesn’t fairly know what ‘finest’ seems like. For the remainder of us, although, the iDSD Valkyrie will probably be a supply of countless fascination in addition to of enjoyment.
iFi iDSD Valkyrie overview: Worth and launch date
- Launched of March 25, 2025
- Priced $1,699 / £1,699 / AU$2,999 (approx.)
The iFi iDSD Valkyrie launched on March 25, 2025, and it prices the identical £1699 now because it did then. In the US it should set you again a barely extra palatable $1699, whereas in Australia it goes for AU$2999 or one thing very prefer it.
I don’t suppose I will probably be startling anybody after I observe that that is fairly some huge cash for a transportable (or, as iFi prefers, ‘transportable’) DAC/headphone amp. Actually, the one different of any profile that’s contesting the identical space of the market is Chord’s equally wilfully named Hugo 2 – which suggests the Valkyrie is competing towards a minimum of one massively achieved rival…
iFi iDSD Valkyrie overview: Options
- Quad Burr-Brown PCM1793 DACs
- Quite a few processing choices
- 20000mAh battery energy for 18 hours of fixed operation
Sure, there are three headlines as regards ‘options’ simply above right here – however in all honesty I might have chosen from fairly just a few others. ‘A trowel’ is just too small an implement to point what iFi has used to put it on with right here.
I’ve to start out someplace, although, so I’ll as nicely begin with battery energy. There are 4 batteries fitted to the Valkyrie which suggests it should run fairly fortunately for as a lot as 18 hours earlier than it wants charging – and its quick-charge facility means it may be brimmed inside three hours.
Getting digital info into the Valkyrie and decoded analogue info out once more may be achieved in fairly quite a few other ways, however what occurs to it in between is topic to various user-defined variation. Essentially, digital audio stuff is given the once-over by a quartet of Burr-Brown PCM1793 DACs, however they’re working along with an FPGA (area programmable gate array) that enables a bewildering variety of processing, filtering and upscaling choices to be delivered to bear in case you so need.
There are six filtering choices, from the light-touch ‘bit good’ to the heavy-handed ‘apodising’ and factors in between – upsampling to resolutions manner past the native decision of the incoming sign may be facilitated this manner. PCM and DSD information may be upsampled to DSD512 or a colossal DSD1024, which suggests incoming content material can have its pattern fee adjusted in fairly just a few methods.
And never for the primary time the place certainly one of its extra upmarket merchandise are involved, iFi has included JVC Kenwood’s ‘K2’ processing that was initially developed again when 16bit/44.1kHz compact disc customary dominated the roost – it intends to assist restore info which may have disappeared through the authentic remastering from analogue to digital. And naturally sufficient the upgraded ‘K2HD’ that displays the newer transfer to hi-res content material is included too.
In addition to the bodily digital and analogue inputs, the Valkyrie is fitted with Bluetooth 5.4 wi-fi connectivity – and it’s suitable with top-of-the-shop, state-of-the-art aptX Lossless codec compatibility too. iFi has been demonstrating its impeccable facility with Bluetooth for fairly a while now, and the implementation of the as-good-as-it-gets customary bodes very nicely certainly.
Options rating: 5 / 5
iFi iDSD Valkyrie overview: Sound high quality
- Lavishly detailed and insightful
- Open, spacious and well-defined
- Your favorite sonic stability is in there someplace…
I’m going to should assume you’ve taken your funding severely, and have spent so long as it takes to seek out the sonic stability throughout the Valkyrie’s countless permutations that fits you finest. Throughout this journey you will have found that it’s attainable to make the iFi sound overprocessed and unnatural – however, in fact, that is what ‘trial and error’ is all about.
When you get the place you wish to be, although, there’s little or no that’s inaccurate about the best way the Valkyrie offers along with your digital audio info. It’s solely barely perturbed by very compressed, low-resolution content material, and it doesn’t in any respect thoughts about the kind of music you prefer to take heed to. It’s forgiving of partnering tools, regardless of if it’s headphones or a full-on system. And it’s able to peering right into a recording on a forensic stage and returning with an absolute stack of related info that it is just too keen to impart.
A recording like Nick Drake’s Which Will that’s saved as a 24bit/96kHz FLAC file illustrates a number of what’s so pleasing and so spectacular concerning the Valkyrie. Its midrange constancy is, fairly frankly, gorgeous. There’s an immediacy concerning the vocal efficiency right here, an totally pure tonality, that makes each side of the singer’s efficiency – perspective, emotional state, character, phrasing, breath-management, you title it – fully obvious. And, what’s extra, makes it sound pure, unforced and alive.
The spare instrumentation of the recording is equally alive – the tonal stability the iFi strikes is convincing, and the stage on which this efficiency happens is confidently outlined. Frequency response is easy and even, consideration to harmonic element is fanatical, and there’s the form of unity and togetherness of presentation that I extra readily related to the vinyl format.
A 24bit/48kHz FLAC file of James Holden’s Frequent Land permits the Valkyrie to reveal martial low-frequency management and an unequivocal manner with rhythmic expression. Bass sounds are fast, loaded with variation, dynamic as may be, and with the form of straight-edged assault meaning the tune simply snaps. On the reverse finish there’s substance to treble info that properly balances out the chunk and crunch the iFi brings, and once more the Valkyrie observes the assault, the onset, of top-end sounds with full consideration.
I get the sturdy impression that the Valkyrie is ready to carry one of the best from any partnering tools regardless of if it’s a system or a pair of headphones, and regardless of how a lot or how little this tools prices. Even when the digital audio info is entering into the machine through Bluetooth, the output isn’t lower than coherent and convincing. Naturally in case you resolve you wish to upsample a 320kbps MP3 file of The Roots’ Dynamite! to DSD1024 it’s attainable to discern a course of at work behind the precise sound you’re listening to – however you’ll respect that I’m taking issues to extremes right here.
Sound high quality: 4.5 / 5
iFi iDSD Valkyrie overview: Design
- Arrives in a big picket field
- As winged because the title calls for
- Very good customary of construct and end
You may’t recommend iFi hasn’t put the arduous yards in the place the design of the iDSD Valkyrie is anxious. It is a product that’s been designed to inside an inch of its life. In some methods this ‘designing in any respect prices’ impacts on outright usability (as we will see), however by no means let or not it’s stated iFi doesn’t supply a little bit of visible drama to associate with all that efficiency.
So the Valkyrie arrives in a considerable picket field that stretches the definition of the phrase ‘transportable’ greater than considerably. Inside is the machine itself (a not insignificant 30 x 160 x 172mm [HxWxD] and 882g) together with a essentially giant (and unarguably beige) carry case, a choice of connection cables and adapters to cowl each eventuality, and a mains adapter.
The machine itself is dramatically angular in a way, says iFi, that evokes “the majestic wings of a Valkyrie’s horse” – which is bold, no two methods about it. And let’s face it, solely by evaluating it to a horse does the iDSD Valkyrie appear something apart from very giant. I’ve been utilizing the equally particular iFI i DSD Diablo 2 as my reference headphone amp/DAC for some time now, and I used to suppose it was fairly huge. Not any extra.
There’s no arguing with the usual of construct and end right here, thoughts you. The match is even, the panel gaps are very tight certainly, and there’s even a suggestion of tactility concerning the casework. Used as a system machine in a home setting or on a desktop it’s a singular and diverting looker.
Design rating: 4.5 / 5
iFi iDSD Valkyrie overview: Usability and setup
- Multi-function sockets and buttons
- Lilliputian labelling for these sockets and buttons
- Nearly an excessive amount of consumer enter into setup
So sure, as I stated: this dedication to make sure the iDSD Valkyrie is Totally Designed has led to some compromises the place usability is anxious. It has a good few sockets and buttons on either side and each ends – however in all honesty it might do with just a few extra, as a result of too a lot of them are fulfilling multiple perform.
As an illustration, on the rear panel there’s a USB-C socket for charging that quartet of batteries and one other for information switch. Then there’s a hybrid optical/coaxial 3.5mm digital enter, and a pair of stereo RCA analogue outputs. After that there are two analogue connections – one is an unbalanced 3.5mm socket and the opposite a balanced 4.4mm different – and each of them perform as each inputs and outputs.
Up entrance there’s one other 4.4mm balanced analogue output – this one doubles as an output for MEMS headphones. There’s additionally one other 3.5mm unbalanced analogue output, with a (comparatively) giant quantity/mute control-cum-power on/off dial within the centre. A button that permits you to cycle via your quite a few filter choices and to provoke upsampling to DSD (512 or 1024) is adjoining to a button that offers each with enter choice and turns K2 or K2HD processing on or off.
On the underside of the chassis there’s the same old iFi ‘iEMatch’ swap for finessing output relative to the calls for of your headphones, and on the highest there are two little buttons coping with out there audio modes. One switches the ‘XSpace’ mode (designed to enhance imaging) on or off, and likewise governs the three several types of energy output ranges, whereas the opposite offers entry to ‘XPresence’ mode (for further midrange grunt) and ‘XBass II’ mode (take a wild guess). It additionally permits you to entry menus on the little display on the highest of the machine, turning the amount management right into a flip/push dial to navigate them.
After I recommended most of the sockets and buttons on the Valkyrie are overburdened, I actually wasn’t joking.
And in case you’ve learn the ‘options’ part, then you definately’ll know that as the tip consumer you have got loads of legwork to do earlier than the Valkyrie is about as much as your satisfaction in purely sonic phrases. The entire sound modes, along with all the filter choices, allied to all the processing and upsampling potentialities, imply it should take effort and time to get the purpose you deem optimum.
Usability and setup rating: 3 / 5
iFi iDSD Valkyrie overview: Worth
Like nearly all the pieces that will get reviewed at techradar.com, the ‘worth’ the iFi iDSD Valkyrie represents is subjective.
Is it ten occasions higher than certainly one of iFi’s personal admirable little USB DACs that value a tenth of the worth or much less. In fact it isn’t; features on the very prime of the meals chain have all the time been incremental. However if you would like what’s approaching ‘final’ the place a product of this kind is anxious, nicely, it’s going to value you.
And don’t be in any doubt, the outcomes listed here are profoundly spectacular.
Worth rating: 4.5 / 5
Ought to I purchase the iFi iDSD Valkyrie?
|
Attributes |
Notes |
Score |
|---|---|---|
|
Options |
Is it attainable for a DAC too boast too many options? No, in fact not |
5/5 |
|
Design |
It is huge for moveable, however it’s also lovely |
4.5/5 |
|
Sound high quality |
Staggeringly agile and detailed, to an nearly humbling diploma – it merely is not a fan of very compressed stuff |
4.5/5 |
|
Worth |
It’s extremely costly, however in case you can justify the hefty outlay, you will reap the advantages |
4.5/5 |
Purchase it if…
Do not buy it if…
iFi iDSD Valkyrie overview: Additionally contemplate
The apparent rival to the iFi iDSD Valkyrie, and the reigning ‘madly costly and outsized headphone amp/DAC’ champion is the Chord Hugo 2 – which may be discovered for across the identical charge because the Valkyrie nowadays (however launched at £1,800 / $2,175 / AU$4,500). In its personal manner it’s simply as oddball a product because the iFi – it’s been eight years because it launched, and I’m no nearer to understanding what every of the colour mixtures that represent a consumer interface really imply. Nevertheless it’s a staggeringly achieved performer nonetheless.
How I examined the iFi iDSD Valkyrie
I related the iDSD Valkyrie to a MacBook Professional (operating Colibri software program) through its USB-C socket, and I additionally related it through its digital optical enter to a Rega Apollo CD participant.
I related a FiiO M15S digital audio player wirelessly utilizing the LDAC codec. I used a pair of Sennheiser IE900 in-ear headphones through their 4.4mm balanced connection as an output, together with a pair of Bowers & Wilkins Px8 through the three.5mm unbalanced output – and I additionally related the Valkyrie to a predominant reference system (Naim amplification, Bowers & Wilkins loudspeakers) utilizing its RCA outputs. After which I fed it a number of music, of various file varieties and sizes, and of various genres, in an effort to seek out one thing the iFi doesn’t excel at.
After which I needed to settle for that ‘excel’ is just what the iFi iDSD Valkyrie does.