Test it in the youtube link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmah9iIjNZ0

The sound in the youtube video is only on your left ear, if you got a headset on the right way.

Dirac sensaround ll mode it will fix the audio from left ear to center in your head.
Its like night and day in sound with the Dirac Sensaround ll mode on or off.
It fixes all like it should have been. It is almost funny switching the mode on and off.
It is torture not to have it on in this video

Love the sound quality, the amp is really good and DAC is actually quite reasonable. Listening with good quality headphones or speakers really shows off its quality. It may be a little too analytical for some, but I find it quite neutral and revealing.

I picked this up on a 20% sale, essentially getting it for $400 and... what a deal. I've got other dac/amps that can't touch this, the previous setup was a topping d10 dac and o2 amp (essentially the same price!), the difference was substantial, especially through the balanced output. I will say that I've now become partial to the AKM dacs over the ESS dacs to the point I've changed my home dac to a bi-monaural AKM setup.

I'm a Mac user and listen to Tidal and library FLAC files through Audrivana, upconverting to DSD128, through the balanced output into Senn 58X, Beyer 770/880 and Focal Elex has been a heavenly experience. It pushes the 250ohm Beyers without issue but the open backs really shine. With the 150ohm Senns, I live in the -40db range for casual listening, -30db is powerful, -20db is almost painful. Buy this, use this, ignore the "preview" on ASR. I will say that I almost exclusively use the balanced output now so if you're a SE user, this review might not the most accurate for you. I have used the SE with the Beyers and it worked, but I prefer my open backs.

The only thing I wish this unit did was MQA decoding, love it or hate it, I like it and want a little future proofing. ATTN MONOPRICE: I'll happily pay for a future firmware with MQA decoding. Pass that license cost along to me... happily.

TL;DR: good quality, good build, good sound, good stuff, worth the monies.

i'm just getting into higher end stuff. to date i've been listening using senny HD558's through a topping tp30. i thought that sounded pretty good. but i decided to try this...

if you're running lossy stuff, it sounds really good. its clear, defined, neutral, everything you want. The DIRAC dials down the lower register to keep things airy, but changes the sound signature too much and you end up actually missing parts of the music..

if you're running lossless, this thing will change your world. the first time i started running stuff through it, i had to check to make sure i was playing the album i thought i was. it literally peels off a 1/2" sheet of plywood off your music (well, at least compared to the Topping I was using before). And so far all I've plugged into this are my old senny HD558's. and the DIRAC is brilliant and 90% neutral - it almost makes it seem like the cans are floating beside your head.

my only gripe is that my plan was to also use this as a pre-amp. unfortunately, you have to go through 6 steps on a 1.5" lcd screen using 2 buttons and a dial to toggle between headphone-out and line-out. I've heard there's a way to wire the rear XLR inputs into full-time outputs, but when something sounds this good, why would you not ship it with this functionality?

anyways, that said, i really can't complain. i'm typing this with a set of cans beaming Oneohtrix Point Never and Jon Hopkins into places in my consciousness i didn't know existed until now.

if you've been using HQ DACs, then maybe you wouldn't be as excited as me. But if you need an reason to step up your sonic game, this is it.

Passes the sounds so good to cry test handily. Great build, but wish for in-line power brick. interface a tad wonky but still easy. Wish it graphically labeled the PEQ Q curve but that the PEQ is there at all is a bonus. Everything is effortless and transparent and just naturally mystical on this. it pushed 600Ohm cans to max loudness at -10dB on the dial that goes to +16. Power aplenty too. Extremely versatile unit. Better fw/ui and it'll best 5/5.

I’m loving this little guy. Having used EQ and compression forever, these capabilities are right up my alley, and they work great. Caveat: Without some form of visual guidance, you can screw all of this up quite nicely. But who cares. Tweak away; learn something.Construction, features, functions, and interfaces are just fine as well. You won’t unbox this thing and think it came from Audio Research or any other First Tier manufacturer. It has a bit of a “cottage” feel to it, and I think it’s all the better for it - the R&D went elsewhere. Yay!I’d like to have digital out, of any type. But no. So, I calibrate and use the analog line outs instead, for special purposes.Just pick one up and see if doesn’t hit all the right spots for you - I expect it will. Oh - headphone listening is a splendid experience too!Happy listening!

Excellent, very detailed and very easy of use , after a few usage of getting use to , a bit pricey ,at $700 Canadian with shipping express ,
I used the Sonarworks True-Fi pc full licensed program , with selected headphones , running with this monoprice thx 788 , sounds amazing , very good bass and excellent mids , on my Focal Elear headphone, I also recommend the Creative Super xfi amplifier , if you are looking for a awesome portable amplifier , now with purchase comes with a headphone , it is totally a cool amplifier , major surround sound watching movies on Netflix and music is good ,too !

The AMP is stellar. Absolutely no channel imbalance from mute to sound. Also perfectly silent. The DAC is perfectly fine from what I can tell. I own the JDS labs element and Modi 2, and the Monolith sounds just as good. One thing is that if you’re using this as a DAC only option the RCA output is a pre-out. I found that upping the volume on the unit to 0db works best. The digital screen is nice to look at and tastefully done. My endgame dac/amp. i current output to JDS labs el amp. The unit is not affected by cell phone signal, as no interference can be heard at all). Which is a plus.

Buy it, buy it twice, true balanced internally and amazing clarity.

Build Quality:

The build is great. It has a nice hefty and well put together metal chasis with a great volume knob. The inside board is well laid out and extremely clean. The front has balanced XLR and single ended 1/4 inch headphone jacks. On either side of the volume knob are a menu button and an enter button. These buttons do feel a bit cheap compared to the rest of the unit but are quite usable.

The display is a light blue OLED which displays a lot of information at once.

On the back, there are XLR-inputs, RCA, Coax, Digital Toslink inputs, and RCA outs. No XLR output unfortunately.

UI/Menus:

I found the menus to be quite cumbersome at first. There's a lot here!

First off, the menu and enter buttons are not placed next to each other, so using the menu is a struggle sometimes. But once you get the hang of it, it's not too bad.

The first set of menu items is the built-in Equalizer. You have the option of doing a quick Bass/Treble EQ (Shelf-EQ) or a 5 band parametric EQ that lets you customize very finely. You can pick which frequency, the gain level and the Q-factor. It's quite handy if you know what you're doing!

The second set of menu items is pretty much useless and a waste of space. It's Dynamic Range Compression. Why would any one want to reduce the dynamics of a song? WHY?

The third set is DIRAC, which is a DSP. This new DSP is called Sensasound II by DIRAC, and it works very well for some songs. Basically it manipulates the crossfeed and extends the height and depth of the soundstage while trying to maintain the width, creating a 3D stage in front of the listener. It works very well for songs that do not have heavy bass/beats emphasis. In songs where you want to feel it more than hear the intricacies from your surroundings, you'll lose a lot of richness and fullness to songs.

Finally, the last set of menu items is the Settings, which is where you'll find Line Out option. I wished this was active all the time.

The Enter button, when held down, will activate the Device input. I have the amp connected to my PC via USB and the TEAC PD-301 CD Player using Coax and I constantly use this function to switch devices.

Sound:

I have to say, the THX amp is extremely clean. EXTREMELY clean sounding. Yea. It is as advertised. It sounds transparent, whatever that means. I never feel like anything is overly emphasized and music sounds ultra smooth throughout and is well extended. It will sound a little leaner than other amps, and thats quite evident on those heavier songs, but the detail that is put out on this amp is excellent.

Overall, I'm very happy with this purchase. I do want to make users aware that there were some bad shipments sent out to some users that had a BETA version of the firmware. Luckily, I had v1.01 on my unit and did not have the same issues as what Amir of Audio Science Review experienced. Hopefully, he will be able to get a production unit to test in the future.

Until then, I am happy to report my findings. Great sound. A little clunky UI (at first), and could use a remote. But otherwise, the music speaks for itself.