Overview
Description 
THE VARÈSE MUSIC SYSTEM
Varèse features a unique architecture devised for total precision and absolute fidelity. Its novel design and bespoke technologies bring a level of performance beyond anything we had previously dared dream possible.
Radical Innovation
Varèse is our most ambitious undertaking to date – the culmination of a series of intensive projects that began when we asked ourselves: how do we create an even more profound and immersive experience for music listeners of the future?
Our engineering team have developed new processes, products and protocols, once again stretching the limits of audio engineering to create our best-performing, most revealing and most intuitive music system to date.
Features 
RADICAL INNOVATION
Varèse is dCS’s most ambitious undertaking to date – the culmination of a series of intensive projects that began when they asked themselves: “how do we create an even more profound and immersive experience for music listeners of the future?”
DCS’s engineering team have developed new processes, products and protocols, once again stretching the limits of audio engineering to create dCS’s best-performing, most revealing and most intuitive music system to date.
CORE
The Core is the heart of the Varèse Music System. This technological powerhouse supports most hi-res formats and major streaming services. It handles a multitude of operations, from audio input to the conversion, noise shaping and filtering stages carried out before signals are output to the Varèse Mono DACs. The first dCS product of its kind, it utilizes dCS’s novel ACTUS protocol to radically simplify setup whilst taking sonic and measured performance to new heights.
MONO DACS
The Varèse Mono DACs encapsulate dCS’s relentless focus on absolute performance. Driven by a desire to further enhance the sonic and technical capabilities of dCS’s DACs, they embarked on a radical reinterpretation of dCS’s DAC architecture and technologies. They created a dedicated DAC for each audio channel, along with an all-new version of dCS’s renowned dCS Ring DAC hardware. They also devised a patented clocking protocol, dCS Tomix, to ensure perfect synchronicity between the Mono DACs. These innovations have enabled dCS to take their signature ultra-low distortion performance to a new level whilst significantly lowering noise floor, bringing listeners an even more compelling and visceral sonic experience. Discover new depths of detail and emotion in your music, and prepare to fall in love with your favorite recordings all over again, with the sublime capabilities of these extraordinary components.
MASTER CLOCK
The Varèse Master Clock brings all the benefits of a dedicated dCS master clock – including improved imaging, focus and presence – to the Varèse Music System. It ensures absolute timing accuracy and synchronicity for optimal performance at all audio sample rates. The Master Clock utilizes dCS’s new ACTUS and dCS Tomix protocols to deliver unrivalled jitter performance, providing dCS’s lowest jitter, lowest drift and most accurate clocking signal. Its design is informed by dCS’s decades of experience developing audio master clocks for both professional and home use.
USER INTERFACE
The Varèse User Interface works in tandem with the Varèse Remote Control and dCS Mosaic ACTUS app to deliver a rich and engaging playback experience. Its full-color touch screen displays full album art plus detailed track data, play queues and other settings, allowing you to view more information at a glance. Display modes and visible information can be tailored to suit your preferences, with customizable views, adjustable text size settings and optional dark mode. The User Interface connects with the Varèse Remote Control via Bluetooth LE. It also enables compatibility and integration with UPnP control point renderers and servers.
REMOTE CONTROL
With its ergonomic design, backlit touch icons and focused hot keys, the Varèse Remote Control provides an intuitive and highly tactile way to interact with your Varèse Music System. Use the volume dial to adjust levels or perform a range of functions such as play, skip, pause and mute with just one tap, all whilst remaining immersed in your music. The Remote Control charges via USB-C and connects to the Varèse Music System via Bluetooth for maximum convenience. Meticulously crafted, it features a capacitive touch glass screen with illuminated icons and CNC-machined aluminum casework.
MOSAIC ACTUS
The new dCS Mosaic ACTUS app offers a rich browsing experience and refreshingly simple navigation. Its intuitive design allows you to set up your system, browse music and control playback with the greatest of ease, so you can spend more time immersing yourself in your favorite recordings.
ACTUS: Audio – Control – Timing – Unified – System
ACTUS is a bespoke interface that delivers audio, control and timing signals between Varèse components. This novel innovation enables the Varèse Music System to be connected with a single cable running from the Core to each unit. The ACTUS protocol is unique to Varèse. Building on learnings gained through four decades of audio design, they set out to radically simplify setup whilst further enhancing musical performance. This novel innovation removes the complexities associated with multi-component audio systems and provides a simple yet high-performance solution for listeners.
DIFFERENTIAL RING DAC
The dCS Ring DAC™ has earned global acclaim for its technical and sonic abilities. This unique digital-to-analogue conversion system resides at the heart of all dCS DACs. It has been carefully refined over many years to reproduce sound with the utmost clarity and precision, bringing listeners a profoundly natural and highly detailed musical performance.
In 2022 they delivered major enhancements with the launch of dCS’s Ring DAC APEX hardware. Not content with dCS’s achievements, they continued exploring how they could build on dCS’s accomplishments and once again improve the capabilities of dCS DACs. After thorough investigation, they decided this could only be achieved with a comprehensive redesign of the Ring DAC’s architecture and operations.
They made a number of developments, creating a new design with twice as many current sources and introducing a new differential mode of operation. DCS’s extensive changes have made it possible to further increase linearity whilst significantly lowering noise floor and delivering a host of additional benefits.
The biggest change to dCS’s DAC architecture in a generation, the Differential Ring DAC elevates the dCS experience once again, bringing an experience of even greater presence, immediacy and intensity.
DCS TOMIX
dCS Tomix is a patented clocking technology which enables the Varèse Mono DACs to operate in complete synchronicity – ensuring the left and right channels of each audio sample are converted at exactly the right moment – whilst simultaneously maintaining the highest degree of clocking accuracy within each DAC.
While developing Varèse, they carried out an exhaustive review of existing protocols and found that no current technology enabled us to achieve perfect sychronicity when sending signals via IP link. They felt there was scope to create a novel solution and dCS’s investigations led us to develop dCS Tomix.
This breakthrough allows us to harness the sonic benefits of a Mono DAC arrangement whilst maintaining the exacting standards they have set for clocking performance.
Varèse is dCS’s most ambitious undertaking to date – the culmination of a series of intensive projects that began when they asked themselves: “how do we create an even more profound and immersive experience for music listeners of the future?”
DCS’s engineering team have developed new processes, products and protocols, once again stretching the limits of audio engineering to create dCS’s best-performing, most revealing and most intuitive music system to date.
CORE
The Core is the heart of the Varèse Music System. This technological powerhouse supports most hi-res formats and major streaming services. It handles a multitude of operations, from audio input to the conversion, noise shaping and filtering stages carried out before signals are output to the Varèse Mono DACs. The first dCS product of its kind, it utilizes dCS’s novel ACTUS protocol to radically simplify setup whilst taking sonic and measured performance to new heights.
MONO DACS
The Varèse Mono DACs encapsulate dCS’s relentless focus on absolute performance. Driven by a desire to further enhance the sonic and technical capabilities of dCS’s DACs, they embarked on a radical reinterpretation of dCS’s DAC architecture and technologies. They created a dedicated DAC for each audio channel, along with an all-new version of dCS’s renowned dCS Ring DAC hardware. They also devised a patented clocking protocol, dCS Tomix, to ensure perfect synchronicity between the Mono DACs. These innovations have enabled dCS to take their signature ultra-low distortion performance to a new level whilst significantly lowering noise floor, bringing listeners an even more compelling and visceral sonic experience. Discover new depths of detail and emotion in your music, and prepare to fall in love with your favorite recordings all over again, with the sublime capabilities of these extraordinary components.
MASTER CLOCK
The Varèse Master Clock brings all the benefits of a dedicated dCS master clock – including improved imaging, focus and presence – to the Varèse Music System. It ensures absolute timing accuracy and synchronicity for optimal performance at all audio sample rates. The Master Clock utilizes dCS’s new ACTUS and dCS Tomix protocols to deliver unrivalled jitter performance, providing dCS’s lowest jitter, lowest drift and most accurate clocking signal. Its design is informed by dCS’s decades of experience developing audio master clocks for both professional and home use.
USER INTERFACE
The Varèse User Interface works in tandem with the Varèse Remote Control and dCS Mosaic ACTUS app to deliver a rich and engaging playback experience. Its full-color touch screen displays full album art plus detailed track data, play queues and other settings, allowing you to view more information at a glance. Display modes and visible information can be tailored to suit your preferences, with customizable views, adjustable text size settings and optional dark mode. The User Interface connects with the Varèse Remote Control via Bluetooth LE. It also enables compatibility and integration with UPnP control point renderers and servers.
REMOTE CONTROL
With its ergonomic design, backlit touch icons and focused hot keys, the Varèse Remote Control provides an intuitive and highly tactile way to interact with your Varèse Music System. Use the volume dial to adjust levels or perform a range of functions such as play, skip, pause and mute with just one tap, all whilst remaining immersed in your music. The Remote Control charges via USB-C and connects to the Varèse Music System via Bluetooth for maximum convenience. Meticulously crafted, it features a capacitive touch glass screen with illuminated icons and CNC-machined aluminum casework.
MOSAIC ACTUS
The new dCS Mosaic ACTUS app offers a rich browsing experience and refreshingly simple navigation. Its intuitive design allows you to set up your system, browse music and control playback with the greatest of ease, so you can spend more time immersing yourself in your favorite recordings.
ACTUS: Audio – Control – Timing – Unified – System
ACTUS is a bespoke interface that delivers audio, control and timing signals between Varèse components. This novel innovation enables the Varèse Music System to be connected with a single cable running from the Core to each unit. The ACTUS protocol is unique to Varèse. Building on learnings gained through four decades of audio design, they set out to radically simplify setup whilst further enhancing musical performance. This novel innovation removes the complexities associated with multi-component audio systems and provides a simple yet high-performance solution for listeners.
DIFFERENTIAL RING DAC
The dCS Ring DAC™ has earned global acclaim for its technical and sonic abilities. This unique digital-to-analogue conversion system resides at the heart of all dCS DACs. It has been carefully refined over many years to reproduce sound with the utmost clarity and precision, bringing listeners a profoundly natural and highly detailed musical performance.
In 2022 they delivered major enhancements with the launch of dCS’s Ring DAC APEX hardware. Not content with dCS’s achievements, they continued exploring how they could build on dCS’s accomplishments and once again improve the capabilities of dCS DACs. After thorough investigation, they decided this could only be achieved with a comprehensive redesign of the Ring DAC’s architecture and operations.
They made a number of developments, creating a new design with twice as many current sources and introducing a new differential mode of operation. DCS’s extensive changes have made it possible to further increase linearity whilst significantly lowering noise floor and delivering a host of additional benefits.
The biggest change to dCS’s DAC architecture in a generation, the Differential Ring DAC elevates the dCS experience once again, bringing an experience of even greater presence, immediacy and intensity.
DCS TOMIX
dCS Tomix is a patented clocking technology which enables the Varèse Mono DACs to operate in complete synchronicity – ensuring the left and right channels of each audio sample are converted at exactly the right moment – whilst simultaneously maintaining the highest degree of clocking accuracy within each DAC.
While developing Varèse, they carried out an exhaustive review of existing protocols and found that no current technology enabled us to achieve perfect sychronicity when sending signals via IP link. They felt there was scope to create a novel solution and dCS’s investigations led us to develop dCS Tomix.
This breakthrough allows us to harness the sonic benefits of a Mono DAC arrangement whilst maintaining the exacting standards they have set for clocking performance.
Specifications 
Type: Varèse Music System
Dimensions (H x W x D; allow extra 60mm depth for ACTUS cable connectors and 120mm for bend radius. Ensure airflow around the unit):
User Interface: 131mm x 444mm x 450mm / 5.2” x 17.5” x 17.8” (includes Bluetooth aerial depth)
Master Clock: 131mm x 444mm x 437mm / 5.2” x 17.5” x 17.3”
Left Mono DAC: 131mm x 444mm x 437mm / 5.2” x 17.5” x 17.3”
Right Mono DAC: 131mm x 444mm x 437mm / 5.2” x 17.5” x 17.3”
Core: 244mm x 444mm x 438mm / 9.7” x 17.5” x 17.3”
Weight:
User Interface: 14.6kg / 32.2lbs
Master Clock: 15.7kg / 34.7lbs
Left Mono DAC: 18.7kg / 41.3lbs
Right Mono DAC: 18.7kg / 41.3lbs
Core: 33.1kg / 73lbs
D/A Converter Type: dCS Differential Ring DAC
Analogue Outputs:
2x pair balanced outputs on 4x XLR connectors.
Output impedance: 1.5Ω
2x pair unbalanced outputs on 4x RCA connectors.
Output impedance: 52Ω
Maximum load: 600Ω (10kΩ–100kΩ recommended)
Output levels: 0.2V, 0.6V, 2V, 6V rms for a full-scale input (set in menu)
Digital Inputs:
Ethernet on RJ45 connector: For network streaming
USB Type A connector: For mass storage devices (navigated using Mosaic ACTUS)
If the Digital I/O Module is fitted to the Varèse Core:
USB 2.0 interface on B-type connector: Accepts 24-bit 44.1–384kS/s PCM, DSD/64 & DSD/128 (DoP)
3x AES/EBU inputs on 3-pin female XLR connectors:
Accepts 24-bit 44.1–192kS/s PCM & DSD/64 (DoP)
AES1+2 act as Dual AES pair: Accepts 24-bit 88.2–384kS/s PCM, DSD/64 & DSD/128 (DoP)
Digital Outputs (if Digital I/O Module fitted):
1 x S/PDIF interface on RCA Phono connector: Outputs 24-bit 44.1–192kS/s PCM, DSD/64 (DoP)
Wordclock I/O (if Digital I/O Module fitted):
1 x Word Clock Output on 1x BNC connector:
Outputs TTL-compatible Wordclock at 44.1kHz or 48kHz (depending on input sample rate)
Sample Frequencies and Formats Supported:
PCM: 44.1–384kS/s, up to 24 bits
DSD: DSD/64, DSD/128, DSD/256, DSD/512
Native DSD + DoP
File formats: FLAC, WAV, AIFF
Residual Noise: Better than 118dB0, 20Hz–20kHz
Spurious Responses: Better than -115dB0, 20Hz–20kHz
Power Supply: Self-selecting for 100, 115, 220, and 230V AC, 50–60Hz
Power Consumption: 30W
Dimensions (H x W x D; allow extra 60mm depth for ACTUS cable connectors and 120mm for bend radius. Ensure airflow around the unit):
User Interface: 131mm x 444mm x 450mm / 5.2” x 17.5” x 17.8” (includes Bluetooth aerial depth)
Master Clock: 131mm x 444mm x 437mm / 5.2” x 17.5” x 17.3”
Left Mono DAC: 131mm x 444mm x 437mm / 5.2” x 17.5” x 17.3”
Right Mono DAC: 131mm x 444mm x 437mm / 5.2” x 17.5” x 17.3”
Core: 244mm x 444mm x 438mm / 9.7” x 17.5” x 17.3”
Weight:
User Interface: 14.6kg / 32.2lbs
Master Clock: 15.7kg / 34.7lbs
Left Mono DAC: 18.7kg / 41.3lbs
Right Mono DAC: 18.7kg / 41.3lbs
Core: 33.1kg / 73lbs
D/A Converter Type: dCS Differential Ring DAC
Analogue Outputs:
2x pair balanced outputs on 4x XLR connectors.
Output impedance: 1.5Ω
2x pair unbalanced outputs on 4x RCA connectors.
Output impedance: 52Ω
Maximum load: 600Ω (10kΩ–100kΩ recommended)
Output levels: 0.2V, 0.6V, 2V, 6V rms for a full-scale input (set in menu)
Digital Inputs:
Ethernet on RJ45 connector: For network streaming
USB Type A connector: For mass storage devices (navigated using Mosaic ACTUS)
If the Digital I/O Module is fitted to the Varèse Core:
USB 2.0 interface on B-type connector: Accepts 24-bit 44.1–384kS/s PCM, DSD/64 & DSD/128 (DoP)
3x AES/EBU inputs on 3-pin female XLR connectors:
Accepts 24-bit 44.1–192kS/s PCM & DSD/64 (DoP)
AES1+2 act as Dual AES pair: Accepts 24-bit 88.2–384kS/s PCM, DSD/64 & DSD/128 (DoP)
Digital Outputs (if Digital I/O Module fitted):
1 x S/PDIF interface on RCA Phono connector: Outputs 24-bit 44.1–192kS/s PCM, DSD/64 (DoP)
Wordclock I/O (if Digital I/O Module fitted):
1 x Word Clock Output on 1x BNC connector:
Outputs TTL-compatible Wordclock at 44.1kHz or 48kHz (depending on input sample rate)
Sample Frequencies and Formats Supported:
PCM: 44.1–384kS/s, up to 24 bits
DSD: DSD/64, DSD/128, DSD/256, DSD/512
Native DSD + DoP
File formats: FLAC, WAV, AIFF
Residual Noise: Better than 118dB0, 20Hz–20kHz
Spurious Responses: Better than -115dB0, 20Hz–20kHz
Power Supply: Self-selecting for 100, 115, 220, and 230V AC, 50–60Hz
Power Consumption: 30W
Delivery and returns 
Orders ship Sunday through Friday from our offices in Dubai, UAE.
In-stock products typically ship within 48 hours and should be expected to arrive in 3-4 business days. Orders outside of the UAE should be expected to arrive in 5-7 business days.
Pre-order and backorder products will state the approximate delivery timeline beside the Add To Cart button.
If you would like to place a custom order, chat with our specialists for a guided shopping experience. Once your order has been placed, a timeline will be provided depending on your order details.
- Free delivery within the UAE
- Shipping charges will be calculated upon checkout for orders outside of the UAE (Bahrain, Oman, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia & Qatar).
- Taxes and duties are calculated according to the applicable laws of the state or country an item is shipped to and are the customer's responsibility.
For additional information on shipping and our exchange & return policy visit our help center.
Installation 
Installation charges are applicable and can be paid upon delivery for our clients based in Dubai.
- Installation Charges: AED 450 Per Hour
- Speaker Cables: AED 32 Per Meter
- Trunking: AED 10 Per Meter
For clients based outside of the UAE, please contact our specialists and we will share an estimate based on your requirements.
