Eight years down the road, such and even slightly improved performance can be found in DragonFly Black for less than half that price. was $249 and it was widely regarded as a great bang for the buck product. The original AudioQuest Dragonfly, also known as V1.0, was the one to start the whole miniaturization of DACs. True enough, this is a typical comparing apples and oranges situation, but I did it anyway for educational purposes. Adding a low noise power supply such as iFi iPower to it takes things even further, offering dynamics and clarity Cobalt simply can’t match. However, switching to a good desktop product such as E30 shows it is capable of extracting even more details and spreading instruments into a wider soundstage. Everything good said about Cobalt in the Sound section still stands, it’s a well-rounded performer, capable of taking on DAC duties in an entry-level system. Topping E30 was here to access Cobalt’s capabilities as a pure DAC when used in room setup, connected to an amplifier. Cobalt is still putting a good fight but now Sparrow is the one taking the lead in terms of micro-details and openness. Things turn upside down when I use Sparrow’s balanced out. On its single-ended out it sounds a bit darker and sweeter, whereas Cobalt is a bit more open and airy, taking a win in my opinion. It also uses Sabre components but provides both single-ended and balanced outputs. Cobalt is just one of those well-rounded performers, and no matter how much I tried, I couldn’t really find a serious complaint about its sonic abilities.ĮarMen Sparrow is one of the new competitors with a very similar form factor and lower price tag. But worry not, play something livelier such as The Prodigy by Luca Stricagnoli, and it will happily sink its teeth into the rhythm. Listening to something like Beautiful Boy by Gillian Welch combines all these traits into a very life-like and intimate experience, filled with atmospheric cues. The soundstage feels wide and the instruments are well-separated. The highest frequencies are crisp and make Cobalt sound open and airy. Because of it, both male and female vocals sound present, rich, and filled with details. The midrange is also praiseworthy as it successfully combines a full-bodied tone with plenty of micro-details. The bassline is weighty but well defined, managing to provide a beefy base to the rest of the spectrum, but also a very good insight into bass notes’ details and texture. Switching to Hifiman HE4xx proved it’s also capable of providing good drive and dynamics to these planars as well. Connected to my CTM CE320 or Kinera Freya it was providing all the power I could ever need. It didn’t take long to realize that Cobalt is indeed a more capable performer than both Black and Red. So far so good, but let’s see how it actually performs. Like the rest of the family, it supports up to 24 bit / 96 kHz PCM files, as well as MQA compressed ones. It was immediately recognized by any PC and phone I connected it to. Lastly, AudioQuest boasts the new microchip PIC32MX274 that supposedly reduces current draw and increases processing speed by 33 % over DragonFlys Black and Red. The headphone amplifier comes from the same company in form of ESS Sabre 960. This one is very popular in desktop products but not often seen in portable ones. The most important upgrade happened on the inside, and the heart of Cobalt is the Sabre ESS ES9038Q2M DAC chip. Honestly, I wouldn’t expect anything less since even the cheapest DF Black is built with high standards. Esthetics is subjective but it looks nice and sturdy. Nice touch that also adds some additional value to the whole package.Ĭobalt itself is a bit more compact than its older siblings. In the box, you’ll find the Dragonfly Cobalt itself, a protective pouch as usual, and one new addition in form of DragonTail USB-C to USB-A adapter designed specifically to fit Cobalt’s esthetics. I’ll be testing those claims and comparing it with some competing products as well, so let us begin. It’s priced at $300 and it is supposed to offer better sonic qualities than its older and more affordable cousins Black and Red. Cobalt is the latest and greatest Dragonfly from AudioQuest.
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