O+I/O #39 arrived on Friday. From the time I received the FedEx email that it had shipped to the time it was in my front door was just three days. I let them acclimate in the flight cases in my front hall over the weekend. Had some helping hands here yesterday to get it in the rack. I plugged it into the mains power and turned on the rear switches. Downloaded the BMS app and the O+I/O showed right up. I was able to set the charge cycle to my preferred timing. Super easy so far.
It's not mandatory but I wanted to let the O+I/O charge overnight before wiring into my system. Enjoying my Extreme for one more day.
This morning, I powered down the Extreme, router and switch. Wired the O+I/O into my system, powered up the router, and waited a few minutes. Powered up the switch, waited a minute. Then powered up the O with its front switch. Restarted my Ipad, signed into Roon, then Quobuz and Tidal. Selected the Olympus as the Roon server and selected the Taiko USB output. I queued up one of my favorite recordings both musically and sonically (Chick Corea - Trilogy - live from 2013, 96/24) and VOILA I was listening to sweet music again! That was super easy!
What was with all the trepidation on my end? I find that I almost go into panic attack mode when my stereo system is down. So, I put on a CD to break the silence when the Extreme was offline, and the O+I/O was being wired. Just the possibility of removing the Extreme from my system and then not being able to get the O+I/O working had me sweating throughout the process. As it turned out the worrying was for no reason. The whole unwiring of the Extreme, rewiring of the O+I/O and O setup process took less than a half hour.
I’m starting out using USB to the DAC. It will take me at least a few days of listening to get a good idea of the difference in sound between the Extreme and O+I/O. Even though it has only been running for about an hour, I can already say there is a significant improvement in definition, imaging, transient response, dynamics and detail. The imaging is much larger in every dimension which tells me that the Dac is receiving even more detailed and accurate information than it was previously. I remember the Extreme improving in sound quality for about a month or so when it was new. So, I expect a similar burn in period for the O+I/O. Once I’ve spent some time listening to the USB output, I’ll give a listen to the I/O XDMI analog out. After reading the comments that others have posted, I’m really looking forward to that!
Fun times ahead for sure!
