Keces Ebravo: A High-Powered Network Player

Founded over twenty years ago, the Keces brand specialises, among other things, in simplifying and stabilising power supply to prevent it from interfering with the smooth operation of their hi-fi equipment. The brand’s catalogue thus showcases a range of power supplies and conditioners.

Keces Audio puts all the most common components of a modern Hi-Fi system at your disposal; featuring a DAC, preamplifiers, amplifiers and a streamer. This means that you can create a highly customizable system, with completely separate components each dedicated to a specific task. Fortunately, the units are not very large, so they don’t take up too much living space when added together. For the purposes of the review, we received the Ebravo Streamer, but also, to better bring it to life, a DAC/preamplifier/headphone amp and a stereo power block.

The Keces Ebravo at a Glance

The Ebravo is a network player with an extremely simple design. There’s no need to get bogged down in design details, the aim being to emphasise the music. It’s all packed into a black case just under 7cm tall. The front panel has three buttons: power on/off, source selection and display off. The display is a classic two-line text display, which constantly indicates the source, current playback sample and volume.

There is a small infrared receiver, but no remote control is supplied. You won’t find the power supply in this particular bundle either, as that comes in a second box of the same size. It’s worth noting that the Ebravo can be purchased without an external power supply, supplanting it with a simple 12 volt brick, in the same style as power supplies for older laptops. So, the main box contains only the bare essentials: the Ebravo, a mini-notice and the wi-fi antenna, with the external power supply in tow.

Connectivity has also been streamlined. This network player actually doubles as a bridge, meaning that it does not include a digital/analogue converter. There are only digital outputs, in three formats: coaxial, optical and XLR AES. The USB port cannot be used for audio output, since it can be used for external media filled with music files. This is a shame, admittedly, as USB audio output means no limits with respect to formats. The last available socket is an RJ45 port for the wired network. Alternatively, you can switch to wi-fi, and activate Bluetooth if required.

The power input is a 12-volt socket. Keces supplies a specific cable to connect this input to the appropriate output on the separate P6 power supply; it’s linear and very quiet. It is based on a custom-built toroidal transformer and an integral discrete component design. It also benefits from protection against overheating, overvoltage and undervoltage. Shielded, the P6 power supply eliminates the risk of both electromagnetic interference and radio frequency interference. The two DC outputs are configurable. It can therefore supply two different devices with different voltages, 5 to 12 volts or 12 to 24 volts.

In terms of aesthetics, although these two devices have the same dimensions and a similar finish, they do not offer the same presentation. It’s a minor detail, but we thought it was a shame. When you buy Hi-Fi products, although the main objective is the quality of the sound reproduction, you also pay attention to the presentation of the devices. Here, there’s no consistency: one has curved edges, the other doesn’t, the logo and status LED are not in the same place, and the reference number is not written in the same way. Hopefully in the future new versions may be more visually unified.

Using the Keces Ebravo

As we saw earlier, the Ebravo network player may have a display, but it doesn’t give access to any settings or configuration menus. Keces has transplanted all the usual network player settings and interfacing, such as internet connection, services, audio settings, etc. to the 4Stream mobile application, with which we are very familiar. This application is shared by many manufacturers, avoiding the hassle of developing their own platform.

Preferring the stability of wired technology, we connected the Ebravo to the Ethernet network. It was immediately discoverable on the application, which integrates Qobuz by default. All the usual services are available, from new releases to playlists and recommendations. Textual content appears for artist biographies, but not for albums and tracks. You can’t edit Qobuz playlists, but you can add tracks to the favourites in the app itself.

As the Keces Ebravo is UPnP/DLNA compatible, you can use another app to control it, such as Mconnect on iPhone or Bubble UPnP on Android. These two apps are our favourites because they also integrate Qobuz in a very comprehensive way. What’s more, the streamer is AirPlay 2 compatible. This opens even more doors, even if the audio quality will end up capped. You can use it directly in the Qobuz app or configure it as a playback point in Roon.

There are no advanced audio settings other than a 10-band graphic equalizer. There are several presets with names such as Classic, Acoustic, Dance, etc… but you can create your own preset. Among the other settings available; you can change the latency in milliseconds and select the maximum output quality. Finally, Keces lets you choose whether or not to apply smooth transitions between tracks, so it’s up to you to decide what you prefer.

The other two Keces devices available to us were the S3 and the S300+. The first is a DAC, which is essential with the Ebravo Streamer, as it lacks one internally. It also acts as a preamplifier and an unbalanced and balanced connection amplifier. We used these three functions in conjunction with the Streamer and various headphones before trying out the Keces S300+ amplifier. The Keces S300+ is a stereo amplifier with 2x130 watts at 8 ohms, or 2x225 watts at 4 ohms. The first 5 watts are in class A, after which it switches to class AB. It weighs no less than 14 kg. The performance announced on paper in terms of low harmonic distortion, damping factor and channel separation are faithfully reproduced Once again, we note that the aesthetic coherence is incomplete, with the two devices displaying different logos, although their front panels are identical.

Listening Experience

Our listening session was divided up into two stages. Firstly, we replaced our various network players with the Ebravo, free of the other bells and whistles. Then, we introduced the Sw3 preamplifier and the S300+ amplifier to create a complete set of Keces Audio electronics, all connected to our Dynaudio loudspeakers.

The Ebravo was at home in our system, producing a sonic reproduction emphasising finesse above all else. Flavia Coelho’s voice on their album Ginga comes through more prominently than on other lower-range players. It’s more precise, better defined, with more body. Above all, we noticed the increased presence of micro-informations, which give depth and width to the whole, with the reverberations seeming more present to open up the soundstage further. The bass is on par with the other models in its price range.

Our listening session of Alicia and Michael Olatuja’s album OLATUJA, which highlights percussion and bass guitar, testified to the fact. The Ebravo delivered the low-end cleanly with a good dose of impact. It’s right up there in terms of cost value, offering more musicality than entry-level models. There’s also less coloration, with greater respect for timbre, especially on vocals, and extension of the soundstage.

Let’s move on to the combination of all the Keces electronics at our disposal. Listening to the Alvin Queen Trio on the Feeling Good album, the ensemble works wonders, boasting very high-level definition. The sound separation is also exemplary, with a clear sense of the various layers, the placement of the instruments in relation to each other and the way they pass the ball back and forth. The Citrus Sun group’s extremely polished acid jazz was propelled through our listening room with enough welly to knock the walls over. Precision and finesse are the order of the day, helping to respect the timbres of instruments set free to express themselves.

The S300+ amplifier exerts a tight grip on the loudspeakers, delivering a controlled, powerful and punchy bass. However, with such a reserve of power and stratospheric damping factor, we were expecting a more profound exploration of the low frequencies. The result, however, still comes as a very present upper bass, retaining tension and roundness, especially evident in the realistic resonance of instruments like the double bass. We finished with Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No.2 by the Berlin Philharmonic. The depth contributed complementarily to the realism, with well-detached sections and pleasant timbres, particularly in the strings.