This is a review and detailed measurements of the WiiM Pro Plus streamer, DAC and preamplifier with Bluetooth support. It was sent to me by the company and costs US $219.
While the case is plastic, it still "looks the part" as the Brits would say relative to other more famous brands of streamers. I was pleasantly surprised to see support for analog input:
There is both Toslink in and out and even trigger support (for automation/turning on downstream devices). As usual, you need to download an App to get access to full set of functionality. Upon running said app, I was once again pleasantly surprised in it instantly finding the streamer. It asked me if I wanted to upgrade and I said yes. It took about 6 minutes which was rather long but otherwise worked smoothly.
Note that my version is the "Plus" which has a much more performant DAC and retails for more money as a result.
Upon power cycle I went to my Roon player to see if it sees the device but it did not! I could swear I was told it now had Roon support. Searching online showed that it should be there but nope. Power cycle did nothing. FAQ did nothing. Searching on WiiM site did not inform. Searched again and landed on a thread on Roon forum where it said the *Plus* version is yet to be certified. And that it is the standard WiiM Pro that is already there. What a mess. I put most of the blame on Roon for their slow process here but from WiiM front, I would have liked to see a notation in documentation/app saying support is not there yet.
Fortunately Chromecast is supported which gives the same high resolution, bit-exact streaming as Roon endpoing does so I did my streaming tests with that.
One key feature of this streamer is support for both Graphic and Parametric EQ. Latter is limited to 4 bands but that is good enough to do major good for both speaker/headphone response and even room EQ.
WiiM Pro Plus Measurements
Here is our dashboard with Roon pushing bits over Chromecast protocol to Wiim Pro Plus:
This is excellent performance for the class, easily landing it in the Excellent category of all DACs tested:
Distortion was below threshold of hearing so noise dominated:
There is a broad sequence of tones at very low amplitude are visible in our jitter test:
Levels are below -130 dB though so not remotely audible.
The default filter is provided which is fine by me:
IMD and noise are very good:
Linearity is perfect:
There is however some rise in distortion with decreasing frequency:
Edit: looks like there is an improved version that came out to address this last month. My sample is a few months old.
WiiM Pro Plus Equalization Measurement
You all keep asking me about impact of equalization on performance of products with it. So I decided to turn on EQ but leave the four filters at gain of zero (so frequency response is not changed). Here is Toslink input with EQ defeated:
And now with EQ on:
As you see, it has no impact.
WiiM Pro Plus Analog Input Measurements
Here is the performance with analog in and out:
Predictably, we don't have a high performance implementation as far as distortion. Noise while fluctuating some in the dashboard, was good by itself:
You have selectable sample rate for analog input which is a nice feature. I set it to max (has no impact on above measurements) and got nice, wide bandwidth:
Conclusions
The WiiM Pro Plus is extremely capable streamer with just the right feature set of DAC, EQ and analog input. Plus version nicely ups the performance by a good mile, essentially matching that of our low cost DACs in $100 to $120 range. But then it adds analog input which has no analog in DACs, pun intended. Software shows impressive depth and capability. Other than Roon support not yet being there, I can't critique anything.
I am happy to add WiiM Pro Plus streamer to my recommended list.
------------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
While the case is plastic, it still "looks the part" as the Brits would say relative to other more famous brands of streamers. I was pleasantly surprised to see support for analog input:
There is both Toslink in and out and even trigger support (for automation/turning on downstream devices). As usual, you need to download an App to get access to full set of functionality. Upon running said app, I was once again pleasantly surprised in it instantly finding the streamer. It asked me if I wanted to upgrade and I said yes. It took about 6 minutes which was rather long but otherwise worked smoothly.
Note that my version is the "Plus" which has a much more performant DAC and retails for more money as a result.
Upon power cycle I went to my Roon player to see if it sees the device but it did not! I could swear I was told it now had Roon support. Searching online showed that it should be there but nope. Power cycle did nothing. FAQ did nothing. Searching on WiiM site did not inform. Searched again and landed on a thread on Roon forum where it said the *Plus* version is yet to be certified. And that it is the standard WiiM Pro that is already there. What a mess. I put most of the blame on Roon for their slow process here but from WiiM front, I would have liked to see a notation in documentation/app saying support is not there yet.
Fortunately Chromecast is supported which gives the same high resolution, bit-exact streaming as Roon endpoing does so I did my streaming tests with that.
One key feature of this streamer is support for both Graphic and Parametric EQ. Latter is limited to 4 bands but that is good enough to do major good for both speaker/headphone response and even room EQ.
WiiM Pro Plus Measurements
Here is our dashboard with Roon pushing bits over Chromecast protocol to Wiim Pro Plus:
This is excellent performance for the class, easily landing it in the Excellent category of all DACs tested:
Distortion was below threshold of hearing so noise dominated:
There is a broad sequence of tones at very low amplitude are visible in our jitter test:
Levels are below -130 dB though so not remotely audible.
The default filter is provided which is fine by me:
IMD and noise are very good:
Linearity is perfect:
There is however some rise in distortion with decreasing frequency:
Edit: looks like there is an improved version that came out to address this last month. My sample is a few months old.
WiiM Pro Plus Equalization Measurement
You all keep asking me about impact of equalization on performance of products with it. So I decided to turn on EQ but leave the four filters at gain of zero (so frequency response is not changed). Here is Toslink input with EQ defeated:
And now with EQ on:
As you see, it has no impact.
WiiM Pro Plus Analog Input Measurements
Here is the performance with analog in and out:
Predictably, we don't have a high performance implementation as far as distortion. Noise while fluctuating some in the dashboard, was good by itself:
You have selectable sample rate for analog input which is a nice feature. I set it to max (has no impact on above measurements) and got nice, wide bandwidth:
Conclusions
The WiiM Pro Plus is extremely capable streamer with just the right feature set of DAC, EQ and analog input. Plus version nicely ups the performance by a good mile, essentially matching that of our low cost DACs in $100 to $120 range. But then it adds analog input which has no analog in DACs, pun intended. Software shows impressive depth and capability. Other than Roon support not yet being there, I can't critique anything.
I am happy to add WiiM Pro Plus streamer to my recommended list.
------------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
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