Sony HAP-Z1ES Hi-Res Music Player RMAF 2013

Upsampling all PCM to double speed DSD is what Meitner and Playback Design do. With mods this might be killer. I am thinking I might work up serious mods on this baby.

I have seen pics of the inside of the Sony and it is going to be easy to do some serious mods on the player. Most importantly, I can remove all the output stages (op amp based) and replace them with my discrete fet I-V stages. Other mods can be done to the power supplies and clocking. The output stages are ready to install now. I would say around $500 for balanced output stages and a few other simple mods. Cannot wait to mod one. Should be killer modded.

The S1 and the Z1 are for different people. The S1 has a built in power amp and more features but does not have the ES tweakiness (therefore better sound via line out). The Z1 is for those audiophiles that have a serious system and already have a great amp and or preamp/amp combo. The build quality of the Z1 is much better. Two serious transformers....dual mono 32 bit DACs, better output stages, better and more regulators, parts, etc. (all just for the DAC....not sharing power with an amp). You can see pics of the inside on the internet.

Imagine a company selling a $1000 integrated amp and then also has a $2000 preamp and a $2000 power amp.....You would hope the $4000 separates would sound better. This is what Sony is offering. They have a $2000 integrated amp that is the companion to the Z1.

Since there is room in the Z1 for mods then a modded Z1 could be really seriously great. Again, a different price point and different users.

I will have mods that optionally can include a remote control volume. Looks like this: discrete I-V converter for each phase (no op amps) then a shunt volume control between phases and then zero feedback jfet buffers on all 4 phases (for full balanced or unbalanced use).

Yes, the Hap-Z1es is fully balanced. However, it inverts phase....pins 2 and 3 are backwards to the American standard. The unbalanced is inverted too. Sony is said to be addressing this issue in a software upgrade soon.

The balanced outs have a different op amp in them and different coupling caps with no bypass caps. The unbalanced outs have better Burr-brown op amps and different caps with small bypass caps. I would think the unbalanced might sound better. Never listened to balanced as I use the unit unbalanced and modified.

My modified units have the phase correct on all outputs.