Mytek Brooklyn Bridge streaming DAC/network server

A DAC/preamp/headphone amp from Class A of Stereophile's list of Recommended Components, updated with streaming and network-server capabilities—and it still sells for less than $3000? If you believe that, I have a bridge I'd like to sell you. (Har, har!)

Most Americans have heard that line before, but many may not know the story behind it—I didn't. George C. Parker, a real American person born in 1860, is famous for perpetrating audacious frauds, specifically sales of property he did not own and could not possibly have owned. He is reported to have sold the Statue of Liberty, Grant's Tomb, the original Madison Square Garden, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and—most famously—the Brooklyn Bridge that last one twice a week for several years, at prices ranging from $75 to $5000. Or so some say (footnote 1).

There's nothing fraudulent about the Mytek Brooklyn Bridge ($2995). On the contrary, this Brooklyn Bridge offers apparently good value—not to mention great sound. The Brooklyn Bridge retains all the main features of the Mytek Brooklyn DAC+—asynchronous USB; high-rez PCM and DSD-decoding; full MQA decoding; preamp functionality, with analog inputs and both digital and analog volume controls; and a very good headphone amplifier—and adds streaming and network-server capabilities, wireless and via Ethernet. As with the DAC+, there's even a phono preamp that works with MC cartridges. The only thing it loses, as far as I can tell, is the DAC+'s AES/EBU digital input, that space being needed for the added Ethernet jack, Wi-Fi antenna, and USB Type-A port intended for connecting a hard drive or solid-state drive (SSD).

The Bridge's enhancements provide a means of getting music from Qobuz, Tidal, Deezer, vTuner, Spotify, et al into the DAC over Ethernet or wireless using only an iPad, iPhone, or Android device—no computer or server required—while allowing convenient playback of music files stored in another room or in the cloud. Additionally (and with limitations), the Brooklyn Bridge allows similarly easy playback of music files stored on local digital storage media, without a server or dedicated computer.

Setup and use
The DAC part of the Mytek Brooklyn Bridge is identical to the Brooklyn DAC+ I reviewed in the April 2018 issue of Stereophile; there's no need to repeat what I wrote there. This review will focus instead mainly on the added streaming and network-server capabilities, in-use, although toward the end I have some things to say about the Brooklyn Bridge's sound.

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After unboxing the Brooklyn Bridge, I screwed the wireless antenna into its rear-panel socket, attached the IEC cord, and started punching buttons. My experience with the Brooklyn DAC+ (and the Brooklyn DAC, its predecessor) had acquainted me with Mytek's logical, intuitive settings menus; I thought I could take at least the first steps—connecting the Brooklyn Bridge to my home network via Wi-Fi—without consulting the manual. Within seconds, I located what appeared to be the correct settings—one labeled "Network" and an adjacent one labeled "WPS" (for Wi-Fi Protected Setup, a common Wi-Fi security protocol)—but pushing the "Network" button resulted in a message ("Connecting . . . ") that never went away, and when I restarted the Brooklyn Bridge, I found the "Network" tile grayed out. The "WPS" tile had disappeared.

The cause of the problem quickly became apparent: When I pushed the button activating the INFO tile, I learned that the firmware installed on the Brooklyn Bridge was version 0.10.

Before I updated the firmware, I got sidetracked by another task: making sure the Brooklyn Bridge could play music. I connected the Pro-Ject CD Box RS2 T transport I have in-house to one of the Brooklyn Bridge's S/PDIF inputs and hooked a pair of balanced cables from the Bridge's outputs to my preamp. I used the settings menu to bypass the volume control: I would be using my preamplifier to control the volume. Sitting in the transport's disc tray was Disc One of Cooperstown, the excellent, fun opera by composer and Stereophile writer Sasha Matson. I pressed play and heard the stadium organ that opens the opera. Yup: The Brooklyn Bridge played music, and sounded good, too.

In a white paper on DAC design, Michal Jurewicz, Mytek's head and chief designer, writes that a Mytek DAC "must be 'broken in' for several days with a music loop or white noise" before it is evaluated against other DACs. I left the music on and went out for a long lunch.

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The Brooklyn Bridge with Roon
When I got back, I visited Mytek's website, downloaded the latest firmware and the Mytek Control Panel app, and plugged the Bridge into my laptop with a USB cable. Two minutes later, the Bridge's INFO tile indicated firmware 1.01.

Now there was a Wi-Fi tile that wasn't there before. I pushed the proper buttons to access the Wi-Fi settings: The Bridge saw my network immediately. It took me a minute or two to scroll through the letters and numbers to enter my Wi-Fi password. Fifteen seconds later, I was wireless. As my grad school roommate used to say, now we're cookin' with gas heat.

I returned to my computer, which I use as a Roon remote, driving my Roon ROCK/ Intel NUC server. In Roon, the Brooklyn Bridge was still selected as the current audio device. I clicked on Dave Douglas's new album, Devotion, streaming from Tidal, and got music. Then I tried a 24/192 file to see if the high sample rate would cause problems over the wireless connection. The hi-rez file played flawlessly (footnote 2).

In my system, though, there's no compelling reason to run wirelessly. I plugged the cable in. Again, no problems playing music.

Just like the Brooklyn DAC+, the Brooklyn Bridge's processing hardware is capable of high sample rates and (for PCM) bit depths. But the hardware used for streaming is limited to 192kHz and 24 bits (with PCM) and to DSD64. To test this, I sent (or tried sending) the Bridge a 352.8kHz file from Roon, over Ethernet; Roon downsampled it automatically to 176.4kHz, the highest supported rate in the 44.1kHz family. MQA files will still unfold to their full resolution (although it must be acknowledged, without going into detail, that above 96kHz, an unfolded MQA file is not equivalent to a PCM file of the same specification).

If you want to play back very high-rate files in full resolution, you'll need to have your Roon core close to your DAC so that you can connect to it with a USB or S/PDIF cable.

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The Brooklyn Bridge with streaming apps
Roon is an elegant solution and works great with the Brooklyn Bridge (as it does with most other streaming and nonstreaming DACs), but Roon must run in a separate box, either a regular, multifunction computer or a dedicated server, and Roon itself costs $119/year or $499 for a lifetime license. Part of the appeal of the Brooklyn Bridge is that you don't need all that: You can get it to work with nothing more than a smartphone and an app that's free or cheap. The manual makes passing mention of these capabilities, but Mytek provides a Quick Start document (included in the box and as a pdf on their website) that very briefly outlines how to set it up.

Years ago, when I acquired my PS Audio DirectStream DAC with its Bridge II network interface, Roon was still in its early days, streaming DACs were new, and the two had not yet learned to play nice with each other. I was eager to send something via Ethernet to my new networked DAC, so I downloaded an app—mConnect—that allowed me to send Tidal content directly to the DirectStream, over Ethernet, using nothing but my iPhone. It worked, but it was primitive. I was happy when Roon and the DirectStream learned to play together.

Although the actual digital converters are completely different, the streaming part of the Brooklyn Bridge is similar to PS Audio's Bridge II in that both use streaming hardware from Korean company ConversDigital. (The main streaming-related difference is that the Brooklyn Bridge adds Wi-Fi.)


Footnote 1: Is it wrong to invoke fraud in the opening paragraph of an audio review Maybe, but they're the ones who called it the Brooklyn Bridge. What choice did I have

Footnote 2: Later, I did have some problems with Wi-Fi. I'm not surprised, since I live in a prewar New York City apartment with thick plaster walls and lots of interference from neighbors' Wi-Fi networks. In an environment like this, a wired connection is essential.

COMPANY INFO
Mytek HiFi
148 India Street, First Floor
Brooklyn, NY 11222
(347)384-2687
ARTICLE CONTENTS

COMMENTS
Bogolu Haranath's picture

If you believe (or, don't believe), that you can buy Greenland, just like Alaska for 2 cents an acre or, just like Louisiana for 3 cents an acre, then believe me, I can sell you the (Mytek) Brooklyn Bridge for $2,995 in 2019 .........

Yours truly,
George C. Parker :-) ........
(No relation to Peter Parker the Spider-Man) :-) ........

Anton's picture

Great review.

I still haven't wrapped my head around "bridge."

Bogolu Haranath's picture

A partial denture ....... According to Wikipedia :-) .........

Jim Austin's picture

Broadly, a bridge simply translates from one audio format to another Specifically, in the network context, a bridge takes audio data delivered via TCP/IP--either wired Ethernet or Wi-Fi--and renders it into standard audio data and delivers it via a standard audio interface. So, for example, in PS Audio's DirectStream DAC, the Bridge II is an add-in card that takes an Ethernet input and delivers audio data (via I2S? I'm not sure) to the DAC itself. This Mytek calls itself "Brooklyn Bridge" but in fact it's a Bridge-DAC combination.

Jim Austin, Editor
Stereophile

Bogolu Haranath's picture

It certainly would be hard to wrap around the king of all bridges, the Danyang-Kunshan Grand Bridge, which is 102.4 miles long ......... The world's longest bridge :-) .........

Bogolu Haranath's picture

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Bogolu Haranath's picture

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Bogolu Haranath's picture

BTW ....... A variant of stoptail bridge is a 'wraparound bridge', used in some guitars :-) ...........

Bogolu Haranath's picture

Gold Note DS-10, at approx. the same price, is a close competitor for Mytek Brooklyn Bridge :-) ...........

dcolak's picture

I stopped reading there.

Anton's picture

I admire your efficiency.

mosfet50's picture

I have tens of thousands of dollars invested in very sophisticated electronic instruments. In all the years and all those purchases I never once had a manufacturer say you have to break this in for 100 hours before it works right - never. Audio voodoo, you gotta love it!

Bogolu Haranath's picture

'Bridge Over Troubled Water'? :-) ..........

TJ's picture

Thanks Jim for your review. Congrats to Mytek on its EISA award, even if some may think that Mytek is going deeper into a Swiss Army knife direction. If they're using the ConversDigital network module (?), a Brooklyn+ with a small external bridge like ultraRendu or SOtM Neo could be a cleaner NADAC solution in terms of SQ and noise.

Jim Austin's picture

I too have found wi-fi in general to be of limited utility. But given what I take to be the target market for something like this it probably makes sense. It certainly reflects the same design approach as including a phono preamp. To me though, "kitchen sink" is a little uncharitable (although I can tell it's not intended to be unkind). I think they have a particular customer in mind: Think compact system in a Williamsburg, Brooklyn, condo, with a couple of standmounts or small-footprint floorstanders and a simple TT.

[Edit: Thought I should add: This doesn't mean it won't work for other scenarios of course; it does have an Ethernet port after all, which is how I mainly used it.]

Jim Austin, Editor
Stereophile

Bogolu Haranath's picture

Off topic ....... But, may be Jim Austin could review the new Parasound Halo JC-5 stereo amp ($6,000), and tell us how JC-5 works with the Revel Salon2 speakers? :-) ........

Bogolu Haranath's picture

Following the JC-5 review, may be Jim Austin could also review the new matching Parasound Halo JC-2 BP pre-amp ($5,000) :-) .......

TJ's picture

Understood. I'm a big fan of Mytek, have two of their DACs.

jaiello's picture

The fact that Mytek is using ConverseDigital for their Bridge is disappointing. They do such a terrible job on the PS Audio Bridge II that no one should use them. I told Michel this a year ago before I knew that a Bridge product was coming. I guess he didn't care as he was probably already down the road with them. I would really love to know what the limitation is for either Bridge that they can't do higher rate DSD than DSD64.

rwwear's picture

...the only company with enough sense to put HDMI on their high res DACs?

pmilner's picture

If I read this paragraph correctly, to use Roon together with the Brooklyn Bridge I don’t need a computer/ NUC, just an iPad. If this is true, where does the Roon Core reside?

jaiello's picture

You still need to host the Roon Core on a NUC or other device. The Brooklyn Bridge just replaces the streamer in that set up.

Jim Austin's picture

If I read this paragraph correctly, to use Roon together with the Brooklyn Bridge I don’t need a computer/ NUC, just an iPad.

No. As i wrote near the beginning of that section:

but Roon must run in a separate box, either a regular, multifunction computer or a dedicated server, ...

However, with the Brooklyn Bridge (and similar products) you can use a set of standards called uPnP (Universal Plug 'n Play) to send music directly to the Bridge/DAC without a separate box OR Roon. It's not as elegant nor as versatile as Roon, but it's cheaper that way and it works--with limitations on direct-connected (but not networked) music storage as noted in the review.

Jim Austin, Editor
Stereophile

tonykaz's picture

DACs are the King's New Suit kind of product as far as I can tell.

I've been buying DACs for a few years now and still haven't discovered much difference between any of the ones I own.

I think that I'll just use ( borrow ) your adverbs : " aspires to and approaches neutrality". I'll probably substitute all manner of descriptives for your "neutrality" which seems too neutral to be descriptive.

Still, I don't like talking about DACs because I don't know what I'm talking about and I can't quite hear much difference between them. I haven't found a bad one, yet!

Thanks for trying

Tony in Venice

ps. "aspires to and approaches neutrality" is itself the best piece of writing in this Issue, in my opinion, a scientific equivalent to water. PH 7.0

Bogolu Haranath's picture

'Neutrality' most likely means, not adding it's own sound ........ Not editorializing the sound, which is passed through the component .........

Welcome back, Tony :-) ...........

Bogolu Haranath's picture

Not 'Vitamin Water' :-) ........

tonykaz's picture

The British Pound is now at $1.19, rapidly approaching it's low of $1.05 in the 1980s when I was Importing Air Containers of British HiFi and selling thru at one Turn per Week!, 52 Turns per year !!! phew.

Tony in Venice ( closely following Global Business )

ps. much of Brit. HiFi is now Chinese HiFi with China and it's BRIC partners leaning to Gold Standard instead of Paper Currency Standards based on GDP. We ( Washington ) is not winning the Trade War with China, tariffs are increasing, pain is being felt. Petrol Dollar is loosing it's grip, Juan is gaining.

Verito's picture

Roon for $499? Those were the times! Since release 1.7 it‘s a whopping $699 = an increase of 40%
And I thought the tendency of software prices are rather to go down over time.... well I was wrong.

navr's picture

they not gonna get 1 cent from me, that is for sure.

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