Melco Audio has debuted the N50-S38, its first mid-range SSD-based digital music library.
The new N50-S38 features a 1.7mm-thick full-width chassis, an IEC power inlet with noise filter, and classic Melco styling. It also has an enhanced main board with a specially selected 3.84 TB SSD drive coupled to the new rigid, layered SSD cradle, plus a new dynamic PSU with 25% more output. Re-engineered isolation feet are also included.
Its rear panel includes four specific USB ports – a USB 3.0, Expansion, Backup, and a dedicated USB DAC output ready for connection to USB DACs, USB DAC-equipped amplifiers or active speakers.
Users can effortlessly connect and operate USB devices without any configuration, including importing or playing music from memory devices, HDD/SSD drives, and CD drives. The ports can also be used as capacity expansion with Melco’s E100 (or other) storage drive, as well as an easy backup to HDD/SSD drives.
The back panel of the N50-S38 also includes Melco’s dedicated dual Ethernet ports, providing a dedicated ‘Player’ port in addition to the LAN port, to minimise the unwanted effects of noise on the music signal and present network audio players with a direct, high data-integrity connection.
The N50-S38 can also be connected to a streamer (via Ethernet) using the PLAYER port or used as a local player with the dedicated USB DAC output.
The front panel features a high-quality OLED display with push button control as well as Melco’s Intelligent Music Library suite comprising of MinimServer and SongKong software.
Like the EX-series models, the N50-S38 is Roon Ready, DSD compatible and offers app control via DLNA/UPnP (in USB DAC mode) with support for TIDAL, Qobuz, and vTuner streaming. Qobuz Downloader and HighResAudio.com also enable high-resolution downloads direct, without the need for a computer.
The N50-S38 (silver) and N50-S38B (black) are available now priced at £4,999.