Let it break in for at least 50 hours then you will hear what the D50 has to give. When I got mine around 6 months ago I also thought it sounded a bit thin at the begining but after several hours of break in (I left it ON for several hours in a row playing Hi Res music from a Sony UBP X-800 UHD BD player, files were on a SSD) it sounded as it does now,accurate.My journey with dacs started 6 years ago, when I bought Fiio entry level dac. Within few days I upgraded to Fostex HP3 dac, which was far better than Fiio. I had fostex dac for more than 2 years and during that time, I started auditioning other dacs. Through experience, I realized, though fostex was a good dac with clear sound but it was more on analytical side, sounding bit thin and not having enough bass and highs.
I moved on to Chord Mojo, after reading raving reviews from various forums and experts. Finally, bought Chord Mojo, I was amazed with the sound and it still amazes me. I use it along with Luxman 505ux integrated amp. The only downside is, it gets hot very fast. If you keep it on charging while playing than it trips in summer due to the heat it generates.
I decided to have one more dac, alongside Chord to take care of various sources (Apple TV, Laptop, TV etc..). I read good reviews about Topping D50 on this forum and finally bought it in last weekend. It was delivered in a day and I immediately hooked up with Toslink input from apple TV and output feeding into Luxman integrated amp. Immediately impressed with the sound very detailed, nice separation, deep and tight bass and lush highs.
I did a/b to compare against Chord Mojo... I didn’t notice too much difference, but few things stands out in D50
1. Better extended highs than chord
2. Better instruments separation
3. A bit more bass
But one thing where Chord stands out is, better mid level bass, which makes sound more musical.
My question is , does Topping D50 has thinner mid level bass compared to Chord Mojo or I need to give some more burn in time...
Keep atention to the power supply as it will have an impact on the sound of your D50. I feed my D50 with a high capacity powerbank, a 22400 mAh EC Technology I got from Amazon, it's power supply is very stable.
Between my D50 and the amp is conected to I have a Yaqin SD-CD3 Tube Buffer that makes the D50 sound fatter, with wider soundstage and silky mids and high, but not with the supplied tubes, I had to spend 75 € on a pair of NOS JAN (tubes made for the US military and navy) Philips 6SN7GTA.
The mind does wonderous things.
So do good tubes, I have a pair of NOS and in their originalboxes RCA 6SN7 GTB with black plates on the way, they're one of the best 6SN7 tubes ever made, I can't wait to try them with my D50.