Company & Product Overview
Pro-Ject Audio Systems was founded in 1990 by Heinz Lichtenegger. Their driving goal since their inception has been to provide music lovers with great value products. The Pro-Ject Debut Carbon is one shining example of this philosophy. It has become known as one of the best deals in high-performance audio and is the best selling turntable in the world under $400. Pro-Ject Audio has factories in the Czech Republic and Slovakia with their R&D headquarters outside of Mistelbach Austria.
The company has two divisions, one specializing in all things related to turntables and another division making small audio components that are known for over-delivering for their size.
While the team at Pro-Ject Audio Systems are friends of ours, we must admit that we think they have way too many products. Right now there are 33 different models of turntables and a full 7 different series of electronics. The sheer volume is overwhelming, making it easy to get numb to their product releases.
The downside is that when this happens, a real jewel may not get the attention that it deserves. One such jewel is their latest Digital Box design, the Pro-Ject Pre Box S2 Digital. It’s a digital micro preamplifier that can fully unfold MQA files.
If you aren’t familiar with MQA, it stands for Master Quality Audio, and has been gathering momentum over the past year for its ability to deliver very high-resolution audio over streaming. Tidal, for example, is currently offering a growing library of MQA audio files.
Design & Build Quality
Like most of the Pro-Ject Box designs, the Pre Box S2 Digital is tiny! It is 4” wide, 4” deep, and only around 1.25” tall. That is small enough to easily fit in a messenger bag. It is housed in a very nicely finished all aluminum box. Like most of the Box Designs, you get a choice of silver or black.
The front panel has a full-sized headphone jack on one end and a small, but great feeling volume knob on the other end. In the middle is a tiny color display window flanked on either side by two buttons that let you select the input, get into the menu, and change the filters.
