HiFi Rose is a fairly nondescript magazine, but the South Korean company has made a name for itself at record speed, with music streams that go beyond most we’ve seen.
Take the RS150B, which looks like nothing you’ve seen before. With a 14.9-inch touchscreen across the entire front, it oozes high-tech, and that’s what you’ll find inside, too. An advanced music streamer with 32-bit digital converter with support for DSD, MQA and PCM formats among others. A Femto clock controls the music signal, and a hexa-core Cortex processor is the brains behind everything.
At the back you will find a number of inputs for both digital and analogue audio sources, including an HDMI output for 4K video out to a TV or external monitor. HiFi Rose RS150B can indeed stream video from Rose Tube, which is a TV channel with their own online content, but even more importantly, it supports streaming from all known streaming services. Including Tidal in MQA quality, high-resolution music from Qobuz, and of course Spotify and Apple Music.
Photo HiFi Rose
The large screen can be configured as desired, and can even display McIntosh-style Vu meters if desired. It comes with a Bluetooth remote control for the most used functions, but it is the Rose Connect app that you should use. It works on iOS and Android, and is exemplary clear and easy to use.
The music streamer’s built-in DAC is brilliant and perfect for digital audio sources, and you can stream music from NAS or computers with DLNA to an RS150B. Which also has a USB input for wired streaming from a computer. It even has a free space on the underside for an SSD, if you want to store music, which can be ripped from a CD drive connected via USB.
Sound quality
Setting up an RS150B is very easy. After connecting to the system, simply connect to the network, either wirelessly with the included Wi-Fi dongle, or Ethernet cable. It connects to the network lightning fast, and you have an almost endless number of settings and configurations at your disposal. Selectable digital filters are just some of it, the screen can be configured as you like, and shows album covers and information over the entire screen surface.
It doesn’t take long to learn how to use the player, which is by far the most user-friendly music streamer available right now.
It is also among the clearly most melodious.
The sound image on Jan Gunnar Hoffs Living is reminiscent of the sound image from the Auralic streamer. But here it is a bit narrower and there is not quite the same depth in the piano sound as from Auralic. – Feels like you are being pushed a little further to the back of the hall, but the music flows nicely, some would say musically, comments Geir. It plays much better than if you e.g. had connected a cheap Argon streamer to a good DAC. You definitely hear that you are in the high-end class here.
Exile sounds a little shrunk, not that the sound image is smaller, but the music is more concentrated around the speakers, compared to Auralic which unfolds a wider perspective. The vocals sound a bit drier, and on Sudan Archives Loyal, there is less ‘distance’ in the soundscape between the vocals and the synth. The sound is extremely well controlled and the bass is deliciously tight and weighted. It really lives in the soundscape from the HiFi Rose streamer. The only thing we miss is a little more dynamic contrast and a little more air in the sound image.
Conclusion
There is no doubt that HiFi Rose is a producer we will be hearing more from. The uniquely beautiful RS 150B is the most user-friendly music streamer by a wide margin. This is not only due to the sharp touchscreen, but also a user-friendly app and a clear interface both on mobile and on the device’s screen. It also has a brilliant DAC built-in, and you can connect external hard drives with music, or easily install an SSD for storing music that you get immediate access to on the big screen. The HiFI Rose RS150B is experienced as a cornucopia of smart solutions, and it delivers top-shelf sound quality.
