WiiM Ultra Music Streamer & Digital Preamp | 3.5″ Touchscreen, Compatible with Google Cast & Alexa, Stream Spotify, Amazon Music, Tidal & More | HDMI ARC, Phono Input & Headphone Output | Space Gray

For my use case, it’s almost perfect.
I highly considered buying one of Wiim’s lower end units on Prime Day, but I’m glad that I went for the Ultra. The screen is fantastic. The unit feels rock solid and looks like a much higher priced piece of equipment. But ultimately, I paid the premium for the Ultra to get the USB audio output, which I consider to be superior to COAX or Optical. Sound quality out of this output last night into my DAC and headphone amp proved to be right on par with what was coming out of my MacBook. And now I don’t have to have a laptop sitting on my lap to flip through tracks. I can just use my iPhone like a remote control and use Tidal Connect to control Tidal on the Wiim.There has been quite a bit of buzz this week about the Ultra not including Apple Airplay. As a lifelong Apple fanboy, this should bother me. But it doesn’t. I have an AppleTV that handles my Airplay needs just fine…and Airplay really takes a hit to your audio quality.So who is this product for? I think it’s perfect for a guy like me. I consider myself a budget audiophile with a decent headphone listening setup. I’m not going to spend $900 on the EverSolo or even $600 on the Bluesound. But I’ll spend $329. I think this unit is worth that price. It may be a tad lower than it could be.And if I ever get tired of my Ultra in this use, I’ll gladly move it into my home theater and utilize the excellent internal DAC for music streaming purposes to my main system. The things it does well, it does exceptionally well at this price point.Who is this product NOT for? As good as it is, it doesn’t do everything. As much as Wiim really wanted to call this unit a replacement for a preamp in a main system, I don’t see it. Despite its inputs, it just would never be enough to replace my full featured home theater receiver. Maybe you have lesser needs than I do. It would probably do okay utilizing the HDMI ARC and a small external power amp and pair of speakers. But I’d never really do this. I just think you’d be better served stepping up to a decent entry-level Onkyo or Denon receiver. And if I was looking for streaming for a really small secondary system, I’d absolutely just buy the Mini.If Airplay is your breaking point, then you are already voluntarily sacrificing sound quality. You may as well either look at one of Wiim’s lower offerings or just consider using an AppleTV run to your television and the HDMI ARC back to the Wiim Ultra. (I do love my AppleTV.)If I were still using Apple Music, I’d be hosed by the entire Apple closed ecosystem anyway. Which is why I switched to Tidal. Apple doesn’t play nice with others, and doesn’t seem care so much about sound quality. I am very happy with Tidal and the Tidal Connect functionality in the Wiim Ultra works flawlessly for me.So is this a perfect product? No. It’s five-star product for my specific use case. If your use case is different, it may not be a one-star product. But if you are looking for a way to get a high quality digital stream from one of the services that the Wiim covers, it works exceptionally well. I could have likely lived without the USB and just spent $89 for the Mini. The delta in quality isn’t big. But I did take looks/aesthetics into consideration. Would I have paid $500 more just for that? No. But $230 more for a screen, beautiful casework, and USB and Coax digital ports? I’m not disappointed with my choice.

Perfection
This thing is perfect.It has everything I want in a device like this, it’s built well and it just works.It was super simple to set up, it sounds great and it works flawlessly.I have a streaming device in my living room that costs literally ten times as much and have had nothing but issues with it.For this price point, I can’t say enough good things about this product. I am very impressed.Update:After more use, I actually do have a couple of small negatives to point out, but they are really just nitpicky and don’t take away from the overall benefit of this product.First is the auto-dimming feature on the screen is still very, very bright at night, so it’s really not usable. I wish I could leave the clock on when I’m not using the device, but it lights up the entire room on the lowest setting.Secondly, the headphone output on this thing sounds like hot garbage. If you are getting this product with the intention of using it with wired headphones, this is really the only glaring issue that could be a dealbreaker.

Know what this is and is not.
I bought this piece, reviewed it on my website and YT. I raved about it for a few reasons.1. Its price is very good for what it offers. Most all in ones within the audio world are priced into the thousands, with some in the 20k+ range. Things that do the same thing (though much better build and refinement and sound) as the Ultra. At $300 it’s a steal for those who do not want to spend thousands. For those who are not ultra picky audiophiles.2. It’s cheap in build. My COAX jack pushed in after changing cables three times. This is not some tank like build of the big brands, and feels hollow. Even so, when set up correctly it sounds 80% as good as those big mega brands in what it does (stream/DAC).3. The streamer here is great and handles all formats easily. The screen is icing on the cake at this price level.4. As a preamp it is good but nothing close to dedicated audio preamps that sell for thousands.5. As a DAC it competes with $300 DAC’s easily. It’s a bit warm,. full, and with gentle details vs analytical details.6. Easy set up. Turn it on, hook to ethernet or wifi, follow instructions and away you go. If you want to use an amp with it, it will work with ANY amp that has RCA inputs. Tale the pre out into the amp and you are all set.This is a piece meant to be added to an integrated amp or power amp. It’s not meant to work with the Wii amp as that would be doubling up on everything. I tested it with lower cost amps and audiophile amps up top $11k.Worked fantastic, sounded good and looks great. I had no bugs in operation. Is it as good as my $5200 streamer and $5k DAC? No way! But in al honesty, in regards to sound, it’s 80% there.Diminishing Returns is a thing in audio. As we spend more we gain small improvements or changes, and then are all just changes. This Ultra is PERFECT for someone starting to get into streaming with a modest low to mid fi system. I know of nothing better.

The Ultra has worked flawlessly for me during very heavy use since purchase. The setup was extremely simple. The sound is fantastic; (as with my WiiM Mini, I opted to use the “Fixed Volume Output). The room correction is a huge plus in a large space with 8 foot ceilings on one side going up to 26 feet on the other side and one speaker facing an open space and the other a wall. The phono pre sounds wonderful and the plug for the phone grounding was very helpful. I am using a Pioneer Elite DVD player for CD playback using the optical in of the Ultra. For me, it would have also been nice to have a coax input on the Ultra but this streamer is a highly functional piece of kit and an amazing deal at this price point.

Przyzwoity streamer. Działa bardzo stabilnie, nie zrywa połączeń.Jakość dźwięku wyśmienita. Pilot minimalistyczny, ale jest wygodny i ma to co potrzeba.Jakość wykonania urządzenia – ponadprzeciętna.Nigdzie nie znalazłem o tym informacji, ale na duży Plus zasługuje wg. mnie możliwość obsługi za pomocą przeglądarki internetowej przy pomocy Logitech Media Server. Aplikacja iPeng na iPhone również działa bez zarzutu.Na minus jedynie – odczucie podczas kręcenia gałką głośności…. tu ewidentnie coś poszło nie tak…. jakby coś obcierało.Tak czy siak polecam (zwłaszcza jako alternatywa dla Squeezebox’a)