Project Pre Box S2 Digital Preamplifier

DESCRIPTION

PROJECT PRE BOX S2 DIGITAL PREAMPLIFIER

 

Pre Box S2 Digital - a performance revolution in a small package!

Pre Box S2 Digital marks a new era for ProJects S-series components. For the very first time they are using a dual mono configuration with the highest class D/A converters of ESS Sabre. Their flagship DAC-chip ensures highest class audio in a small and affordable package. This DAC is capable of high resolution audio up to 32bit/768kHz PCM and DSD512! Pre Box S2 Digital is also the very first of our devices to support hardware MQA unfolding. Its also the premiere of their proprietary Optimum transient digital filter and their proprietary clock circuitry design. Digital audio is the art of time, with their new proprietary clock design they have managed jitter rates of unrivalled 100 Femtoseconds, this easily outperforms many renowned and respected audiophile clock generators!

With organic polymer capacitors and thin film miniMELF resistors they were able to create a tiny device that will blow away even much bigger components for a much higher price. With a total of seven digital filters the sound can be shaped precisely to the listeners liking. Pre Box S2 Digital is fully remote controllable, it can also control the playback software of a computer. You can use Play, Pause, Forward and Rewind straight with your Pre Box S2 Digital

Since Pro-Ject felt this unit would mainly be used in USB mode, they also spent a lot of R&D time coming up with a way to reduce all of the noise that is present on a typical computer USB connection. Many components use passive filtering, but Pro-Ject used a special combination of passive and active filtering which brought the noise levels to below -130db. This is a ridiculously low number! All of this translates into great sound with a super low noise floor. When listening to this unit, you never get any trace of background noise

Pro-Ject also spent a lot of time developing the clock used in the Pre Box S2 Digital. While digital audio can be great, jitter is one downside that we see often. If the digital signals are not put back together with the same timing as the original recording, the music seems to lack emotion, no matter how clear it may sound. The Pre Box S2 Digital has one of the lowest jitter rates ever seen, far surpassing some much more expensive units

The Pre Box S2 Digital comes equipped with flagship D/A converters made by ESS Sabre. The cutting-edge ESS9038 dual DAC ensures the highest quality audio performance in a small and affordable package. This DAC is capable of high resolution audio up to an impressive 32-bit, 768 kHz PCM and DSD512. For the very first time ever, Pro-Ject is using a dual mono configuration - youll see that its a completely dual mono design, with each channel of the signal path mirrored

And it's MQA and Roon-ready, too.Its a digital micro preamplifier that can fully unfold MQA files. If you arent familiar with MQA, it stands for Master Quality Audio, and has been gathering momentum over the past year for its ability to deliver very high-resolution audio over streaming. Tidal, for example, is currently offering a growing library of MQA audio files.

The Pre Box S2 Digital won a Best DAC/Headphone Amplifier 2017-2018 Award from EISA, the European Imaging and Sound Association. The Pre Boxs performance is characterised by an admirably clean and unfatigueing top end. With an open and expressive nature, and supreme versatility, the Pre Box S2 Digital sounds bigger and bolder than it looks - making it great affordable hi-fi. The Pro-Ject Pre Box S2 Digital offers digital audio listeners a very high-value DAC/digital preamp at an almost ridiculously low price. Not only does it include a plethora of important features, but it sounds good, has an elegantly designed control surface, and is expandable.

Dual mono construction
High end ESS Sabre ESS9038 dual DAC
Proprietary clock circuity design
Organic polymer capacitors and thin film miniMELF resistors
MQA hardware decoding
DSD64, DSD128, DSD256 & DSD512 (DSD over PCM)
Up to 24bit/192kHz for optical & coax inputs
7 selectable digital filter characteristics
1 proprietary optimum transient digital filter
Headphone output on the front (6.3mm)
Synchronisation of all internal oscillators
Jitter as low as 100 Femtoseconds!
Gold plated four layer PCB
Full alu/metal sandwich casing in silver or black.Variant: Black