Smartphone-savvy portable DACs like the Award-winning Cyrus soundkey (£100), Chord’s equally Award-winning Mojo (£400) and AudioQuest's just-as-Award-winning DragonFly Red (£170) may be the exceptions rather than the rule, but they’re proving convenience and good sound quality need not be mutually exclusive.
Now Mytek Digital – first and foremost a New York-based purveyor of professional recording studio equipment – is increasing its recent foray into the DAC/headphone amplifier consumer market with a similarly affordable and portable device.
The Mytek Clef is a 105g, pocket-size DAC/headphone amplifier designed to be the middleman between your device (a smartphone, say) and headphones.
The Clef can handle 32bit/384kHz PCM and DSD128 files, has an eight-hour battery life and, Mytek claims, can output more than double the volume of an iPhone.
Clef, which sports a piano black finish, will be available next month for €247 from
www.clefmusic.com.