PrismSound Callia DAC Preview

See the complete review of the Prism Sound Callia DAC

PrismSound is a UK based digital audio manufacturer known best for their professional recording hardware used in recording studios around the world.

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Their products include digital recorders, editing workstations, test and measurement equipment and, most relevant for this review, multi-channel DACs and ADCs. Their modular ADA-8XR multichannel AD/DA converter unit is a benchmark for high quality ADCs and DACs in the recording industry. PrismSound has recently turned their pro audio skills to the consumer high end market with the new Callia DAC. This DAC takes advantage of PrismSound’s engineering capabilities to put a lot of that pro audio technology into a consumer DAC. The Callia offers 24 bit PCM at up to 384 kHz sampling rate (32 bit for the USB input), plus DSD up to DSD128. All inputs take advantage of PrismSound’s CleverClox hybrid PLL clocking circuitry with very low jitter, better than 50 ppm. The analog signal path is fully balanced, with a defeatable volume control for the preamp outputs in addition to a high quality headphone amplifier with a real analog volume control.

Everything about the Callia, from the engineering and build quality to the features offered says “professional,” without any audiophile silliness. My initial testing shows that the sound quality is excellent, though. A full review expounding on how excellent, will appear here soon.

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See the complete review of the Prism Sound Callia DAC

Chris Groppi

Chris Groppi is a radio astronomer and electrical engineer working as an assistant professor at Arizona State University. He received his Bachelor's degree in astronomy from Cornell University in 1997, and his Ph.D. in astronomy with a concentration in electrical engineering from the University of Arizona in 2003. He studies how stars and planets form, and designs and builds millimeter-wave and terahertz receivers for radio telescopes. He became interested in HiFi during high school the first time he listened to a real high-end system (B&W 801s with Mark Levinson electronics). His first system in college was a Headroom headphone amplifier powering Sennheiser HD 580s, and graduated to a real HiFi system in graduate school. His first love has always been 2-channel audio, although his current system has added home theater capability.