Suggestions for a low-cost DAC?

[jabbr]

I have a bunch of really cheap DACs that supposedly "measured well" strewn around my house and car ... meh.

 

The Topping DX7s has been a disappointment for me. I purchases it following the glowing review on ASR. Perhaps I got a bad model but I've tracked it down to static which seems to peak every second or so, somewhat like a scratch on an LP, and so I believe its the analog output stage in the DAC. It doesn't vary if I use the headphone output or the RCA outputs. Using an Uptone Regen ISO doesn't help at all. The sound ultimately is really poor.

 

The  iFi iDSD Micro is vastly better when it works. The glitchiness seems to be because its overloaded with features. If the Espressobin NAA running it reboots, the USB power is cut off and it switches to battery mode. Then dies. I keep have to turning it on and off to get it back into USB power mode -- that sort of glitchy stuff. When the iFi is working (mostly) it sounds great though.

 

I'm almost ready to pull the plug and get a Pro-ject Pre S2 Digital ...

[jabbr]

7 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

analog output stages affect SQ in amps, pre-amps, so.... why not the DAC

 

I'm going to say that all else equal, the analog output is what determines SQ i.e. not all ESS chipped DACs sound the same by any stretch of the imagination, and the analog electronics are what primarily determine SQ.

 

7 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

 

that is also something that a digital circuit engineer may be inclined to ignore, just like they ignore their engineering heat exchange class...

 

I'll be curious to hear your thoughts on the S2 - esp. if you compare it to an RME...

 

Not entirely fair to compare the $400 S2 to a $1300 RME. At that level I'd consider the new Holo Spring 2. It claims DSD1024 and focus on analog electronics (yep uses ESS). The Topping DX7s was supposed to be my experiment to see if I can hear an ESS SQ but I'm not going to blame ESS   So for that reason Pro-ject

[jabbr]

6 hours ago, Miska said:

 

What? Holo Spring is a discrete DAC and doesn't use any COTS DAC chip (ESS or anything else)...

 

 

I have no idea why I wrote that Holo used ESS. Thanks for correcting that. 

 

I think >$1000 offtopic for a “low cost DAC” thread, but I’d love to hear Holo Spring 2 next to T+A (DSD1024 version) ie compare mostly analog electronics for discrete DSD DACs.

[jabbr]

On 2/23/2019 at 3:51 PM, Ralf11 said:

analog output stages affect SQ in amps, pre-amps, so.... why not the DAC

 

that is also something that a digital circuit engineer may be inclined to ignore, just like they ignore their engineering heat exchange class...

 

I'll be curious to hear your thoughts on the S2 - esp. if you compare it to an RME...

 

Ok so I've been sufficiently aggravated by the Topping DX7s with its static, and can't devote more time to try and figure out whether its a driver issue etc etc etc.

 

I'm also tired of my iFi iMicro (original) with its too many switches and settings and glitches ... when it works it sounds great though.

 

Got a Pro-ject S2 Digital, and the out of the box experience is terrific. Plugged it in, clicked on USB input, connected to my Massdrop CTH amp, HQPlayer recognized my Espressobin NAA, and its playing DSD512 beautifully over Wifi. Its the best sub $500 DAC I've heard by far ($399).

 

Does it equal the iFi iDSD Micro -- no, the Micro has "tighter" bass output and "cleaner". The BL is even better. I'm attributing this to differences in the filters/analog output ... to my ear, these differences are more than the differences between different filters.

 

To summarize, although the ASR testing indicates that the DX7s is "better" than the S2, to my ear the S2 vastly beats it -- perhaps I have a malfunctioning unit? Perhaps thats quality control? Who knows (and at this point who cares?)

 

To my ears: iFi iDSD Micro BL > iFi iDSD Micro > Proj-ect S2 >> Topping DX7s (and all the really cheap SMSL etc $100 DACs sound the same to me).

[jabbr]

1 hour ago, Miska said:

By the way, are you both using S2D same way?

 

Well folks, I've tracked this down. Turns out that when I bus powered the S2D directly from the Espressobin, I got the same static (like an LP record with crackling) on the S2D as on the DX7s (the DX7s has an AC connection) but when I bus power the S2 using an Uptone ISO Regen, itself supplied by an LPS1.2, the S2 sounds great!

 

This is the biggest improvement I've heard with an ISO Regen ... ever ... hands down bar none. Its weird that they both have the same issue, perhaps the ESS chips are very power supply sensitive (the iDSD Micro doesn't have this same sensitivity for me). 

 

The S2D is sounding pretty great through the Regen/LPS.

[jabbr]

7 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

 

I'm not clear on what configurations you have compared...

 

S2 w/Regen vs. S2 w/o ??

S2D with Regen -> great

S2D w/o Regen -> background static like the DX7s

 

Quote

 

S2 (how?) vs. the BL version ??  (which is a battery operated DAC, right?)

 

 

 

Will do some more careful listening (the BL doesn't seem Regen dependent at least with the Espressobin) -- I'm not going to use the S2D w/o the Regen/LPS in the future because its unpleasant -- possible that using power isolation etc could fix that but this is supposed to be a semi portable system.

[jabbr]

I can say that the Pro-Ject S2D sounds far better than any of the little wheat thin like DACs that I’ve heard... and I have a few that are laying around my desk and car etc but never call me back to listen. As opposed to the iFi Micro, the Pro-Ject seems to be sensitive to noise on the USB input, in that the UpTone ISO Regen actually makes a big difference (as opposed to the iFi Micro for which it didn’t). The Pro-Ject is far less annoying than the iFi which has too many knobs & switches and options that I can’t keep straight.

[jabbr]

58 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

jabbr, have you compared an expensive DAC with the Pro-Ject S2D?  Say thru a Nelson Paas chain... to speakers?

 

I’m not doing blinded or even sighted A/B comparisons on my NP amps, at least not in the near future. I’m using it with my Cavalli Tube Hybrid (Massdrop version) headphone amp, and it’s quite good. 

 

Frankly there are are so many variables that I find it tedious to do accurate SQ testing on equipment. @Superdad had sent me an ISO Regen for review and I finally bought it — after keeping it for 6 months! — but was still really struggling to hear a difference with the iFi — when I initially used the S2D it frankly sucked until I intervened with the ISO Regen and now I love it — that’s my impression....

 

Im currently in the midst of tuning my server for HQPe — and ultimately will probably give up on the dual E5 and get a faster clocked chip eg i9 ... there are so many many many variables it’s really really hard to control them all.

[jabbr]

32 minutes ago, Shangri-La said:

Yeah the designer has stated that the Pro-Ject S2D will benefit from a linear power supply.

Yeah so the ISO Regen powered by LPS1.1 which is what I’m doing now works just great. 

[jabbr]

2 minutes ago, Jud said:

 

I don't know if it was what Miska was referring to when he mentioned aggravations with the iFi firmware, but for me there are very often times when I have to unplug and replug power to ISO Regen or micro-Rendu to get the iFi to show up as NAA or UPnP/DLNA endpoint.  If it is the DAC, I'd certainly be happier with one that reliably connected for streaming.  (Once it is connected, there's no trouble maintaining that, but it's a PITA having to play with it to get it to show up in the first place.)

 

Yeah so there is this overloading weirdness ... by overloading I mean that unplugging external power switches the device into battery mode, and so you then need to turn on and off to get it back to bus powered mode ... I think the battery then dies and it obviously shiuts off ...  ugghhhhh!

 

The iFi sounds fantastic but its UI is awful. The Pro-ject, I can sit down, hit Room on my iPhone and listen to the music streaming at DSD512 without turning everything on and off 10 times first.

[jabbr]

2 hours ago, Em2016 said:

I wonder if the Pro-Ject measures better (better than 19 bits resolution?) than the iFi and that's why you can hear differences better with the Pro-Ject?

 

"Measuring" with my ears, I am saying that the iFi sounds terrific with or without the Regen. It is the Pro-ject that, for me in this specific setup, has a fairly dramatic improvement with the Regen. So, the Espressobin with its cheap wallwart usb power supply, powering the S2D sounds like crap, and the ISO Regen + LPS 1.1 cleans that up. The iFi Micro doesn't care, its great regardless.

 

Frankly I see this as the problem with anyone listening to something for 30 seconds and then drawing eternal conclusions. 

 

I am all in favor of measurements when they exist, but this difference is dramatic enough that I don't need measurements. What can I say? YMMV

[jabbr]

21 minutes ago, Paul R said:

Unless of course, you guys are letting the music player machine go to sleep. If you do that, the iFi will switch to battery power and die off after 10 or so hours. So the answer is, just don't do *that*. Leave the music machine powered on 24x7.  It will extend the computer's life span anyway.

 

 

In my case I'm using ARM devices for which I often have to custom compile a linux kernel, so yeah who knows? At some point I just want to plug it in and have it work and not worry about these details. ... I'm of the philosophy that I probably put up with more glitchiness than 99% of people out there (other than the other Phasure customers 😂 -- sorry not sorry @PeterSt) and so there's a lot to be said for simple plug and play -- the S2D wins big in this category  

[jabbr]

8 hours ago, PeterSt said:

 

If you rephrase that a little I might be able to understand what you are saying there ... 

 

I was just teasing Peter, and not meaning to talk about Phasure in this “low cost DAC” thread! The Pro-Ject is $399 and might not have good input isolation and is PSU sensitive. 

 

I haven’t tried to control XXHE with Roon, so I can’t fairly comment.

 

What I am discussing here is plug and play, turn it in and go without “fiddling”, and that the Pro-Ject S2M beats out the iFi Micro in this regard (not taking about SQ here). 

 

I dont think thst this is what the majority of Phasure *customers* are looking for for example a USB cable with an approaching infinite number of pluggable configurations  I will also say again that XXHE is a terrific bargain, does a terrific job at PCM upsampling and I encourage everyone to try it. 

 

I haven’t A/B tested the Pro-Ject S2D against my NOS1a. nor have the plans to. (The S2D is in my den and when the household commotion goes up, I plop on my headphones and keep working  )

[jabbr]

7 hours ago, Jud said:

 

I haven't felt that XXHE is glitchy. 

XXHE itself isn’t glitchy, and is a terrific PCM option on Windows. Come to think of it, the place where I had difficulty — and ultimately gave up — was trying to get HQPlayer to play to my NOS1a — so to better clarify: the Phasure customers understand that it’s a someone unitary environment, which produces outstanding SQ, but works best with the full Phasure stack that @PeterSt has so laboriously optimized over the years. 

[jabbr]

8 hours ago, Paul R said:

Difference is I am running the uRendu as Roon Ready. Has never failed so far. I suspect it is the software looking for something that causes the drop off the network. The only situation I can think of that causes the iFi to discharge it's battery though, is a loss of power over the USB port. Ah, I see - you have the drop-offs and Jabber has the battery drain. 

 

Heres what I mean by “overloading interface”. You switch the iFi from battery power to bus power by turning on and off. Gak. So suppose the power briefly shuts off ... my entire network and servers all come back up in an orderly fashion. 

 

But the iFi comes back up as battery powered and will then die despite being plugged into an active USB source ... and when it’s totally dead it seems to need a little fiddling to get it to work again — I’ve seen situations where $ lsusb doesn’t see the iFi so perhaps this is why?

 

In any case I’m seeing what @Jud sees to the point where I tried to upgrade the firmware only to find that the new firmware disables DSD512 in favor of MQA!!!

[jabbr]

1 hour ago, Paul R said:

 

Um - I kinda wonder if the "buggy behavior" is just a conflict of interest. If the DAC is running on battery power, then plugging in a  USB cable cannot be allowed to trigger a switch to bus power. Elsewise, in the portable world, you will be draining people's iPhones very quickly. But you should not be seeing that behavior. 

 

Dropping on and off the net is a protocol issue with the software driving the DAC, not an issue within the DAC itself. 

 

-Paul 

 

 

Or just perhaps, a device should remember its settings despite power cycle. Or perhaps don't overload the power/volume knob with a change in battery vs bus powering. I see this as a UI issue. The Pro-ject S2D UI is vastly better.

[jabbr]

18 minutes ago, Hugo9000 said:

@jabbr , I'm intrigued by your signature, and can't decide if it's meant as a joke or not.  I suppose sound-deadening room treatments to lower ambient noise would be extremely useful for open-back headphone listening, so that could be what you mean?

 

Its a joke, sort of   I'm not tellin'   ... ok: a deconvolution for your brain!

[jabbr]

58 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

update firmware when unaware of the contents of the update (as an April Fool's Day joke)

 

Some of us get a thrill out of gambling ...

[jabbr]

On 4/5/2019 at 12:13 PM, Rinaldi said:

A friend offered me a digital S2 for a good value, will it be worth exchanging the iDAC2 for the S2 or it will not have much difference ??

 

I haven’t listened to the iDAC2 specifically, and whether it makes a difference *to you* depends on you and the rest of your system. I would consider it.

[jabbr]

11 minutes ago, Ottoa62 said:

Where does the Project Box S2 fit into this list? I have one, been getting the itch to maybe change again. But to what. My budget is under 500.00 at 399.00 the S2 fit the bill, per amp, MQA,  etc 

The pro-ject s2d is my recommendation at this price point. if you want to bump up a couple bills the the iFi iDSD micro BL