Wadia is a digital high-end specialist, and has long built some of the chunkiest and best-sounding disc players around. The 581i se maintains that tradition. It’s bigger and heavier than most power amps, weighing 25 kg and extending well beyond the shelves on our reference Audiophile base racks. Still, it’s worth accommodating it because this is an astonishing player. Wadia has long believed in bypassing the traditional analogue pre-amp. The 581i has digital volume control and variable gain adjustments to match the partnering power amplifier. Our sample came with the optional digital inputs, so the player can form the heart of a system. Analogue sources have to be converted to digital – Wadia makes converters – and can then be fed into the player. Clever, but it’s Wadia’s own conversion system that makes the 581i different: it’s one that concentrates on getting the timing of the music right, and that’s exactly how the player sounds to us.
Transport:
Modified multi-format drive
Power Supply:
Dual transformers in internal isolation chamber
Decoding Software:
DigiMaster 2.5 with Selectable Upsampling Algorithms and advanced proprietary software based DSD Processing Algorithm that generates bit corrected SACD playback 24 bit resolution
DAC Sample Rate:
1.4112 MHz
Digital Volume Control Range:
50 dB in one-hundred 0.5 dB steps
Maximum Output Voltage:
Can be adjusted via internal switches from 0.3V to 4.25V to match system sensitivity
Output Impedance:
Less than 15 ohms
Analog Outputs:
1 pair balanced (XLR) 1 pair unbalanced (RCA)
Digital Inputs:
1 - USB - The Wadia USB input accepts the following sample rates: 44.1k, 48k and 96k. 1 - AES/EBU (XLR) 1 - SP/DIF (BNC) 1 - Plastic Optical (Toslink)