I think I will definitely wait for a Stream Magic
7, which hopefully will be
comprehensively better than the Stream Magic 6 V1. I get the feeling (maybe wrongly) that the V2, is a stop-gap, while they develop the Stream Magic 7, maybe with a Sabre dac on board??
I've saw on Hi-Fi World's "coming-up-next-month" blurb that they're going to review an Azur 851N.
This
still doesn't seem to be a 'Stream Magic 7'!!
According to the CA website the 851N adds :-
1 - native support for Spotify
2 - native 24/192 playback
3 - Apple Airplay support
4 - DSD
These all seem to be (slight , as far as I'm concerned) 'improvements' to the original StreamMagic 6 (V1). This new Azur 851N still uses the
heart and soul of the SM6, the Anagram Technologies AFT2 24 bit/384 kHz up-sampling circuit. The rest seem to be fiddling around the edges.
1 - Spotify - don't use it.
2 - native 24/192 - can't tell the difference between 24/96 and 24/192
3 - Apple Airplay - Apple, Ha-ha,Ha-ha,Ha-ha,Ha-ha,Ha-ha,Ha-ha,Ha-ha,Ha-ha,Ha-ha.
4 - DSD - Not interested.
So you can see that Cambridge Audio will have to come up with a
genuine upgrade, and not just adding on some extra capabilities that probably should have been there in the first place.
Earlier I said "I think I will definitely wait for a Stream Magic 7, which hopefully will be comprehensively better than the Stream Magic 6 V1. I get the feeling (maybe wrongly) that the V2, is a stop-gap, while they develop the Stream Magic 7, maybe with a Sabre dac on board??"
Well, the V2 does appear to have been a stopgap - while they developed the Azur 851N. But it still uses the exact same DAC (excellent though it is) as my SM6 V1. I will not accept anything CA release as a true upgrade till they change the 'heart and soul' of the player, i.e. the DAC. And it would have to be something special to better the Anagram Technologies ATF 24/384.
The Sabre 9018 or 9023?