Topping DX7 DAC & Headphone Amplifier Review and Measurements

[Jimster480]

At this point I'm not sure whether Amir is upshilling Topping by downshilling Schiit or if SBAF/Head-Fi is trying to censor the truth because I don't know enough about audio science to know whether the measurements are accurate or really mean anything and I can't trust anyone to be unbiased in this forum war

I guess I'll just get my Topping DX7S next month and hope it sounds significantly better than my PC's onboard audio.

EDIT: If anyone would like to loan me a Schiit Jotunheim with the DAC module I can do an uneducated unbiased subjective no-measurements comparison between the two.

Actually Schiit products just aren't as good as they say they are.
There will be other stuff measured too, but right now the Topping stuff just measures really well for the money.
Soon he will have the M8 and others to test in a lower price range.
The JDS Labs OLDAC actually beats most of the Schiit products too. Does it mean hes shelling JDS Labs also?

All hes doing is measuring gear and putting the results out there for everyone to see. He's actually not being a shill of any kind

 

[FrantzM]

Hi

My posts have been lately of the shilling, applauding variety... I will continue in that directions since I don't have much else to add .. This is great! This is making people aware of an inexpensive product in a hobby that seems to be predicated on selling ever more expensive stuff for no improvement in sound quality.
I am buying the Topping and ... am in the meantime learning to measure , to correct and to integrate ... A bit Off-topic : I recently bought the JBL LSR 308 and cannot begin to understand how good these things can sound. I have had the Kef LS50 , the AudioEngine HD6 .. these products were hailed by a good number of reviewers as being great. Well.... in my honest opinion, the LSR308 seems to surpass these to my ears..
I have downloaded REW, I will download later Acourate, I haven't corrected the JBL yet .... I haven't used the latest audiophile Power Cords, the Viper Cobra, rattlesnake Ultra Power Cord in the JBL yet and I am looking for a good grounding box to see how I will widen my soundstage which is at this point quite wide but not yet galactic-wide

The point I am trying to make is that we have been steered astray by the audiophile press and many fora... It seems to me that most audiophiles go to the jewelry aspect of the hobby rather than concentrate on the real performance (even subjective)... Good speakers, properly corrected ( not as easy as it sounds) , room treatment and proper subwoofer integration will bring a level of quality that can bring endless musical enjoyment and financial health. In other words .. These days more than ever great performance is available for reasonable amount of money. This forum is leading the way. It is revealing in a startling way the amount of B-Schitt ( I am not using an expletive here )

I have to shoot
CONGRATS AMIR.
Long Live the KING
I bestow you this, if you hadn't had one yet

 

[Thomas savage]

Hi

My posts have been lately of the shilling, applauding variety... I will continue in that directions since I don't have much else to add .. This is great! This is making people aware of an inexpensive product in a hobby that seems to be predicated on selling ever more expensive stuff for no improvement in sound quality.
I am buying the Topping and ... am in the meantime learning to measure , to correct and to integrate ... A bit Off-topic : I recently bought the JBL LSR 308 and cannot begin to understand how good these things can sound. I have had the Kef LS50 , the AudioEngine HD6 .. these products were hailed by a good number of reviewers as being great. Well.... in my honest opinion, the LSR308 seems to surpass these to my ears..
I have downloaded REW, I will download later Acourate, I haven't corrected the JBL yet .... I haven't used the latest audiophile Power Cords, the Viper Cobra, rattlesnake Ultra Power Cord in the JBL yet and I am looking for a good grounding box to see how I will widen my soundstage which is at this point quite wide but not yet galactic-wide

The point I am trying to make is that we have been steered astray by the audiophile press and many fora... It seems to me that most audiophiles go to the jewelry aspect of the hobby rather than concentrate on the real performance (even subjective)... Good speakers, properly corrected ( not as easy as it sounds) , room treatment and proper subwoofer integration will bring a level of quality that can bring endless musical enjoyment and financial health. In other words .. These days more than ever great performance is available for reasonable amount of money. This forum is leading the way. It is revealing in a startling way the amount of B-Schitt ( I am not using an expletive here )

I have to shoot
CONGRATS AMIR.
Long Live the KING
I bestow you this, if you hadn't had one yet

I’d take my JBL 705p’s over the kef LS50 any day of the week.. I’m no JBL fan boy but they piss all over the kef , I think the kef is one of the most overrated speakers Iv ever heard tbh.

Nice crown , might be too heavy for amir though

 

[amirm]

I have to shoot
CONGRATS AMIR.
Long Live the KING
I bestow you this, if you hadn't had one yet

Now if you all chant like Frantz, I will be happy! Otherwise I have to go and finish my Caviar for breakfast....

 

[amirm]

At this point I'm not sure whether Amir is upshilling Topping by downshilling Schiit or if SBAF/Head-Fi is trying to censor the truth because I don't know enough about audio science to know whether the measurements are accurate or really mean anything and I can't trust anyone to be unbiased in this forum war

I guess I'll just get my Topping DX7S next month and hope it sounds significantly better than my PC's onboard audio.

Welcome aboard. And congrats for stealing that alias!

Truth to be told I am pretty uncomfortable with that accidental association. I am hoping some other brand products do well so that I can recommend them.

 

[Thomas savage]

Welcome aboard. And congrats for stealing that alias!

Truth to be told I am pretty uncomfortable with that accidental association. I am hoping some other brand products do well so that I can recommend them.

If your really that uncomfortable Id happily take advantage of that Hawaii time share topping bought you ..

 

[L0rdGwyn]

I reached out to Topping about the D50, I was told it will retail for $249.99 and will be released at the beginning of March.

Feeling the pangs of Massdrop DX7S buyer's remorse. I don't have much use for the balanced amp, likely would have gone for the standalone DAC had I known.

Here's to hoping the DX7S head-amp is something special

 

[stunta]

I reached out to Topping about the D50, I was told it will retail for $249.99 and will be released at the beginning of March.

Feeling the pangs of Massdrop DX7S buyer's remorse. I don't have much use for the balanced amp, likely would have gone for the standalone DAC had I known.

Here's to hoping the DX7S head-amp is something special

It may not be that hard to turn around and sell it especially if you don't open the box.

I paid more than the massdrop price and have no regrets. No new DAC for me a while .

 

[Jimster480]

Following what was posted on headfi, when you install the DX7 via USB there is a "human interface device" that will be installed aswell.
This device on windows 10 will keep the computer awake.

Interestingly I just reinstalled my DX7 via USB (was using Coax output from SMSL xUSB) and it installed as 16/48kHz?

I reached out to Topping about the D50, I was told it will retail for $249.99 and will be released at the beginning of March.

Feeling the pangs of Massdrop DX7S buyer's remorse. I don't have much use for the balanced amp, likely would have gone for the standalone DAC had I known.

Here's to hoping the DX7S head-amp is something special

Any idea what is inside? Dual 9038Q2M also? Doesn't look balanced tho

 

[rebbiputzmaker]

Following what was posted on headfi, when you install the DX7 via USB there is a "human interface device" that will be installed aswell.
This device on windows 10 will keep the computer awake.

Interestingly I just reinstalled my DX7 via USB (was using Coax output from SMSL xUSB) and it installed as 16/48kHz?




Any idea what is inside? Dual 9038Q2M also? Doesn't look balanced tho

Is there any listing anywhere online, do not see anything on their web site, not even a picture.

 

[Jimster480]

Is there any listing anywhere online, do not see anything on their web site, not even a picture.

The only picture of the device itself is in the picture with the DX7S, I posted the picture on this site before. I would post it again but their website is seemingly down at the moment.

 

[amirm]

Interestingly I just reinstalled my DX7 via USB (was using Coax output from SMSL xUSB) and it installed as 16/48kHz?

Where did you see that?

 

[Jimster480]

Where did you see that?

My windows did it in Sound->PlayBack->DX7->Properties->Advanced

I thought the audio sounded weird and too recessed.. I noticed the screen said 48khz so I set it back now to 44.1 and its fine. Just weird that it installed the driver as 48khz.

 

[amirm]

My windows did it in Sound->PlayBack->DX7->Properties->Advanced

Ah, you can't go by that. What that is showing is the fixed bit depth and sampling rate that Windows will convert everything you play using normal audio pipeline. It does not care what else the device can play.

If you click on that drop down you see other choices that you can select.

But you should not be using Windows audio pipeline. You should use an audio player that lets you bypass that using WASAPI interface. Once you select that, then the above setting makes no difference.

For now, set that to 44.1 at 24 bits so that there is no sample rate conversion when you play CD with everyday applications.

 

[Jimster480]

Ah, you can't go by that. What that is showing is the fixed bit depth and sampling rate that Windows will convert everything you play using normal audio pipeline. It does not care what else the device can play.

If you click on that drop down you see other choices that you can select.

But you should not be using Windows audio pipeline. You should use an audio player that lets you bypass that using WASAPI interface. Once you select that, then the above setting makes no difference.

For now, set that to 44.1 at 24 bits so that there is no sample rate conversion when you play CD with everyday applications.

44.1/24 really?
I've always used 44.1/16.
I'll set it to 24, but I primarily listen via Spotify which doesn't let me bypass WASAPI

I have foobar with Kernel streaming but I don't use that as I don't really have any music library after my music drive died a couple years ago.

 

[amirm]

4.1/24 really?
I've always used 44.1/16.
I'll set it to 24, but I primarily listen via Spotify which doesn't let me bypass WASAPI

The reason for 24 bit is that internal sample resolution in Windows is floating point. This then needs to be dithered down to 16 or 24 bits before sending it to DAC as integer values. Setting it to 24 bits lowers the impact of that dither.

But yes if you use streaming apps like that, they will only use Windows audio stack and hence the reason you want to set the sample depth/rate to a reasonable value.

 

[Jimster480]

The reason for 24 bit is that internal sample resolution in Windows is floating point. This then needs to be dithered down to 16 or 24 bits before sending it to DAC as integer values. Setting it to 24 bits lowers the impact of that dither.

But yes if you use streaming apps like that, they will only use Windows audio stack and hence the reason you want to set the sample depth/rate to a reasonable value.

Good to know, I will change it to 24 bit on both of my systems.
I long for the day that Spotify has Kernel Streaming (EDIT: Or ASIO support)!

 

[AdrianG]

Waiting for the D50 review! i wonder how much it'll cost... Saludos amigos !

 

[punkriot]

Regarding Spotify, they are still not using lossless compression. So this is probably the reason why they do not care about WASAPI exclusive mode. You can test TIDAL for a while. With HiFi or Master you can use WASAPI exclusive mode.

 

[Jimster480]

Regarding Spotify, they are still not using lossless compression. So this is probably the reason why they do not care about WASAPI exclusive mode. You can test TIDAL for a while. With HiFi or Master you can use WASAPI exclusive mode.

Yes but Tidal is just inferior to Spotify in every way other than having FLAC. But honestly OGG VBR Q9 is so close to lossless that I don't think there is any real sonic advantage to using FLAC. And FLAC is 8x the bandwidth usage