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Just be careful if you intend to use it with non-NuForce speakers. I tried it with nearly a dozen pairs of speakers at a local audio shop - all of them exhibited the noise, regardless of input selection or volume level.On their help forum, NuForce reps propose that if you're bothered the low-level hiss (quite possible some people won't care about it), then instead use two other NuForce products (Icon AMP and uDAC). But they have not suggested which other speakers *do* work cleanly with the Icon. But then you have two boxes on your desk, not one.Awesome potential, beautifully stylish design. The NuForce Icon is a beautiful little device, and one of a tiny handful of "single box" products that includes a USB input with DAC, RCA inputs, 1/8" input, headphone amp, and speaker outputs.Unfortunately the NuForce Icon is designed to be used with proprietary NuForce speakers, and it exhibits a fair bit of low-level hum/hiss/noise with most speakers of other brands.Apparently NuForce used to warn prospective customers about this characteristic on their web site, but no longer do. The NoForce folks are very responsive on their help forums, saying yes, the only way to guarantee no noise is to use the NuForce speakers. The *are* designed for non-Nuforce speakers.
It is very high quality in terms of the fit, finish, construction and the sound. The product is GREAT and does exactly as advertised. It was also MUCH less expensive than the other options I explored.I use this product with Sennheiser Noise Cancelling Headsets in an aircraft (for the entertainment system)and it made a HUGE difference in the volume and sound quality of the system.I even contacted technical support to see if I could make a small modification (for my specific application)and they were very nice and very helpful.
wonderful little D class amp. built in DAC makes a marked improvement with itunes from a mac/pc rather than ipod or computer headphone jack.
ships fast too. i digress.
added an HD radio tuner and line from tivo/sat.( man, wish i had this setup in college.remember the dozen milk crates of albums). i'm very pleased with this little gem and recommend it highly.
Vivre La Revollution. clean, crisp, balanced and just powerful enough for a small office, bedroom or dorm.
the size of the icon is small but the quality of the components within is great, as is the quality of the sound that comes out.
I sent feedback to the vendor, they called the end user, assured them all was included in the box and how to set it up. He thought he was missing cables. Amazing. This is an amazing vendor for this NuForce Icon. I sent it as a gift, the end user was not clear how to set any of the equipment up (just not experienced). This to me was terrific follow through.
It fit easily on my desk, and the included speaker cables were just long enough to connect my bookshelf speakers. I don't need to go beyond half volume for typical listening, and if I push the audio up to 3/4ths of the max volume then it's more than loud enough for any type of music I want to listen to. I'm not sure it could provide enough power for a large listening room, but for a bedroom or an office, it provides more than enough.The ability of it to function as a headphone amp was just a bonus for me, but it's proven to be a nice bonus. The lingering question I had is how well would a little 12 WPC amp be able to drive my bookshelf speakers.The answer, I found, was very easily.
Overall, highly recommended. Switching to an analog input works just fine with my radio tuner, though most of my time is spent using the USB DAC input.The downside to me is that there is a loud pop though my speakers when I turn on the amp, so I often just leave it powered on all the time (being a Class D amp, it consumes very little power while running). I wouldn't say that I hear things in the music that I didn't hear before, but there is far more clarity than there was before and it makes listening a more enjoyable experience. The NuForce Icon was attractive to me as a replacement due to it's small size, multiple audio inputs, and most importantly the built in USB DAC. People have become attracted to USB for a DAC due to it's ease of installation and low jitter, and I was hopeful this would work well in that case.The Icon is a very tiny package. I was also able to install the ASIO4ALL driver to bypass the Windows Audio Kernel (for better performance and higher quality audio) and that has worked without any conflicts so far. I haven't been able to notice the speakers suffering in anyway compared to being driven by a much larger 70 WPC amp as they were before.
Also, if I had speakers that were further away at all then I would need to purchase the longer speaker cables, but those are very reasonably priced from NuForce, as well as the power supply upgrade that I would like to try out (probably not needed if used only as a headphone amp, but it may help for speakers). Before I got the NuForce Icon, my headphone and speakers at my desk were being driven by an older Harman Kardon receiver, which did a fine job, but also was overkill for the job and took up a large amount of valuable desk space. Once I connected the Icon to my PC it was recognized by Windows XP instantly and the software installed for it with no issues. Combined with the DAC, using my Grado headphones the music I listen to (all files stored as lossless FLAC on my PC) has more clarity to it than it did before.
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