OK, and what good DAC should I use as interface to handle USB (ESS), coaxial and optical signals?
My interest about this ES9038 DAC was because it had an USB interface plugged on it, as well as the other inputs mentioned.
Of course I mean kits, not assembled boxes, which can be awfully expensive.
My interest about this ES9038 DAC was because it had an USB interface plugged on it, as well as the other inputs mentioned.
Of course I mean kits, not assembled boxes, which can be awfully expensive.
I'm afraid that I've moved past kits to designing and building my own DACs from scratch. These days I'm keeping myself entertained with a dual mono AK4490 DAC. There's a thread about it somewhere around here.
But it is not an inexpensive build. Up to now I've designed (and had made) 5 different PCBs for the build, one of them 4-layer.
It's just now getting to the point of being actually usable.. But there is more to be done.
But it is not an inexpensive build. Up to now I've designed (and had made) 5 different PCBs for the build, one of them 4-layer.
It's just now getting to the point of being actually usable.. But there is more to be done.
Hi,
I bought the module and the case separately, fortunately they fit to each other.
I can confirm that the DAC works. It accepts all the formats up to DSD128 (Foobar2000). Mac converts DSD to 384kHz PCM. It also work with my CD player by a coaxial cable.
I can see a few issues but it is no bad.
I am waiting for professional audio transformers and AD797/MUSES8920, but even now it outperforms my old DACs.
Peter
I bought the module and the case separately, fortunately they fit to each other.
I can confirm that the DAC works. It accepts all the formats up to DSD128 (Foobar2000). Mac converts DSD to 384kHz PCM. It also work with my CD player by a coaxial cable.
I can see a few issues but it is no bad.
I am waiting for professional audio transformers and AD797/MUSES8920, but even now it outperforms my old DACs.
Peter
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
I'll throw in another data point. I have this ES9038PRO DAC board (from a different seller, diyeshop-668), and to my ears it outperforms SMSL M9 and Topping D50 DACs(I own all three). Music just seems a bit more "fresh" and "intimate" through this DAC. I replaced the NE5532 and NE5534 Opamps that came with board with LM4562 and LME49710, but I am not sure how much difference it made.
Kurt
Kurt
Looks like the same dac board someone is modding to fix some sound quality shortcomings over here: Moving from 9038Q2M to a 9028Pro board Different heat sink on the voltage regulators is all.
Of course, a lot of the know-how and influence on that project came from over here: ES9038Q2M Board
Of course, a lot of the know-how and influence on that project came from over here: ES9038Q2M Board
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Haven't seen any problems with any used or otherwise under performing chips.
Regarding the other thread, if you are thinking about making any upgrades to the board you have, it would probably be worthwhile to take look at the ES9038Q2M thread that I also linked.
There seem to be three main areas by which low cost Chinese Sabre dac boards of any kind can be transformed to achieve pretty much amazing improvement in sound quality, no matter how good you may think it sounds now. (1) all the power supplies need to be as clean as you can get them, especially one or two called AVCC. That needs to be super clean and stable, (2) they sound much better with high sample rate DSD rather than PCM even for playing regular CDs. The way we do that over in the other thread is to use a Chinese AK4137 sample rate converter board to convert all incoming audio to 11.2MHz DSD, and (3) the clock should be replaced with a lowest jitter one you can find. A Crystek CCHD-575 100MHz works better than almost any others if you want to be able to play back the highest sample rates. If you are willing to accept lower sample rates only, there are more manufacturers of good clocks at lower frequencies.
That is the most of it. Smaller improvements can be made with a dedicated regulator for the clock, maybe VCCA, and by tweaking some dac chip control registers to for lowest distortion operation.
Now, I know there are other people that like opamp rolling and transformer outputs and stuff like that. Those things are bandaids in my view and experience. The recommended approach would just be to fix the dac properly so it doesn't need bandaids.
Regarding the other thread, if you are thinking about making any upgrades to the board you have, it would probably be worthwhile to take look at the ES9038Q2M thread that I also linked.
There seem to be three main areas by which low cost Chinese Sabre dac boards of any kind can be transformed to achieve pretty much amazing improvement in sound quality, no matter how good you may think it sounds now. (1) all the power supplies need to be as clean as you can get them, especially one or two called AVCC. That needs to be super clean and stable, (2) they sound much better with high sample rate DSD rather than PCM even for playing regular CDs. The way we do that over in the other thread is to use a Chinese AK4137 sample rate converter board to convert all incoming audio to 11.2MHz DSD, and (3) the clock should be replaced with a lowest jitter one you can find. A Crystek CCHD-575 100MHz works better than almost any others if you want to be able to play back the highest sample rates. If you are willing to accept lower sample rates only, there are more manufacturers of good clocks at lower frequencies.
That is the most of it. Smaller improvements can be made with a dedicated regulator for the clock, maybe VCCA, and by tweaking some dac chip control registers to for lowest distortion operation.
Now, I know there are other people that like opamp rolling and transformer outputs and stuff like that. Those things are bandaids in my view and experience. The recommended approach would just be to fix the dac properly so it doesn't need bandaids.
I was considering buying Topping D50 after I had read this review:
Review and Measurements of Topping D50 DAC | Audio Science Review (ASR) Forum
My ES9038PRO I bought here:
ES9038PRO DAC DSD Decoder board HIFI + TCXO 0.1PPM better than ES9018 ES9028PRO | eBay
Review and Measurements of Topping D50 DAC | Audio Science Review (ASR) Forum
My ES9038PRO I bought here:
ES9038PRO DAC DSD Decoder board HIFI + TCXO 0.1PPM better than ES9018 ES9028PRO | eBay
Peter,
What board is that up front? Did you buy it separately? From whom?
It looks different from the one on eBay.
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carlmart,
I enclosed the link above - seller's name is 2012moon816 - with the Amanero USB module. Seller answers inquiries within 24h.
The board came really dirty but got running without any problems. There was missing an IR receiver.
I decided to buy everything separately and audio transformers at a reliable Polish producer's shop (I am waiting for them). I haven't trusted in Chinese transformers since one of them burned completely.
I can see that they offer also version with the Crystek oscillator:
NEW Version ES9038 ES9038PRO DAC decoder assembled board upgrade Crystek CCHD 575 option USB XMOS XU208 or Amanero HIFI AUDIO-in Amplifier from Consumer Electronics on Aliexpress.com | Alibaba Group
but it is more expensive then buying the board and the oscillator separately.
I enclosed the link above - seller's name is 2012moon816 - with the Amanero USB module. Seller answers inquiries within 24h.
The board came really dirty but got running without any problems. There was missing an IR receiver.
I decided to buy everything separately and audio transformers at a reliable Polish producer's shop (I am waiting for them). I haven't trusted in Chinese transformers since one of them burned completely.
I can see that they offer also version with the Crystek oscillator:
NEW Version ES9038 ES9038PRO DAC decoder assembled board upgrade Crystek CCHD 575 option USB XMOS XU208 or Amanero HIFI AUDIO-in Amplifier from Consumer Electronics on Aliexpress.com | Alibaba Group
but it is more expensive then buying the board and the oscillator separately.
You would need software that could keep three different USB devices in sync with each other. Don't know if such a product exists.
Some semi-professional home audio recording interfaces have multiple dac channels that use one USB output along with a multi-channel ASIO driver for Windows or Mac. You would still need software with DSP that do the cross-over filter calculations on your playback audio data stream in real time. Don't know if you have something like that in mind.
Probably more common are solutions that send stereo to a hardware DSP chip that does the cross-over filter DSP. MiniDSP devices can do that, although sound quality is not great on those or on any off-the-shelf devices that I know about so far. MiniDSP does make a nanoDSP board that can connect to mulitple dac channels over I2S. One Sabre ES9038PRO actually is capable of running 8-channels at once, although I don't know of a low cost off-the-shelf dac board that offers all 8 channels. I guess an ES9038PRO evaluation board could do it. You would probably need to add power supplies and whatever else. One of the evaluation boards combined with a nanoDSP might get you pretty close to what you want to do.
By the way, the above considerations are why I don't understand people bi-amping and tri-amping in a diy setting. Most of the electronic cross-overs sold for that are junk (IMHO, of course) with cheap low quality analog input and output data converters. Not a very good way to try to get to an end result of really good sounding speakers, again IMHO.
EDIT: Right now a friend is going through trying to figure how to do very high quality bi-amping of his speakers. He is running into the same issue of trying to find a very high quality solution. It may be that something like a nanoDSP and a multi-channel dac could be the best we will be able to do without having to write custom DSP code.
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You need a multi channel USB->I2S bridge and then feed I2S to each DAC board.
There are a few boards available that do 6 channels at 384k and 8 channels at 192k.
With this setup only one USB connection is required from computer to DACs.
There should be no issues with synchronization or bandwidth. I currently use a 12 channel ADC-> DAC interface for recording that runs through USB no problems.
It all depends on your budget and experience with connecting the DACs up.
By the time you add up the cost of all this, ie; separate DAC boards etc, it
might be worth considering buying a (semi) pro interface and mod it for
higher quality. One issue is ALL pro interfaces will have capability to slave off
wordclock and as such *may not have really high quality clocking for reasons too complex to go into here.
Having said this, many of the Pro interfaces now have moved to Sabre DAC
chips and from what I've seen, achieve really excellent measured results, far
better than these cheaper ebay DAC boards.
T
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