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Dacs Again

sq225917 said:
I gave up on dacs a couple of years ago. I can find different, but not better.
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I can kind of understand that... I found that with CDPs back in the day, settled on the fact that I couldn't better the Arcam CD192 I had, no matter how hard I tried

However; having owned the SMSL SU?8 DAC with my JBL active studio monitors and now the SMSL SU9n; I'm confident in saying the SU9n is punchier and more open than the SU8 and the bass is deeper/tauter... Not by stupid amounts; enough to notice though...

Last nights listening to The Hu, Rammstein's latest album and some London Grammar tracks showed that to me!
 
Alex S said:
I've decided you need either something really good and expensive or two dacs - an ASR top of the league jobby and a nice R2R. Rather like I decided a while ago that I need two systems - active monitors and valves/efficient speakers. I switch between them as the mood takes me, and, to totally contradict what I just said, they actually sound very similar.
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Snap Alex. That is exactly the same conclusion I'm coming to. Only I do find them different :)

The MMB2 plays jazz, blues and other "simple" emotional music perfectly, just so involving. Whilst the DX3 Pro+ is better for more upbeat music. I have them in a Roon group, so it's simple to switch between them on the preamp....level matched too for quick A B comparison.
 
Alex S said:
@shoniss, probably good advice but would you deem a Bluesound Node to also be transparent when used as a digital transport since, sadly, to my ears, it's not.
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Hi Alex, I’ve not spent anytime with the node to comment beyond an observation that it seems to be recommended by audiophiles for non-audiophiles due to ease of use not because of it’s sound quality. I’m not sure my system or more probably room would allow me to discern a difference. I bought a WiiM instead as it was a quarter of the price of the node and got more or less the same outcome. I’m not entirely convinced by it but it’s a good experiment. When I discovered the issue with Airplay 2 I thought there was a workaround that involved playing a locally stored file via airplay but proved not to be the WiiM reports a 256k AAC stream. I am hoping that Apple address this problem as it has been worked around on android e.g Eversolo DMP 6.
Kind Regards.
 
So the SMSL DAC has gone back to Amazon today

It didn't play well with my M2 Mac at all; constant drops and when it started to play, it was like it was in fast forward and the only way to rectify it was to disconnect & reconnect; not impressed.

But it is what it is; plugged my Focusrite Scarlett Solo back in and zero issues; works faultlessly & sounds excellent... Just no remote; but it's not a biggy
 
Bad luck. One reason I went Topping is the reports of SMSL not playing nice with Mac. The D70 Pro Sabre has been faultless so far, really good UI and I'm very pleased with how it sounds.
 
Alex S said:
Bad luck. One reason I went Topping is the reports of SMSL not playing nice with Mac. The D70 Pro Sabre has been faultless so far, really good UI and I'm very pleased with how it sounds.
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My previous SMSL SU8 was faultless; that was with my M1 Mac though...
 
hifilover1979 said:
So the SMSL DAC has gone back to Amazon today

It didn't play well with my M2 Mac at all; constant drops and when it started to play, it was like it was in fast forward and the only way to rectify it was to disconnect & reconnect; not impressed.

But it is what it is; plugged my Focusrite Scarlett Solo back in and zero issues; works faultlessly & sounds excellent... Just no remote; but it's not a biggy
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I had drop-outs with an M2 (8GB RAM), now solved by replacing it with a 16GB M1.
I found out about this by reading reports of a few people on Audiophile Style who also experienced drop-out issues with 8GB M1/M2 minis and the changed to a 16GB machine.
 
Alex S said:
Bad luck. One reason I went Topping is the reports of SMSL not playing nice with Mac. The D70 Pro Sabre has been faultless so far, really good UI and I'm very pleased with how it sounds.
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I don't wish to alarm you but I've read reports of technical issues with Topping DACs and HQPlayer developper is no longer recommending them. I hope yours will not suffer from any ailments.
 
tuga said:
I had drop-outs with an M2 (8GB RAM), now solved by replacing it with a 16GB M1.
I found out about this by reading reports of a few people on Audiophile Style who also experienced drop-out issues with 8GB M1/M2 minis and the changed to a 16GB machine.
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My M1 Mac was 8GB; never had any issues; seems the M2 does and it's known a bit. A few posts on Macrumors etc - it'll get sorted with a software update no doubt

Fortunately the Focusrite is spot on and sits at 192 Hz perfectly
 
I bought a Topping E30 mostly to use as a DDC, it started smoking within minutes of being connected, it went back, certainly not a "dream topping!" The same fate befell a Douk/Nobsound DDC. Amazon were great both times. My Singxer SU-6 has been great for the year I've owned it.
 
Thanks but I won’t. I don’t dispute stories of Topping’s bad QA/QC, much like (m)any other Chinese manufacturers. It certainly helps keep costs down and the buyer has to make a choice. My own view, infallible to date is that if a piece of modern electronics works day one to 14, it’ll work for a few years.
 
My gustard dac was faulty out of the box. But the chip factory burnt down the week it landed so I figured worth fixing for rarity value. Bad op amp in the output stage. Been flawless since.
 
Alex S said:
Thanks but I won’t. I don’t dispute stories of Topping’s bad QA/QC, much like (m)any other Chinese manufacturers. It certainly helps keep costs down and the buyer has to make a choice. My own view, infallible to date is that if a piece of modern electronics works day one to 14, it’ll work for a few years.
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The HQPlayer developer’s criticism of Topping relates to their behavior when processing DSD, which is very buggy. I think Topping just aim to get a high rating on ASR’s tests and don’t bother very much with functionalities that are not considered in these tests. I have a Topping D70S and it is great with PCM but more or less unusable with DSD. SMSL is said to be almost as bad as Topping in this regard but my VMVD2 appears to be fine.
 
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