Resonessence Labs tease Veritas DAC, streamer at RMAF 2015

Meanwhile up on the tenth floor of the Marriott Tower…

Desktop speakers aren’t only good for office-like destinations; they’re also well suited to small, less accommodating listening spaces. And rooms don’t come less accommodating sonically speaking than those found in your average hotel, so often to host audio shows. Keeping bass resonances and standing waves from ruining the party isn’t easy so Canada’s Resonessence Labs chose Magnepan’s mini-Maggie 2.1 ‘desktop’ system (US$1490), augmented by a second bass panel. To wit, our room host here achieved sensible SPLs via a sensible speaker system choice that lands at a sensible price.

From Magnepan’s website:

“Yes, the Mini Maggie System is essentially a 3.7i in miniature. No, it is NOT a “computer speaker”. (And it wasn’t made in China). The Mini Maggie System is the world’s first full-range dipole speaker system that will sit on (and under) your desk. The Mini Maggie (“satellite”) is essentially a miniaturized version of the 3.7i midrange and tweeter. The bass panel of the miniaturized 3.7i sits under your desk in the foot-well.”

The end result didn’t threaten to strip wallpaper or unsettle the lintel. It sounded A-OK, allowing the loveliness of Resonessence Labs’ power amplifier (still in development) and source components to shine on like crazy diamonds.

The first new rock to emerge from Resonessence Labs’ British Columbia-based R&D mine is the VERITAS DAC, aimed squarely at customers who’d like more than the CONCERO HD/HP but can’t quite stretch their budget to the INVICTA Mirus. It’s a long road between US$850 and US$5000. The Veritas pulls up at US$2850.

As evidenced by empty black and silver chassis on a side table, each VERITAS unit is milled from a single slab of aluminium with internal gaps between digital and analogue chambers minimised and – therefore – electrical isolation maximised. In the hand it feels suitably weighty and solid. As one might expect, the VERITAS’ footprint is a little smaller than the INVICTA Mirus.

Into full demo duty in the mini Maggie rig went a pre-production VERITAS in a limited edition gold chassis. On the inside, a single 9018 Reference chip (and not one of ESS’s low-power drawing variants) takes care of D/A conversion. Out back connectivity looks like this: 125db balanced and 120db single ended outputs, twin coax (but no BNC), toslink, AES/EBU and USB. On the front panel a rotary that works volume in the digital domain sits next to an OLED screen whose specifications remain TBC.

Like the INVICTA Mirus, remote control comes via a slimline, infrared Apple wand and like the CONCERO HD/HP, firmware updates are to arrive over USB a la CONCERO.

The VERITAS will begin shipping sometime in November.

Feeding the Veritas was Resonessence Labs’ as yet unnamed streaming device. Company founder Mark Mallinson explains that the unit on display in Denver is a prototype running with “off the shelf hardware” because “the software side is still in development”. That means it won’t look like it does in the above picture when it comes to market. Full production is reportedly some three months away; at which point the streamer will meet with in-house-designed circuit boards and a fanless custom case. “There’s still some jitter to be done,” says Mallinson. Translation: we can expect further improvements to its sound quality. Not that the whole shebang, from streamer to speaker, sounded anything less than lovely.

Pricing on the streamer is TBA.

Further information: Resonessence Labs