PS Audio Bridge: First Impressions

They appear to be in stock at Music Direct- $799.99

http://www.musicdirect.com/product/88056

Hey all, thought I'd share my impressions.

In terms of sound quality, the Bridge is very noticeably, though not MASSIVELY, better than my other two transports, though they are not so classy (or at least as current) as Edorr's Marantz (I was using a CAL CL2500 DVD player and an Audio Alchemy DDS III with some XLO coax with which I've had good luck in the past; I've been using a computer over USB for so long, my high-end transports have not been upgraded in forever). It also bested my HP laptop over non-audiophile USB by about the same margin.

I did find that the Bridge got substantially better over time, but whether that was because of burn-in or my brain adjusting to the sound I cannot say--I just know it kept improving TOO ME over about 2-3 weeks. So, in terms of relative sound, the bridge was a worthwhile improvement & have a difficult time believing that there is a $800.00 transport out there that can best it.

In terms of absolute sound, I cannot say--I have not had many other high-end front-ends to compare it against and my speakers (pro/active PMC AML-1s) are idiosyncratic enough to make comparisons with past systems difficult/irrelevant. I can say that when I had the original (Red Label) EMM Labs stack and mbl speakers (121) and amps it crushed my current rig, CRUSHED it (people say you cannot compare over time, trust me, the difference is/was not subtle & I certainly can tell you that much!), but whether that is a result of the EMM Labs or the mbl gear, I cannot say. On the other hand, my old rig was about 2.5x as expensive and not half as fun/usable as the PWD/Bridge...

... speaking of, and in terms of usability, I agree with Edorr 100%. Tag-n-Play is awesome and only going to get better. PSA's use of their "cue" is unique, in my experience, and just makes listening so much better, more accessible and more fun. I love it!

Unlike many, I got a NAS that could not work smoother with the Bridge (HP MediaSmart); I did my homework, shopped audio-storage features hard and this paid huge dividends. I am certain that there are other NAS-boxes out there that will work fine, but I cannot more highly recommend the MediaSmart (although, bizarrely, it has many of the necessary file-sharing permissions turned off by default, leading to several hours on the phone with HP support). I am certain that the PSA solution will be even better, but at the rate that PSA is missing product due-dates, who knows when that thing will see the light of day. Until then, I've got terrific functionality in a $500 box w/ 2TB.

Problems/dislikes: there are a few.

(1) If you turn off your iDevice (necessary if for marathon listening sessions esp. if you do not have an iPad, as I do not), about 80% of the time it will default back to itself as the audio player... it does not disconnect from the PWD, it just de-selects it. It is not a minor pain in the ass to re-connect but it gets annoying over time, plus this doesn't happen about 20% of the time, so I do not believe that it HAS to be this way.

(2) Tag-n-Play occasionally shuffles the order of songs w/in a folder/CD (or maybe this is Twonky's fault, I cannot say for sure). Most of the time, I don't mind if things are a bit out of order, but if you are listening to, say, a symphony or a DJ mixing one song into the next, this is a major source of sucking.

(3) Tag-n-Play play lists only support 128 songs, which is really, really stupid. Sure, my All-ABBA-All-the-Time mix will fit under the 128-song limit, but if I want to dump all of my punk-rock into a play-list, hit random and be surprised... it ain't gonna happen. Not by a long shot. Given that EVERY OTHER music player in existence does not suffer from this limitation, this is perhaps the biggest problem.

(4) Album art is a hit-or-miss proposition, mostly hit on the iDevice and mostly miss on the PWD touchscreen. But PSA is promising support for embedded artwork in the future and this is not SUCH a major problem in any case (besides embedding art, per PSA suggestions/instructions, I also have a .jpeg in the album folder labeled "FOLDER," like I said, sometimes this works, sometimes it doesn't with no rhyme or reason that I can figure out).

Otherwise, functionality, up-time, sound-quality, etc. are all there in spades. Despite the few complaints I've made, I consider the PWD/Bridge the best purchase I've made in a very long time.

The PWD/Bridge combo is going to ruin me for analog....