This review page is supported in part by the sponsors whose ad banners are displayed below

Upsampling. With 192kHz as the default value (green), it's clearly the designer's preference. On good recordings like the Scharoun Ensemble's reading of Schubert's Octet D803 [Tudor] with key members of the Berlin Philharmonic—including former BJO colleague Ulrich Knörzer on viola as I discovered in a private aha moment—I found upsampling a bit brighter and edgier than bypass so I preferred the latter. On certain iTunes store AAC downloads which I haven't been able to replace yet with non-lossy versions, upsampling was a definite improvement however. Even so these are subtle tweaks any owner has to gauge personally. They differ from recording to recording and are so easily checked with a push of a button—there's a small mute while the upsampler switches in—that discussing them here is sorely unnecessary.


USB/coax aka iMac/UX1. I was told that the particular full-metal VRDS sled in my Esoteric UX1 universal machine was the best the Japanese ever made. Apparently OEM price with minimum order requirements of 50 was $6.000 just for this drive mechanism. Needless to say it never saw use outside the company's own top product. Defenders of legacy digital claim that a good CD player still outperforms top PC audio. Perhaps so. All I know is that using the UX1 as transport versus the iMac in memory play booked no advantages with the Eximus. Whilst hot recordings like Diego Amador's Rio de los Canasteros [World Village] bestowed some comfort padding with the 'proper' transport's softer fuzzier reading, a good recording like ECM's Navidad de los Andes (Dino & Felix Saluzzi with Anja Lechner) suggested strongly that the computer feed really was more highly resolved and articulated.


Filter on. Having sung the praises of the Audez'e LCD-2 planar-magnetic headphones which have been improved since with a Rev2 driver and leather headband, I was naturally curious what some happy turbo boost from Simon's +6dB@30Hz would accomplish with what by raw design are already the most bass-extended whilst linear cans I know of. This called for one of my truly wicked bass tracks, "Gold Dust Bacchanalia" from Mychael Danna's soundtrack for the Mira Nair movie Kamasutra. Knowing what's actually on this track from true fullrange speakers, I can say that on sheer extension those have nothing on the LCD-2 au nature. With the filter on—this indeed acted like an instant lateral space expander—99.9% of all speakers won't have a chance coming anywhere close!


It admittedly was a cheap trick which a bit of equalizing in a freeware plug-in could easily accomplish in PureMusic also for speakers. Chances are simply that room acoustics will make a complete mess of it, never mind the very real extra demands this places on your amplifier (if your speakers are up for it in the first place). Clearly my ALO-recabled Audez'e didn't need this filter boost particularly on music that was infrasonically already endowed beyond what's acoustic/natural to begin with. But for some fiendish fun at the headfi drag strip it was pure testosterone.

The beastly inefficient loads of HifiMan's HE-6 cranked at 15:00 on the dial. With them bass boost for honesty was very useful. While the extrasensory ambient benefits weren't as great as they'd been with the Audez'e, they were still very obvious. If the Hippocratic Oath begins with first do no harm, any amp's equivalent commitment must start with raw drive. Without proper control over transducers nothing else much matters. How the HE-6 responded to the Eximus treatment was quite enlightening. Whilst not flawless—the newer HE-500 are better balanced—these gold-traced orthodynamics had still more to give than I knew. They simply took off to generate new appreciation. This stunt confirmed the DP1 as unconditional governator of anything that headfi might throw its way. With perfect traction it'll go louder than is healthy from any basic computer/transport feed.

Doing the math. The DAC-with-USB market is currently hyper active. Simon Lee's Eximus DP1 is far from a Johnny come lately to ride a fashion wave. It's backed by 15 years of specialized digital design experience and a deliberate focus to be the very best its maker is capable of. It's April Music's ambassador for the top of the high end. This explains the designer chassis but not so much the $3.000 sticker. Though far from chopped liver, in today's inflated hifi climate that does not fully telegraph extreme ambition. Perhaps high-performance value statement captures it best. Unless one wanted particular valve-type flavor contributions, chances are high that the DP1 in amp-direct connection will equal or outperform a dedicated transistor preamplifier of equal or even considerably higher coin. For such simplification and cost savings one does give up remote control and additional analog inputs.


Core virtues. The Eximus DP1 portrays physicality without defaulting into fuzzy warmth or pronounced density. Detail magnification is very high and makes for top-notch dimensionality and spatiality. Contrast ratio is just a tad soft to favor contextual transitions over extreme outline focus. Considerable drive makes the presentation a 'they're here' rather than 'I'm there' perspective. The design is capable of surprising dynamics where a superior power cord as extension of the internal power supply becomes vital. Despite very high resolution there's clear evidence of an 'analog' focus. This reflects in the edge transitions and minor overall sweetness.


Whilst cause/effect claims in audio reviews are often dubious—scientific isolation of very specific contributors remains outside our scope—calling the USB 2.0 implementation excellent seems factual given that a top-line Esoteric transport didn't offer any compelling advantages over an iMac (added props are due PureMusic's memory play and integer mode option). If most hifi voicing comes down to a fine balance between lucidity, speed, incision, dynamics and articulation on one side; body, heft, color richness and mass on the other... Simon Lee seems to walk very close indeed to the middle. The Zodiac Gold leans a bit closer to the left or first half of the equation, the Invicta less so but still a tad. Both Burson HA-160D and DA-160 lean well to the other side. The CEntrance DACmini is a hardcore 'leftie' and as such very similar to how I remember the original Benchmark Media piece.

Nobody can hear digital prior to conversion. Much design work can thus be done in the measurement lab to assure low distortion, jitter, noise, wide bandwidth and low Zout. Adapting the laboratory part to final use in a comfy home rather than sterile clinic is the domain of more artistic vision and good experience with analogue circuitry. Simon Lee's 15 years in these trenches have clearly paid off. His April Music Eximus DP1 performs in the league of Igor Levin's €3.495 Antelope Audio Zodiac Gold and Mark Mallinson's $3.995 Resonessence Invicta but for headfi is first amongst these equals. In amp-direct use it exceeds the Gold but lacks the convenient display and remote of the Invicta. Considering price, features, finish and competition, it joins the Stello U3 in winning our publication's Blue Moon award.

April music website
Enlarge!