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The Asus Xonar U7 Echelon Edition ships in a compact camouflage style box with the name clearly marked, alongside an image of the product itself.
You can't fault ASUS for presentation. The gatefold style box opens up to display the Xonar U7 behind a plastic protective cover. Asus are keen to highlight the functionality of the ‘Sonic Radar' software suite.
Inside the box are the supplied accessories – which include:
- S/PDIF adapter x 1
- USB cable x 1
- Driver CD x 1
- User manual x 1
The Xonar U7 Echelon Edition measures 130 x 80 x 25 mm (LxWxH). We do like the finish, as it does not attract fingerprints and ensures that the unit looks clean at all times. You can not say this about the non ‘Echelon' version.
One side of the unit has ports for 7.1 audio, alongside RCA line level output connectors for an external preamplifier or amplifier. Next to these are the USB and dual coax/optical S/PDIF connectors.
The other side of the Xonar U7 Echelon has a headphone connector (driven by the dedicated DAC), and next to this is a microphone connector. If you have higher grade headphones with a 6.3mm connector, then be prepared to use a 6.3mm to 3.5mm adapter. There is also a black up/down volume switch beside the audio output connectors.
Underneath the unit, almost hidden from view, is a USB 1.0/ USB 2.0 Switch. Asus recommend using the switch in USB 2.0 mode when installing the drivers. Asus say ‘Use USB Audio 1.0 for plug and play. Use USB 2.0 on an Apple system'. Asus also add that in USB 1.0 mode the audio sample rate will be limited to 44.1Khz/48KHz @ 16 bit. We set the switch in USB 2.0 for the duration of this review.
Along the top of the unit, is a volume control which works on both OSX and Windows systems (we checked). If you click this, it will switch output between speakers and headphones.
Wow I love those headphones, seriously impressive stuff. Nice review too, good value from ASUS< which you certainly can't always say.
Its a great little device, seems amazing value for money, just ordered one from Amazon. Also kudos on teh headphones, I always wanted the grado 315i’s but this is just porn.
Well this is a good idea, the plain black version was a fingerprint magnet, i had it, until my brother nicked it for his new flat. I might pick this up, as I missed it for my 598s Sennheisers.
Those grados are massively overpriced, ive heard them – incredible bass and overall quality, but the price is ludicrous.
Interesting review.
I am sure it is a solid product and for 80pound it sounds great for some use cases (especially paired with a gaming laptop!)
I have to say, I am very sceptical of the subjective testing for quality though. I am lead to believe that non-double-blind audio testing is massively tainted by confirmation bias.
Not to mention seeing an article breaking down 16bit vs 24bit audio claiming double blind testing lead to a near 50/50 successful determination rate (implying subjects simply guessed).
I mean, I know people who swear on their life that when they swapped their $20 HDMI 1.4 cable for a $150 HDMI 1.4 cable “the picture got so much better, more lifelike and the colours really popped”! Hard not to believe that kind of bias wouldn’t occur when swapping from onboard to 80pound external then 1000+pound enthusiast gear.
So did you connect the Gardo directly to the headphone jack of the U7, without any external amplification?
Having suffered with this infuriating piece of garbage for 2 months I feel its time has come and ebay will be getting a listing. Using windows 7, the software has the following major flaws:
1. As pointed out in the review, you have to change the date on your machine to 2013 to get the software to install to start with – very clever Asus.
2. I play Guild Wars 2. The only way I can get a decent sound out of this heap of !@#% it to set it on Dolby surround playback or I just get a thin stereo 2 channel. OK but it doesn’t consistently keep its settings so half the time when I launch the game I have to go back to launch the echelon soe and spend ten minutes trying to get the sound back on my speakers. The sound through my speakers or ROG Vulcans when using headphones is no better than the onboard sound I was getting before so overall a big waste of time and money.
Nice writing review