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“Kensei” is an honorary Japanese title awarded to swordsmen of legendary skill. The word translates to “Saint of the Sword” and is the relentless commitment to being the best that iFi channeled into the masterfully crafted product that is the iFi Kensei.
This is truly a tool for the audiophile, so without getting too deep into the details, we’re going to get a little more technical in this review than usual, with the goal of keeping it accessible.
iFi GO Kensei Bar: Price and Availability
The iFi GO Kensei bar is available at ifi-audio.com, Amazon, and other online retailers like Sweetwater, for $449. Unlike the iFi Gold bar, this is not a limited run and will be available for a while based on comments from an iFi representative on an iFi-sponsored HiFi user forum.
iFi GO Kensei Bar: Build and Fit
Unpacking the Kensei is an experience. It is housed in a beautiful, environmentally friendly carved wooden box. You get two premium braided cables (USB-C, USB-C to Lightning with USB-A adapter) and a leather case. No larger than a USB flash drive, the GO Kensei Bar is made from Japanese stainless steel and is deceptively heavy for its size. Its body has beveled edges and feels premium in every way, although it attracts fingerprints like a magnet. It has the branding beautifully engraved on the bottom of the bar, but the face is where it gets exciting.
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On the front you will find a panel with LEDs that indicate the volume level, audio format, frequency and sound effects. The right side is where you’ll find the volume and settings buttons, as well as the IEMatch switch. The top of the device is where the 3.5mm and 4.4mm headphone outputs are located, and the bottom is where you’ll find the USB-C input, which supports up to 32-bit/384kHz audio.
The Kensei Go bar does get a little hot during use, but it’s not uncomfortable. Although it is dense and has a good weight, stainless steel is a bit soft when it comes to external wear and will show scratches and scuffs.
iFi GO Kensei Bar: Features
The GO Kensei bar uses a 32-bit Cirrus Logic DAC chipset with high resolution true native® playback of music formats from MP3 to DSD256, PCM384 and DXD384. You also get full MQA decoding. The Kensei is packed with high-end capacitors, giving you a clean signal, reducing potential distortion, and having premium noise reduction capabilities. You can read about them in detail here.
The stars of the show are the four digital filters and two analog modes. The modes and their corresponding LEDs are:
Bit-Perfect (Cyan) I ran this with the Sennheiser IE900 IEMs and it was bright, sibilance-free and transparent. This one gives you high-resolution or lossless audio as intended.
The standard (red) seemed “soft”, with warmth to the vocals rather than brightness.
The minimum phase (yellow) is warmer but with tight bass. If you are a basshead, this is the filter for you. Use it with the XBass filter on and the K2HD filter on, and you’ll get punchy bass with no midrange loss or vocal clarity.
Gibbs Transient-Optimized (white) upsamples your audio to 352/384 kHz. I would simply describe this one as “energetic” overall. You will feel it throughout the frequency range.
Kensei contributes greatly to make sure each earphone o IEM you plug in is treated well with its IEMatch switch, which reduces the output for high-sensitivity IEMs like the Campfire Audio Mammoths I played with, and its Turbo mode, which does the opposite and increases the gain by 6 dB to drive power-hungry headphones like the magnetic HiFiMan Planar I used. Not that the Kensei lacks power to drive what you throw at it, with 477mW or 7.2V from the 4.4mm output and 300mW or 8V from the 3.5S balanced output.
Regarding the volume level output, you can control the audio source from the Kensei in sync with the source device or bypass the source device’s audio controls entirely.
The downside to all the incredible power unleashed in your ears is that you’ll experience a decent amount of battery drain from your phones and tablets, since that’s what powers the Kensei through that USB-C port. Your laptops won’t be as noticeable because they have larger batteries and you can easily charge them while listening, but that drain is there. There is no internal battery here like the iFi GO blue.
iFi GO Kensei Bar: Sound Quality
The “Sword Saint” produces audio that is, in a word, “ethereal” but full-bodied. It’s all there. The sound quality of the 3.5mm and 4.4mm ports is simple and beautifully musical.
This transparent DAC/Amp lets you enjoy every nuance of a stereo image. Combine the Kensei with analytical headphones or IEMs and it’s like turning on a spotlight in a large space that was previously illuminated by a small 40-watt bulb. That’s exactly what I experienced when I connected the Sennheieser IE900 IEMs to the 4.4mm balanced output with the digital bit-perfect filter.
Listening to “Violin Duel” from the Chevalier soundtrack was enlightening. You could hear artifacts and nuances that I had previously missed. The tension of the bow against the violin strings. The attack on the chord changes, whereas before I really only heard the attack in different movements. The same was true for Beyonce’s “Texas Hold ‘Em,” where the banjo and guitar plucking, still layered toward the back, was richly detailed.
When it comes to bass and sub-bass, transparency really shows how a track was designed. The IE900 isn’t a bass-heavy IEM, but its 7mm dynamic drivers can powerfully reproduce deep, dark bass via PEQ or digital filter tuning, as was the case with iFi’s XBass filter enabled. Skrillex’s “Mumbai Power” and “Start A Riot” from the Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse soundtrack growled and rumbled with enough authority and aggression to make me “stink face” as I bobbed my head to that nasty bass and sub-bass. That led me into the trap of testing a dozen hip-hop tracks with this IEM/DAC filter combo.
The important thing here is that the digital filters I mentioned in the features section can make your music sound even better depending on which IEM or headphones you have paired with the Kensei. For example, I used the $120 1MORE Penta Driver IEMs, which don’t have anywhere near the level of transparency of the IE900, but with the K2HD, XBass, and
iFi GO Kensei Bar: Competition
The GO Kensei Bar is unique in that it looks more like a collector’s edition DAC, with its ornate case, accessories, and fit and finish. However, in this price range, there are competitors with several feature offerings. Fiio makes excellent products and the Q15 may better suit some people’s listening habits as it has a built-in IPS display and a Bluetooth SoC, giving you access to high-resolution wireless audio connectivity.
Then there’s the iBasso DC-Elite, which I tried and failed to get hold of for a separate review. It has a feature set that closely resembles the Kensei and a striking design. On paper, he appears to be a worthy contender and is generally considered a solid piece.
iFi GO Kensei Bar: Should You Buy It?
You should buy the iFi GO Kensei bar if…
- You don’t need Bluetooth
- You like DACs with transparent sound
- You don’t want PEQ
You should not buy the iFi GO Kensei bar if…
- Price is a concern
- you need bluetooth
- You want PEQ
The GO Kensie bar is transparent without being harsh or too soft. It pairs perfectly with musical IEMs, its digital filters give you greater options as you pair it with different headphones or IEMs, and the XBass Plus and XSpace analog processing modes breathe new life into bass and sub-bass in open-back headphones. All this while efficiently handling everything I’ve thrown at it, although that does come at a cost to the battery life of your mobile audio source.
This DAC/Amp will be expensive for casual music consumers. For audio buffs, it’s feature-rich and built like a tank, so it should give you years of listening pleasure on the go.
Amazing sound and features!
For its transparency, ability to increase bass enjoyment, and balanced output, the Kensei GO Bar is one of the best mobile DACs you can buy.
