Innuos PULSE Mini?


any impressions on this unit?

appears to be a solid step into that streamer space above bluesound and the other popular entry level units

 

audiocanada

@j_andrews 

I have had the pulse mini since January, and the zen lspu since February. Came from using heos off a Marantz sr5015. Two different animals, by far one of the best investments to date. Extremely easy setup, even the most luddite of us had no problems. No complaints about the sense app, not as colorful as a spotify app but it's a good workhorse. As you  may have noticed i started out with the mini, and that was a noticable difference. Then got the lspu, and oh boy we was cookin now! If you can, get them both together, if not the double upgrade will be a pleasant event. Good luck in the trigger pulling. 

I am also using the PulseMini and powering it with a Keces P3 LPS.  It is feeding a Denafrips Iris and out via I2S to a Pontus II.  Great digital front end for the money, especially using the Sense App as has been noted all over the forum.  I was using a Roon Nucleus powered by the P3 and running Roon but the Sense app's sound quality through the PulseMini was a major and obvious improvement. 

Thanks for the feedback @tom2441 ​​@gkelly 

Planning to pick one of these up in May after I move a couple of pieces I need to get out of the house.

I think it's a natural step up from something like a Zen Stream or a Node without jumping into the $2750-$3250 territory.

I'm also feeding a Denafrips Iris from my Zen Stream but wasn't really sure if it would be necessary with the Pulse Mini.  @tom2441 Have you tested the setup without the Iris?

I do go out of the Iris coax rather than i2s since I'm using a Border Patrol se-i dac.

I'm planning on purchasing the unit without the Zen mini power supply and upgrading a bit later.  From what I understand, Innuos is releasing a matching LPS for the PulseMini eventually.

@j_andrews I haven't but might be interesting.  For that matter, I haven't tried the PulseMini DAC to compare to the Pontus II.  I'll have to try it both ways one of these days.

Demoing one right now in my home now as a digital front end alternate to my Turntable. My analog rig in total is $10k + in cost, (rega p10 and Umami Red) and while it does some different things digital just can not replicate, this little Pulse is literally 85% of it generally speaking. It has a very organic analogue sound that quite honestly I am shocked by. To me it's a steal at twice the price nevermind $1200. 

Likely the software has something to do with how good it sounds. Software updates, easy, initial hook up was simple as well. To me this is a giant killer.