I’m not a big fan of digital and prefer distorted and noisy sound of vinyl to compressed sound. I was struggling with digital for 20 years and went through dozens of speakers and similar quantity of amps and at least half a dozen of preamps, CD players and similar quantity of DACs but once I switched back to vinyl I hardly change anything and I’m happy with my analog sound, indeed every time I listen to it I’m impressed.
I do like convenience of streaming music for background listening and have been using Tidal with iphone10+ Dragon Fly black. Dragon Fly does not measure well and does not sound well either so I decided to try some Chinese DACs that measure well and have some good reviews. So far I have tried Topping E50 III, E30II l and SMSL U1. I could not make E50 III working with iphone. E30 works partially as it does not work in DAC mode only and SMSL-U1 works without any issues. Both E30II and SMSL-U1 have a tendency to sound vety harsh with some music, Stan Getz Bossa nova for example sounds harsh almost like if I was playing MP3 file. If I play music loud my ears are literally bleeding. Also the sound is wide but flat (no 3D).
I know what a lot of people are going to say “ you get what you pay”. I will disagree as I’ve been involved with materials for RF communication for many years with China being the biggest market and saw the transformation of Shenzhen Fab over the years. First of all, Shenzhen is Mecca for electronics manufacturers when it comes to supply chain, talent and cost. Secondly the economy of scale of manufactures of Toppings and SMSLs and likes is totally different than the ones of Chords or others of high priced Western boutique manufacturers. Chinese internal audio market is humongous not only because of the population size but also because Chinese like music. If we add to it the market outside, Topping and SMSLs outsale Chords or similar Western DAC s buy the factor of 100s if not 1000s. Finaly the component base used in DACs is not expensive, at least don’t have to be. Therefore, I expect that if one factor in R&D and manufacturing costs, Chinese cost of DAC manufacturing will be 5-10 times cheaper. Hypothetically Chinese manufacturers can deliver very inexpensive digital products that will easily outperform Western ones. However, both SMSL U1 and E30 sound bad. Unfortunately the only product that I can compare to is Dragon Fly which is not a great product.
Does anybody has good luck with mid priced Chinese digital gear and had a chance to directly and properly (level and gear matching) compare to decent Western product?. Considering that my analog front end cost more than 10K I would not mind to spend some dough on the DAC but only if I can really hear the improvement. I’m considering used RME ADI-2 or Chord qutest, at least I can easily resell them if I don’t like but I suspect that there are must be some Chinese products that outperforms them at a fraction of cost.
I do like convenience of streaming music for background listening and have been using Tidal with iphone10+ Dragon Fly black. Dragon Fly does not measure well and does not sound well either so I decided to try some Chinese DACs that measure well and have some good reviews. So far I have tried Topping E50 III, E30II l and SMSL U1. I could not make E50 III working with iphone. E30 works partially as it does not work in DAC mode only and SMSL-U1 works without any issues. Both E30II and SMSL-U1 have a tendency to sound vety harsh with some music, Stan Getz Bossa nova for example sounds harsh almost like if I was playing MP3 file. If I play music loud my ears are literally bleeding. Also the sound is wide but flat (no 3D).
I know what a lot of people are going to say “ you get what you pay”. I will disagree as I’ve been involved with materials for RF communication for many years with China being the biggest market and saw the transformation of Shenzhen Fab over the years. First of all, Shenzhen is Mecca for electronics manufacturers when it comes to supply chain, talent and cost. Secondly the economy of scale of manufactures of Toppings and SMSLs and likes is totally different than the ones of Chords or others of high priced Western boutique manufacturers. Chinese internal audio market is humongous not only because of the population size but also because Chinese like music. If we add to it the market outside, Topping and SMSLs outsale Chords or similar Western DAC s buy the factor of 100s if not 1000s. Finaly the component base used in DACs is not expensive, at least don’t have to be. Therefore, I expect that if one factor in R&D and manufacturing costs, Chinese cost of DAC manufacturing will be 5-10 times cheaper. Hypothetically Chinese manufacturers can deliver very inexpensive digital products that will easily outperform Western ones. However, both SMSL U1 and E30 sound bad. Unfortunately the only product that I can compare to is Dragon Fly which is not a great product.
Does anybody has good luck with mid priced Chinese digital gear and had a chance to directly and properly (level and gear matching) compare to decent Western product?. Considering that my analog front end cost more than 10K I would not mind to spend some dough on the DAC but only if I can really hear the improvement. I’m considering used RME ADI-2 or Chord qutest, at least I can easily resell them if I don’t like but I suspect that there are must be some Chinese products that outperforms them at a fraction of cost.
No. IMHO there are no excellent cheap Chinese dacs in terms of SQ, although there are some excellent measuring ones. Maybe $1k for a top of the line Topping while its still on promotional sale at Amazon. There are however very excellent world class dacs in existence, but they are expensive. I would stay away from RME, its an AK4493 inside there no matter how well it measures. At about the same price as Chord DAVE is Bruno Putzeys' Mola Mola Tambaqui dac. https://www.mola-mola.nl/tambaqui.php Some people seem to prefer Chord's next lower priced dac over DAVE, although its not clear if Chord understands why. Its also popular to replace Chord SMPS with linear power supplies. Again they don't seem to understand why.
Anyway not cheap, but getting into the good stuff.
Can you DIY a dac that offers world class SQ at a lower cost? I would say its possible, but still not cheap. Maybe around $2.5k to do it really right. Better SQ than Benchmark DAC-3 at around the same price, again IMHO only. Have to be able to solder fine pitch SMD and should have a suitable oscilloscope though.
Anyway not cheap, but getting into the good stuff.
Can you DIY a dac that offers world class SQ at a lower cost? I would say its possible, but still not cheap. Maybe around $2.5k to do it really right. Better SQ than Benchmark DAC-3 at around the same price, again IMHO only. Have to be able to solder fine pitch SMD and should have a suitable oscilloscope though.
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Modius looks interesting and also have good spec and price vise competitive with similar Chinese DACs. As they have 15 day return policy I'm tempted to try after I return Topping and SMSL U1.
AK4493 isn't that bad, but its not world class in terms of SQ. Its not a top of the line AKM dac either. I have an occasional acquaintance who visited here only twice ever and over a period of months.
His whole post is at: https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/dac-recommendation.376015/post-7560022
A key observation he made was: "My DAC before that was an RME ADI-2 Pro, which has fantastic specs, but sorry to say sounds awful in comparison."
Which I have no problem believing. I have an original ADI-2 and it sounds awful too.
I will take a well executed version of MarcelvdG RTZ DSD dac any day over any other dac I have heard so far, and I have heard quite a few.
His whole post is at: https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/dac-recommendation.376015/post-7560022
A key observation he made was: "My DAC before that was an RME ADI-2 Pro, which has fantastic specs, but sorry to say sounds awful in comparison."
Which I have no problem believing. I have an original ADI-2 and it sounds awful too.
I will take a well executed version of MarcelvdG RTZ DSD dac any day over any other dac I have heard so far, and I have heard quite a few.
I have a scope and can solder fine pitch but time is the problem. To make my life more hectic I recently invested in 3d printing start up which consumes all my spare time and funds. I set my budget for DAC to 1K max. Mola Mola sounds very appealing as I'm familiar with Bruno's products and he completely changed my opinion about Class D amps. I put together NC400 amp about ten years ago and have no desire to upgrade it as I also have BAT VK55 but listen mostly to my NC400 amp as it is more convenient although they sound slightly different. I'd like to try Pass XA 60 at some point as 30.5 was my favorite amp.
Fifteen years ago when I was looking for a better DAC I bought and compared Benchmark, Young M2Tech and some Musical Fidelity DACs in my system and I could not hear much difference and indeed did not hear any improvement over my Rega Appolo CD player. That was a while ago and considering the pace of development in digital I expected to find much better DACs at much lower price point. After reading BS that "all well measured DACs sound identical" on ASR forum I hoped that I can find a holly grain for less than $500 but so far my experience tells different and what you said mirrors what I suspected.
Fifteen years ago when I was looking for a better DAC I bought and compared Benchmark, Young M2Tech and some Musical Fidelity DACs in my system and I could not hear much difference and indeed did not hear any improvement over my Rega Appolo CD player. That was a while ago and considering the pace of development in digital I expected to find much better DACs at much lower price point. After reading BS that "all well measured DACs sound identical" on ASR forum I hoped that I can find a holly grain for less than $500 but so far my experience tells different and what you said mirrors what I suspected.
It mirrors some posts. I was reading comments of a musician on Steve Hoffman forum who said that he preferred Marantz Dac1 to RME by a large margin.
https://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/my-thoughts-on-the-rme-adi-2.1015038/
RE AK4493- its not just the chip. The overall execution has a significant impact on the sound. And mfr's datasheets don't necessarily lead to the best execution. I have an AKM demo board that had a critical flaw in its execution they did not catch. AKM introduced me to their sound evaluator who explained how the 4493 was optimized for sound. Maybe you need to be in Japan to access the special details if there are any?
Maybe, but I would expect RME could find out?
Also, seems to me its always true that the implementation around a dac chip is critical.
Regarding AKM demo/eval boards, I would agree they are not optimal.
Also, seems to me its always true that the implementation around a dac chip is critical.
Regarding AKM demo/eval boards, I would agree they are not optimal.
SOA clocks - $1,400. Then everything else. If you can have custom transformers made like I use, they will be costly too.
Try a R-2R DAC, those are usually more analog like, that's what my customers say....
I have this one, and it is as basic as cheap as simply perfect for me :
I plan to integrate one in my next tube preamplifier console project...
T
I plan to integrate one in my next tube preamplifier console project...
T
I have an Andrea Mori R2R dac here. Its a pretty good dac. However I prefer a good DSD dac myself. Hard to make them good though. BTW, Bruno Putzeys Mola Mola dacs are sigma delta PWM DSD dacs with, IIRC, 1-tap (in FIRDAC parlance), which is definitely not R2R. Guess I'm more in sync with Bruno's point of view on this.
Problem with R2R (as with other multibit dacs, as I'm sure many already know), is the element matching problem. DSD dacs don't have that problem but they are clearly more sensitive to jitter. Hence the need for good clocks to get best results.
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Not really a problem with Sign Magnitude.... My low end DACs do just fine with low cost 0.05% parts.... And a $6 clock oscillator 🙂
We may define "just fine" differently. However, if you would like to send one of your good dacs here for listening evaluations, I would be happy to give you our feedback either privately or publicly, as you prefer. The dac would be returned to you in original condition at my expense for return shipping, say, after a period of 2 weeks. I can guarantee a fair and honest evaluation. Not unlikely there would be some mix of some good and some less good. BTW, we previously received a dac for the same purpose from Denafrips.
I don't doubt the existence of such clocks merely the logic using them in a playback device when the music to be played back was created on equipment with nowhere near the same largesse lavished on clocks.