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Got some favorite wired headphones (or earbuds!) you'd like to use with your modern smartphone, tablet, or computer? The ifi Audio Go Blu Portable Bluetooth Headphone Amp/DAC lets you adapt any wired audio device to work wirelessly - including an old stereo - and incorporates top-notch XBass bass boost and XSpace spatial expansion capabilities that you can enable for a big, big sound or disable for a clean, crisp signal. Audio fan Dave Taylor checked out the ifi Go Blu Portable Bluetooth Amp with a pair of Beyerdynamic Amiron headphones and found the experience excellent, as he explains...
You can check out the ifi Amp/DAC at: https://amzn.to/3F9jn2Z
Then check out Dave's Q&A Web site at: https://www.AskDaveTaylor.com/
#ifiaudio #bluetooth #headphones #amp #dac #audiophile #askdavetaylor
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0:00
This will give your wired headphones a new life
0:02
Let's check it out. Dave Taylor here and I'm checking out this tiny little device
0:14
It's the IFI Go Blue portable headphone amp and it's an amp-dac combination unit and it's
0:22
pretty marvelous. As you can see, it is super small, but the idea is you take your wired headphones and
0:29
then plug it into the unit and now your headphones become Bluetooth enabled, but much more importantly
0:37
is it has an amplifier and it's a really crisp, clean amplifier that does marvelous things
0:44
to your music. Now it's built on the Cirrus Logic 43131 DAC chip and it has sample rates up to 24 bits
0:54
at 96 kilohertz, signal to noise ratio of 111 decibels balanced or 116 decibels unbalanced
1:02
That's depending on whether you use the 4.4 or 3.5 millimeter jack
1:07
It supports both. Total harmonic distortion balanced is less than 0.009 percent, which is way beyond anything
1:18
anyone's going to be able to hear. Unbalanced it's 0.03. Again, you're going to have to have pretty incredible hearing to be able to catch any
1:26
of that distortion. It's really clean. It's a really clean amp and 20 to 45,000 hertz frequency response and you know that it actually
1:36
has lots of secret superpowers when I tell you that it supports AAC, aptX, aptX HD, aptX
1:45
adaptive, aptX low latency, HWA, LDAC and SBC. In other words, whatever you pair this with as a music source, it's going to get the very
1:56
best possible sound out of that device with the maximum possible bandwidth and then its
2:03
own amplifying circuits can do even more with the music because it also has what IFI calls
2:10
X-Bass and a new one to me, X-Space. So X-Bass, turn it on and your bass just gets richer
2:17
It doesn't become thumpy. It doesn't sound like it's a square wave or something like that
2:22
It just gives you more bass, which is super fun. And then X-Bass actually gives you a bigger sort of sonic picture
2:30
It gives you a more spatial sense to it and that becomes really fun too
2:37
And you can also use it wired if you want. So I could take these headphones
2:41
These are the Beyerdynamic Amarons, really beautiful headphones, super, super comfortable. So I could plug this into the 3.5 millimeter jack and then it has USB-C for charging, but
2:54
you can also use it to hook up to a music source like your computer
2:58
So if you do that, you're sort of sidestepping the whole Bluetooth, which is fine because
3:03
you're still using it as an amp. Still going to sound really fantastic
3:07
In fact, that's probably the very best sound you can get. But you can use it wired or wireless if you're not a big Bluetooth fan
3:15
And then the 3.5 millimeter is gold plated and the 4.4 is the Pentacom balanced interface
3:26
So if you have 4.4 millimeter headphones, props to you. They're not that common, but they do give you a really nice sound with the assumption
3:35
that the device you're plugging into is producing that sound and the headphones do maybe a little
3:40
bit less work. Maybe not. But in any case, Bluetooth 5.1 if you are using Bluetooth and it is a rechargeable device
3:48
It runs for 10 hours on a charge. When you're ready to charge it, that USB-C comes in handy again and it has LED lights
3:56
on it. So on the top is an LED light that'll show you what sound mode you're in and you step
4:03
between no sound filtering going on to X space, to X space, to X space and X space
4:13
So you can just sort of tap through. It's the second button here on this side
4:16
In fact, let me give you a couple of close-ups so you can see sort of the tour
4:20
On the top you have the 3.5 millimeter and 4.4 millimeter jacks and an LED that shows
4:29
you its mode. Then on the right-hand side you have that multifunction knob
4:36
Dialing it forward and backward will actually change the volume, but there's a push button
4:41
on the end that can do pause, play, previous, next track, all that sort of stuff
4:45
Below that is another button that lets you step through those modes if you want to try
4:50
it without X space versus with. It's super easy to do that
4:54
On the bottom you have the tiny microphone hole because this has a built-in microphone
5:00
so you can use your classic headphones and take a phone call if you really need to
5:05
And then the LED there is your battery status. Mine is green because my battery's in great shape and USB-C for charging and a tiny little
5:14
hole they tell me is for doing a system reset if you really need to
5:18
I have not had to do that. And then on the left-hand side is a single button and that's your Bluetooth functionality
5:25
button for getting into pairing mode and things of that nature. Generally speaking, it just works
5:32
I literally plug this in, turn it on, plug in my headphones, go to my source device and
5:38
it's all ready to rock and roll. If I unconnect it from all of my source devices it goes into pairing mode and then I can connect
5:44
it to another device. Really easy. I've tried this with my iPhone
5:49
This is an iPhone 13 Pro, so I'm using AAC in that sense
5:54
I've tried it with my Google Pixel phone, which gives me aptX
5:58
I've tried it with my MacBook, which I think also gives me aptX
6:03
It's just really easy to work with and as I said, it just gives you this beautiful sound
6:09
So it's this easy to use. So let me plug it into the correct jack, that would be helpful, and put my headphones on
6:17
and then I can do a single push and I am right into some Ahmad Jamal
6:25
I've been listening to a lot of his old music. Solid stuff, but this just gives me this, really this, like the sense that I'm at a
6:34
nightclub and I almost can smell the cigarette smoke and can almost hear the clinking of
6:39
the glasses, but it's just a lot of presence. The sound is rich and beautiful and there's no brights on the high, there's no thumpiness
6:50
on the bass. The soundstage is great. If you add that X-Bass, it gives you even more soundstage
6:57
Now to be totally candid, I like having X-Bass, which gives me just a little bit more bass
7:03
though I feel like these Amarons already do a nice job. Just gives me a little more, but I'm not a huge fan of X-Bass
7:10
That's one where it's interesting to turn it on and off because it does give you a little
7:15
bit more of that sort of spatial sense, but at a price
7:18
It doesn't sound exactly the same, obviously, and I think I like it without X-Bass on, but
7:24
of course IFI has got it totally covered because it's really easy for me to decide to turn
7:29
it on or off. Now, in the box, comes in a very nice box
7:33
I'll go through this super quick, nothing too earth shattering, but it comes with a
7:38
handy little guide that gives you all the light statuses, stati, statuses, well, whatever
7:46
and the warranty, and then in a little box on the bottom, it includes the charging cable
7:55
nice little USB-A to USB-C charging cable, and a little tiny leather bag that you can
8:03
use to carry it around if you want to protect it, and that's nice. It's nice of them to include that, though I suspect I won't use it very much
8:11
I imagine a lot of people will, and that gives them that choice and that flexibility
8:15
So really, this is a remarkable piece of electronics. It is tiny
8:22
It is less than an ounce, and if you're carrying it by itself, you can easily forget you even
8:28
have it. If you add it to your computer bag, or your purse, or your backpack or something, you
8:34
absolutely won't notice that it's there until you use it with your classic headphones
8:39
and you realize, wow, I'm getting a lot more sound and a lot richer sound out of even earbuds
8:45
would work with this, right, because you could plug them into that 3.5 millimeter jack
8:50
So lots to like here. I'm really a fan of this. This is one that's going to live in my computer bag because I just like having the best possible
8:58
sound quality, and that means the only thing we have left to talk about is the price
9:04
But before we get to the price, I'm going to ask if you could subscribe to my channel
9:08
Click or tap on that subscribe button on the lower right, and we're connected. Great
9:13
This is the IFI Go Blue portable headphone amp, and it's $199 at Amazon.com
9:21
Now that might sound a little spendy, but I promise if you plug in your headphones to
9:26
this versus just plugging them straight into your computer, you will absolutely hear a difference
9:32
These are going to make mediocre headphones sound good, good headphones sound really good
9:37
and really good headphones or audiophile level studio headphones sound amazing. And why wouldn't you want to invest a little more to get the best possible sound reproduction
9:48
That's what this offers. So with that, I think I'm going to go back to some Ahmad Jamal, and I will catch you
9:58
in my next video
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