DENAFRISP Ares II Dac Amplifier Owner’s Manual

ARES II DAC
OWNER’S MANUAL

INSTALLATION & SAFETY INSTRUCTIONS

This DAC is designed and built to provide trouble-free performance, but as with all electronic devices it is necessary to observe a few precautions:

• Unpack the DAC carefully.
• Position the DAC on a stable, horizontal surface, i.e. sturdy rack.
• The DAC supports voltage 100-250VAC worldwide voltage by a voltage selector. The voltage selector can be found at the bottom of the DAC. Switch it to the correct voltage prior to powering it up, i.e. 115V for the US / 230V for the EU.
• Please connect the AC power cord with earth(ground) pin unless it is absolutely required to reduce hum from the ground loops of the connected devices.
• Always ensure that when disconnecting and reconnecting your audio equipment the mains supply is turned off.
• Position the power cord and signal interconnects where they are not likely cause trip and fall hazard.
• Do not use the DAC near water, or place water-filled containers on the DAC. Entry of liquid into the DAC is hazardous and may cause electric shock and/or fire hazard.
• Do not place the unit under direct sunlight or heat source.
• Do not remove any covers or try to gain access to the inside. There are no user adjustments or fuses to change without qualification.
• Clean regularly with a damp soft cloth. Do not use any cleaning agents as it might damage the surface finishing.
• The electronics in modern hi-fi equipment is complex and may, therefore, be adversely affected or damaged by lightning. For protection of the audio system during electrical storms, disconnect the mains plugs.

INTRODUCTION

Thank you for purchasing the DENAFRIPS ARES DAC.
The ARES DAC is built with a sole objective in mind – to reproduce digital music to analoguelike sound for today’s audiophile. The use of advanced hardware design, powerful digital processing technology, combined with the know-how of recording and reproduction experiences, ARES DAC achieved the digital music playback goals – musical expression.
The architecture uses the most primitive R-2R DAC technology, it is probably the most suitable architecture to reproduce music. Despite the test results of various measurements and parameters of the conventional R-2R DAC may usually not as good as the mainstream integrated DAC chip, but the sound of R-2R DAC, is often filled with emotion, relax, high resolution, and additive musicality that most of the common mainstream integrated DAC chip cannot match.

DESIGN HIGHLIGHTS

3.1 ADAPTIVE FIFO BUFFER RECLOCKING
The DENAFRIPS approach to address the jitters issue by FIFO BUFFER RECLOCKING. The adaptive FIFO buffer store the source digital audio data in the memory. These data are read from the memory using the low phase noise, precision FEMTO Clock, located right in the DAC.
This technology is close to the perfection, especially so with the local FEMTO Clock. The jitter is so small that it can be neglected.

3.2 PROPRIETARY, STATE-OF-THE-ART USB INTERFACE
The ARES is equipped with the proprietary USB Audio Solution, powered by STM32F446 Advanced AMR Based MCU. DENAFRIPS redesigned and optimized circuitry, allow the DAC to be used as high-end DAC with computers / streamers. It supports 24bit/1536kHz PCM data stream, and native decoding of DSD up to DSD1024. It comes with licensed THESYCON USB Driver for Windows Platform.
NOTE: The USB Module is designed to trigger on only when USB Input is selected. This is intended design to reduce digital input interfaces cross- interference for best sound reproduction. *High res support may vary depending on system compatibility.

3.3 PROPRIETARY SPDIF DIGITAL AUDIO RECEIVER
The SPDIF Coaxial, Optical, input support up to 24bit/192kHz digital audio format. The ARES abandon the use of Digital Audio Receiver chip. The digital data is decoded by the on-board FPGA (Field Programmable Gate Array), signal path is shortened and eliminated the undesirable coloration.

3.4 NOS/OS
The ARES allow the user to change the sampling mode on the fly.
NOS, as the name suggested, does not over-sampling to digital input data.
In OS mode, the PCM 44.1kHz or 48kHz based audio data are up-sampled to the maximum rate of PCM1411.2 or PCM1536. There is no up-sampling of DSD audio signal.

3.5 PROPRIETARY R-2R AND DSD DECODING ARCHITECTURE
The ARES is equipped with 24Bit R-2R DAC to decode PCM data stream and 32 steps FIR analogue filters hardware decoder to decode DSD data stream. These designs guaranteed the PCM format can be perfectly decoded, at the same time, the DSD format can be perfectly decoded as well. It is rare in the currently market that a R-2R DAC can hardware decode both the PCM and DSD formats.

3.6 DAC ARCHITECTURE

DIGITAL SIGNAL PROCESSING – All digital input data are stored in the on- board FPGA highspeed RAM.
FEMTO CLOCK – These data are read from the memory using the low phase noise, accurate FEMTO Clock, located right in the DAC. The processed data are sent to the final stage Discrete R-2R for DA conversion.
R-2R LADDER NETWORK – The data bits are converted to analogue signal by the true balanced R-2R ladder network arrays. The linearity of the conversion is guaranteed by the high-precision thin film resistors, with low thermal effect temperature coefficient of the low 10/15ppm.

OPERATING INSTRUCTION

4.1 Quick Start Guide
The Ares II is easy to use. Nonetheless, please read this section to fully understand the functions and features available.

Description:

1. Standby Button
   Press the button once to switch on the DAC, vice versa, press once to switch the DAC into standby mode.

2. Standby LED
   The Standby LED shall be on when the DAC is in Standby Mode. The LED shall be dimmed when the DAC is in Operating Mode.

3. Input Selection: USB
   Press the button to select USB as current input source. The respective LED shall be on.

4. Input Selection: COAXIAL 1
   Press the button to select COAXIAL 1 as current input source. The respective LED shall be on.

5. Input Selection: COAXIAL 2
   Press the button to select COAXIAL 2 as current input source. The respective LED shall be on.

6. Input Selection: OPTICAL 1
   Press the button to select OPTICAL 1 as current input source. The respective LED shall be on.

7. Input Selection: OPTICAL 2
   Press the button to select OPTICAL 2 as current input source. The respective LED shall be on.

8. Phase Button
   Press the button to toggle Phase Output. Phase LED On: Negative Phase, Phase LED Off: Positive Phase

9. Mute Button
   Press the button to enable/disable Mute. When mute, the Mute LED will be blinking 1s in interval.

10. Digital Audio Signal Input Sampling Rate
    The following table illustrate the Input Sampling Rate LED status.

Parameter Settings:
NOS/OS Selection:

1. Press the Mute button once to enter configuration mode

2. Press the OPT1 momentarily
   • OPT1 LED On = NOS
   • OPT1 LED Off = OS

3. Wait for 5s

4. Ares II back in operational mode

Filter Selection (Effective in OS Only):

1. Press the Mute button once to enter configuration mode

2. Press the OPT2 momentarily
   • OPT2 LED On = Slow Filter
   • OPT2 Off = Sharp Filter

3. Wait for 5s

4. Ares II back in operational mode

Video Guide:
https://www.denafrips.com/config-ARES

Description:

1. AC Power Supply
   CAUTION! Select the correct AC Power Supply voltage prior supplying the power to the Ares
   II. The voltage selector switch is located underneath the Ares II chassis.

2. Digital Audio Signal Input
   There are 5 inputs, namely, USB, COAX 1, COAX 2, OPT1 and OPT2.

3. Analog Audio Signal Output
   Balanced output via XLR (pin2 hot), singled ended output via RCA. The Ares II is a true balanced DAC, we recommend using balanced output whenever possible. The RCA and XLR output are shared, please use either of the output at a time. It is not recommended to use both RCA and XLR output simultaneously.

NOTE:
The Ares II chassis is connected to the power supply earth.

4.2 USB DRIVER INSTALLATION – WINDOWS OS
USB driver is required for Windows Operating System (Windows 7/8/8.1/10, X86/X64). The USB driver is licensed by THESYCON to provide the highest quality audio playback for Computer Audio System.
NOTE: Mac and Linux OS do not require the USB driver.

Installation Guide:

• Download the driver from the support page: https://www.denafrips.com/support
• Do not connect the USB cable from the computer to the DAC. Remove it before the USB driver installation
• Double click the “DENAFRIPS_UsbAudio_v4.82.0” (or the latest version) to install the USB driver.
• Follow the on-screen instruction to complete the installation

• Restart the computer to complete the installation
• Connect the USB cable to the DAC
• Power on the DAC. Select USB input
• The USB DAC shall be detected. The driver status can be monitored as follows

• Select DENAFRIPS USB DAC as default Windows OS Soundcard

|
---|---
Press Set Default button| Properties of the DENAFRIPS USB DAC
|
Direct-Sound default format| ASIO Buffer Size

Playback software recommendation:

• roon
• JRiver
• Foobar2000
• Sonicstudio Amarra

SPECIFICATIONS

DSD64 – DSD1024 USB Only
Supported Format (PCM)| 24bit/44.1, 48, 88.2, 96, 176.4, 192 kHz All Input
44.1 – 1536 kHz USB Only
S/N Ratio| 115dB(RCA), 114dB(XLR)
Dynamic Range| >119dB(RCA), >120dB(XLR)
Stereo Crosstalk| ≤-124dB(RCA), ≤130dB(XLR)
Dimension| 215 230 45 mm
Weight| 3.5kg

WARRANTY

DENAFRIPS ARES purchased from the Authorized Distributor comes with 36 months of warranty from the date of purchase / delivery (whichever later).

the return shipping fee.
Within Warranty Period| Customer to bear both way shipping fee. DENAFRIPS to repair at free of charge.
Out of Warranty| Customer to bear both way shipping cost. DENAFRIPS to provide repair / maintenance services at cost.

© DENAFRIPS CO. LTD. & VINSHINE AUDIO PTE. LTD. (SINGAPORE)
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

V1.1
16th May 2021

References

• SUPPORT | Denafrips

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