Auris Audio Euterpe

According to the Greek Mythology, Euterpe was one of the nine Muses the Goddess of music an a "giver of delight," and that's exactly what Auris Audio Euterpe will bring to the audiophile community, more happiness!

Our Take

The Euterpe offers a bespoke exterior with the DAC and amp innards sandwiched between two pieces of solid wood. All of this sits on a beveled metal base. On any desk, the Euterpe looks classy, dignified, and inviting. Euterpe can work with its own integrated DAC, or you can connect it with another DAC. Also, its pre-out function can be used in case you want to connect it to a smaller system at your home. It’s the kind of equipment you just can’t wait to fiddle around with. The tubes are aligned centrally at the top of the matte black aluminum housing with good separation between the top and sides of the wooden enclosure. They seem well protected from bumps, knocks and accidental finger touching.

ESS Sabre DAC and Ultralinear Tube Amplification

Euterpes internal USB DAC can interact with many modern sources. OTG input capability has some baseline specifics, including a decoding capability of up to DSD128, PCM max 32bit/384kHz. An XMOS USB DAC and ESS Sabre chipset represent the brain of Euterpe. The DAC quality is impressive, with beautiful details captured.

Euterpe is a single-ended headphone amplifier with unbalanced circuit design, so there are no balanced inputs or outputs. The lineup of tubes is classic Auris, with the use of two 7-pin Ei PL95 tubes, which are the equivalent to 6DL5, and a single ECC81 input tube, also known like 12AT7 (running in Ultra-Linear mode). The output power is just a shade lower at 0.9W into a 32Ω load. The magic of Euterpe is really when it is connected to a high-end DAC which tells you a lot about how good that amp can be inside that beautifully crafted wooden enclosure.

To make your headphones sound their best, Euterpe has an output impedance switch marked with L/H (low/high) The inference here is a wider range and simpler switching design at 32-80 Ohm and anything greater than 150 Ohm. With the majority of planar headphones, they tend to rate less than 80 Ohm and are more impedance agnostic than dynamic headphones. You'll need to have that switch set to low or L, for headphones that are rated higher than 150 Ohms you'll want to set it to H. When using Euterpe as a Pre-Amp you will also want the output impedance set to high.

High Quality Top of the Line Design

The Euterpe comes with the technology one would expect from a Auris Audio amplifier:

• Euterpe features an XMOS chip that handles USP input duties, a Sabre ES9018 chip handles the conversion duties, a 12AT7 tube that handles pre-amp functions, with a Mundorf capacitor in line between the preamp and power tubes.
• The supplied power tubes are NOS (new old stock), branded Ei and stamped Yugoslavia: A single ECC81, dual-triode tube serves as the Euterpe’s input stage, while a separate PL95 pentode power tube is provided for each channel; these feed the output transformers. A selector set allows you to use the PL95s, as EL95s with a lower voltage.
• The external regulated linear power supply, with a switchable 115/230 VAC capable output, and will keep noise to the minimum. It has a captive 1m locking pin cable that connects to the amp, and a 15-amp IEC connector for a standard grounded AC power cord.

Bespoke Headphone Stand

The possibility to be used like a headphone stand makes Euterpe utilitarian piece of high-end hardware. Your headphones fit right on top, with a shallow saddle cut into the wood, to keep the cans in place. It can take a full-size headphone without any risk of of heat damage.