Sweet high-res streaming
Intuitive touchscreen and app control give the high-performance RS250 streamer an edge.
After a few minutes experimenting with HiFi Rose's RS250 streamer, you may wonder why more streaming components don't have touchscreens.
HiFi Rose's onboard customized Android™ OS gives the premium streamer/DAC/preamplifier a user-friendliness that will feel intuitive to mobile users in general. Audiophiles will appreciate its authoritative but smooth sound. I also love the cool touchscreen features, like the functional virtual back panel for switching inputs and outputs and the virtual VU meters.
Easy control
I grew up playing vinyl, and then CDs. Streaming was a hard sell, but at this point I see it as an amazing — sometimes overwhelming — and necessary asset. App control across the different platforms isn't always intuitive — it's still the main reason my wife rarely opts for streaming music when she's picking out something to play.
The RS250 feels different. It connects to your internet via Ethernet or built-in Wi-Fi. The interface is user-friendly whether you're using its front-panel touchscreen apps and volume/mute knob, or the free RoseConnect Premium app for Apple® and Android devices. It organizes your different sources — from streaming services including TIDAL, Qobuz, and Spotify, to music files stored in one of its onboard options or your NAS server — in a way that feels almost Roon-like. (By the way, this player is also a Roon endpoint.)
You can also use Apple AirPlay® to control the streamer, or the included Bluetooth remote. Free automatic updates make sure it keeps pace with evolving tech and its expanding capabilities.
Quiet noise-floor makes way for nuanced detail
What I really love about the RS250 is that it stays out of your way. It's true of the interface, and especially true in how it treats audio signals, which it delivers in lifelike clarity with a super-quiet noise floor and very low distortion.
It runs on a snappy hexa-core CPU with a high-performance ESS SABRE DAC capable of 32-bit/768kHz resolution. Also key to its impressive sound is its digital clock, which drastically reduces the distorted edges inherent in digital music transmission by aligning the spaces between the data. The RS250's femto clock measures time down to the femtosecond — one quadrillionth of a second — for exceptionally smooth, precise audio.
4K video rabbit hole
Endless video digressions await you, thanks to the RS250's 4K video decoding via its HDMI 2.0 output. The RoseTube app lets you peruse and play YouTube videos that you can watch on the unit's full color screen or — even better — on your TV. And its digital audio inputs let you get beautiful soundtrack audio from whatever you might be watching.
Exceptional build quality and bountiful connections
You'll notice the attention to detail when you handle the RS250. From the rigid aluminum-panel construction to the understated style of its beautiful glass touchscreen display, you can feel that it's built to dampen vibration — and to last. Under the hood, its toroidal transformer and shielded circuitry work to minimize unwanted noise.
On the back panel you have ample digital connections, unbalanced analog output for connection to your amplifier, and an RCA stereo analog input. You could connect a USB drive, HiFi Rose RSA780E CD drive, or another CD player — even a turntable with a phono preamp.
Flexible local storage options
The RS250 has USB connections for local access to external digital music files. And all HiFi Rose models include an internal bay on the bottom panel for adding optional SSD storage. The player will recognize drives up to 4TB, which is much more than you'll probably ever use.
