Special thanks to Andy Kong and Cayin for arranging a timely sample of the new N3 Ultra for review. Your continued support is much appreciated.
Zhuhai Spark Electronic Equipment Co., Ltd., better known by its Hi-Fi brand name Cayin, needs little introduction. The Guangdong-based company is renowned for its high-end tube amplifiers, though in the portable space, Cayin’s name is more synonymous with digital audio players.
In the last few years, the company fused both its primary areas of interest, creating a range of tube-powered DAPs – initially for the higher-end of the market, due to the cost implications of miniaturising tubes – but lately for more mainstream users too.
Cayin’s latest DAP, N3 Ultra, is the culmination of its experience in designing premium portable tube amplifiers, and follows on from its predecessor, N3 Pro, with some important trickle-down technology upgrades from the ultra-flagship, N30 LE. This includes the first use of Cayin’s third-generation ‘Triple Timbre’ amplification circuit in a 3-series player, and also the first ‘balanced’ tube implementation outside the flagships.
There are some cost-cutting caveats, of course, which I’ll discuss later in the review, along with some interesting usability choices, but if you’re looking for a fully-fledged tube-amplified portable player for less than a kilobuck right now, there’s nothing that comes close to N3 Ultra.
Packaging and accessories
If you’re expecting flashy fanfare from an entry-level DAP unboxing you might be disappointed, but I find Cayin’s N3 Ultra presentation more than acceptable.
Inside the solid silk-screened carboard box you’ll find the player nestled in a faux-velvet foam shelf, sitting above a second cavity housing the included smoky TPU case and USB-C to A digital/power cable. There’s also an envelope with a relatively detailed user guide, a tempered-glass screen protector (nice touch), and some Hi-Res Audio stickers for…some reason.
It’s a well-rounded package, especially the die-cut case that fits like a glove and actually improves the look and feel of the otherwise block-cut and very plain-looking chassis. In fact, I prefer the TPU case over the optional leather case that Cayin sent me, even though the leather case is pretty in blue and has a specially-cut metal panel on the back for venting.
With a glass back-and-front, you’ll want to protect those scratch-prone surfaces. Thankfully a plastic protector comes pre-applied on the back, and the glass protector is really easy to install on the screen. Useful tip: place the player inside the plastic case first, which creates a perfectly-sized frame for the glass screen protector, making installation really easy.
Design and build
If you’re familiar with N3 Pro you’ll be right at home with N3 Ultra’s design. It’s basically the same, just thicker, slightly taller, and a fraction heavier (204g vs N3 Pro’s 195g). In other words, it’s small enough to be pocketable, but won’t be quite as slim as your smartphone. The rectangular, CNC-aluminium frame is easy to hold in one hand, and feels very solid, even if it looks a bit a plain and boxy.
The entire front surface of the player is made of glass, although the 4.1” 720P IPS touch screen only takes up the top two-thirds. Below the screen is an illuminated ‘home disc’ for navigation, that also changes colour depending on bitrate and charge state. If you’re not a fan of the bright LED glow, this can be turned off in settings, though this makes using the disc problematic in the dark.
You’ll find the main controls on the right-hand side: a volume wheel and three playback buttons beneath it. These are accented in a pale gold colour, which looks classy rather than blingy, although there’s no intricate detailing on these buttons like you’ll find on the higher-end players. Unlike N3 Pro, there’s now a dedicated power on-off (and screen lock) button up top, and the latest firmware adds useful touch to wake functionality too.
The output ports are all at the bottom: USB-C, 3.5mm single-ended headphone out, 3.5mm line out, and 4.4mm balanced headphone/line out (shared and switchable). USB can be used for both charging the player, and connecting it to other devices as a USB DAC. You can also attach external OTG storage devices, as long as they are reasonably power efficient, which is useful given N3 Ultra has no internal storage whatsoever.
Finally, on the left, a spring-loaded microSD slot accepts the most common type of storage you’re likely to use, below which sit the two laser-perforated cut-outs of the dual tube array.
Two things I’d like to note here that are important to know. First, this is not a true-balanced tube array (that would require two sets of two tubes), so the balanced output is based on a differential circuit that merely retains the power output benefits of a balanced amplifier.
Second, the glow you see from the ‘tubes’ is not coming from the tubes at all, but rather from small LEDs mounted below each tube. This revelation came as a bit of a shock to me, and I almost felt cheated by the ‘fakery’. Of course, this doesn’t take anything away from the tube character or performance, and understandably the tubes used are too small to emit a proper glow, but as a tube enthusiast I still found it rather disappointing.
Tube tech
N3 Ultra’s faux-glowing heart actually contains two pieces of 1960s-vintage technology: a matched pair of Raytheon JAN6418 NOS (new old stock) vacuum tubes. JAN stands for Joint Military and Navy, which means these tiny tubes were certified for extremely rugged use in demanding military-spec applications. Aside from military equipment, JAN6418s increasingly found themselves in consumer electronics, like early hearing aids and, yes, battery-powered amplifiers.
In theory, these miniature pentodes – one for each channel – work together to virtually eliminate signal distortion, with very large operating voltages in perpetual Class A bias resulting in a cleaner signal than you’re likely to get from far larger and more expensive solid-state amplifiers.
These are not your dad’s large, glowing tubes that infuse music with second-order harmonic distortions that sound pleasant but measure horribly. No, these Raytheon relics sync with the ultra-clean AKM AK4493SEQ DACs, deployed here in dual mono configuration, to deliver some of the cleanest sounding tube audio you’re likely to hear this far from flagship.
But that’s not all. Cayin has implemented its third-generation tube design with what it calls Triple Timbre output: three different flavours for different preferences, applications, and upstream equipment.
Along with pure solid state output (yes, you can bypass the tube section altogether), you get a choice of two tube modes: classic and modern. As the names suggest, classic is closer to the fuller, softer sound you’d imagine comes from big glowing tubes on a desktop, while modern opens up the sound, cleans it up, extends both ends of the spectrum, and returns a faster, snappier presentation.
In lieu of using two matched pairs of tubes, which would make the DAP not only bigger and more complex but also much more expensive to make, Cayin found a workaround for delivering balanced power output by converting a differential signal to quadruple the power of the single-ended output. Don’t ask me how this works, just know that it does.
The result is a very commendable 600mW of balanced power into 32 ohms in both tube and solid state modes. This is a drop of around 200mW from the N3 Pro, but given the improvements elsewhere in the chain, the net result is cleaner power at higher output. Single-ended output tops out at 250mW into 32 ohms, which is still more than enough for all but harder-to-drive IEMs.
Another departure from the N3 Pro is the new discrete analogue volume controller (4-channel JRC NJW1195A), placed after the tube output in the signal chain, which preserves the output character of the tubes without killing dynamics and compromising quality.
Cayin also completely reworked the shock absorption case that holds the tube system in place. Because pentode tubes are prone to interference from knocks and motion, a specially-made silicone-infused suspension chamber was needed to keep any ringing artefacts away from your ears when the DAP is moved around. The result is far less impact-induced noise, all but eliminating the ringing that plagued N3 Pro and earlier tube designs.
Taking all the incremental changes to the tube system into account, N3 Ultra makes full use of Cayin’s tube amplifier expertise, with many of the concepts developed for its high-end products adapted for the ‘masses’. While tube amplification is still relatively new and niche in the context of portable audio, that we’re starting to see these products go mainstream can only be good for the advancement of the industry in my opinion.
Continue to tech and specs…
