The ALLO Audio music steamer - Pic heavy review

[Cycleallday]

Hi everyone. I'm new here so please bear with me.

I have both the iqa dac+ and now the allo kali piano 2.1 combo. Both are on rpi3.

To be honest I liked both from an SQ point of view. Psycho-acoustically, I think the Kali relocker makes me think it sounds better. Unless I do an AB comparison to the iqa within a short time frame for switching between units, (auditory memory is extremely short lived) it would be almost impossible for me to tell the difference.

However in terms of aesthetics, fit and finish from a product standpoint, the iqa takes the cake. It comes across as a polished product when purchased in a bundle with the beautifully articulated smoked case. This is where allo could improve as the available casings are just too utilitarian.

That being said, my mind (not necessarily my ears) thinks the Kali piano combo sounds better so it's here to stay. Jazz sounds absolutely amazing.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I would agree with you on the difficulty between telling the TI based DACs sound quality apart unless in an AB comparison.

I have not noticed the delay with the Kali but strongly agree that it makes a (positive) big difference to the Piano combo. Ironically their new DAC should sound worse than the Kali combo as the whole idea of re-clocking is to improve the sound. A dedicated re-clocker board should really improve on an on board integrated clock chip as on the new DAC.

My main concern with the Allo range is similar to your comment on design. They seem to have paid little attention to erganomics and functionality with cables coming out all sides. It would be far better if cable in/out sockets were kept in line with the Pi. Their boards are generally a smaller footprint to the Pi board so there is space for a better design. Better/stronger RCA sockets would also greatly help as the current ones do seem to twist a bit.

My other concern over Allo generally is their support site is quite poor compared to other popular suppliers. Responses seem to indicate little knowledge of good customer support via provision of quick useful responses. It all seems totally dependent on Andre - who does an excellent job of promotion.

I am not being negative to Allo - I like their products but so far comments in this post have been almost totally on SQ and build, support and usability are also high on my list of measures on product quality.

Mel