Review and Measurements of Topping D10 DAC

[DataX]

I've been reading through the comments about the sleep issue and confirmed I was also able to reproduce. I typically never let my system sleep/hibernate so I hadn't ran into it and not sure if this happened prior to the firmware update.

I started poking around and found that if you simply disable and enable the D10 in Windows Device Manager, this will cause it to reset and restore normal functionality. I believe you may need the Topping USB driver as the 'Topping USB Audio Devices' will only appear once this has been installed.

Further, I figured it would be pretty easy to script this in PowerShell, so that's what I did. I've attached a PowerShell script which will simply look for this device, then disable and re-enable. I'm running Windows 1803, so there's a chance this *might* not work with older versions of Windows 10 or Windows 8 as it requires the "Disable-PnpDevice" cmdlet.

# Prompt for Administrator rights if not running as admin already.
if (!([Security.Principal.WindowsPrincipal][Security.Principal.WindowsIdentity]::GetCurrent()).IsInRole([Security.Principal.WindowsBuiltInRole] "Administrator")) {
 Write-Host "Need elevated rights, will prompt now..." -ForegroundColor Red; Sleep 2; Start-Process powershell.exe "-NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File `"$PSCommandPath`"" -Verb RunAs; exit }

$toppingdevice = Get-PnpDevice -Class ToppingUsbAudio_sc -Status OK | Select -Property InstanceId

Write-Host "Resetting Topping USB Device..." -ForegroundColor Green
Try {

Disable-PnpDevice -InstanceId $toppingdevice.InstanceId -Confirm:$false; Sleep 2
Enable-PnpDevice -InstanceId $toppingdevice.InstanceId -Confirm:$false

Write-Host "Done!" -ForegroundColor Green; Sleep 2

} Catch { Write-Host "Failed to Disable/Enable Topping USB Device." -ForegroundColor Red; Sleep 5 ; Break }

To use, extract the script, right click and select "Run with PowerShell". It will prompt for admin rights and return a status message if able to complete.

You could also potentially create a scheduled task to automatically run this whenever your system comes back from sleep.

 

[έχω δίκιο]

I've been reading through the comments about the sleep issue and confirmed I was also able to reproduce. I typically never let my system sleep/hibernate so I hadn't ran into it and not sure if this happened prior to the firmware update.

I started poking around and found that if you simply disable and enable the D10 in Windows Device Manager, this will cause it to reset and restore normal functionality. I believe you may need the Topping USB driver as the 'Topping USB Audio Devices' will only appear once this has been installed.

Very nice! Thank you. That will give me an easy way to do it on my Windows 10 box, but I have to work on the iMac Pro some more to find a solution -- other than disabling sleep, which is what I've done now.

 

[Krunok]

If nothing else, most of the HiRes stuff has been more carefully mastered.

Is that really so? For all we know it can as well be poorly mastered and upsampled to so called HiRes.

 

[Krunok]

When I started to use it it was free & unlimited. At the moment I pay around 2,5€/month. It has the distinct advantage of being off-site

Heh.. I'm not really sure if I was to trust a backup provider with any kind of valuable data for 2,5 EUR/month. What kind of reliabilty and support can you expect for that kind of money?

 

[έχω δίκιο]

Is that really so?

Yes, it really is so. I have such recordings.

For all we know it can as well be poorly mastered and upsampled to so called HiRes.

And for all we know, CDs are really just mastered by playing cassettes and holding microphones in front of speakers, right? Sorry for being a wise ass, but having heard high resolution versions of CDs that I own, the difference is usually striking.

I'll refer you to a study entitled "Audibility of a CD-Standard A/DA/A Loop Inserted into High-Resolution Audio Playback[/quote] by E. Brad Meyer and David R. Moran, AES Member:

A NOTE ON HIGH-RESOLUTION RECORDINGS Though our tests failed to substantiate the claimed advantages of high-resolution encoding for two-channel audio, one trend became obvious very quickly and held up throughout our testing: virtually all of the SACD and DVD-A recordings sounded better than most CDs— sometimes much better. Had we not “degraded” the sound to CD quality and blind-tested for audible differences, we would have been tempted to ascribe this sonic superiority to the recording processes used to make them. Plausible reasons for the remarkable sound quality of these recordings emerged in discussions with some of the engineers currently working on such projects. This portion of the business is a niche market in which the end users are preselected, both for their aural acuity and for their willingness to buy expensive equipment, set it up correctly, and listen carefully in a low-noise environment. Partly because these recordings have not captured a large portion of the consumer market for music, engineers and producers are being given the freedom to produce recordings that sound as good as they can make them, without having to compress or equalize the signal to suit lesser systems and casual listening conditions. These recordings seem to have been made with great care and manifest affection, by engineers trying to please themselves and their peers. They sound like it, label after label. High-resolution audio discs do not have the overwhelming majority of the program material crammed into the top 20 (or even 10) dB of the available dynamic range, as so many CDs today do.

 

[Krunok]

Sorry for being a wise ass, but having heard high resolution versions of CDs that I own, the difference is usually striking.

If you do a proper blind test I'm pretty sure the difference won't exist at all, especially given our age.

 

[derp1n]

If nothing else, most of the HiRes stuff has been more carefully mastered.

Unfortunately, that's not true in practice.

 

[bakker_be]

Heh.. I'm not really sure if I was to trust a backup provider with any kind of valuable data for 2,5 EUR/month. What kind of reliabilty and support can you expect for that kind of money?

I was on the "free" consumer tier of Crashplan when they stopped it, giving all freeloaders the option to migrate to their Business offering at a temporarily reduced price. Current official price is $10 US/PC/month for unlimited backup, and that's what I'll be paying in a couple of months as well. It is a pure back-up solution, meaning you don't get cloud storage as is the case with e.g. Onedrive, Dropbox etc, allowing them to dimension and manage their server farms accordingly.

 

[Snarfie]

Is that really so? For all we know it can as well be poorly mastered and upsampled to so called HiRes.

My impression is that remasterd older records ar more or less compressed so bass is brought up a lot. In a lot of highres remastering material if compared with the original vinyl or cd the dynamic range get less have a look at dr loudness wars website When listning it is very personal if you like it or not.

 

[έχω δίκιο]

If you do a proper blind test I'm pretty sure the difference won't exist at all, especially given our age.

I'll take you up on that challenge. Let's go with this track for the blind test:
Artist: Grateful Dead
Album: American Beauty
Track: Ripple
CD Release: Warner Brothers (no. 1893-2, UPC 07599-27190-2)
HD Release: HDTracks 24/192

Unfortunately, that's not true in practice.

Yes it is true in practice. Ask the AES members who authored the paper I alluded to or the recording engineers to whom they spoke. Again, this is what they wrote:

"...virtually all of the SACD and DVD-A recordings sounded better than most CDs— sometimes much better."

"...engineers and producers are being given the freedom to produce recordings that sound as good as they can make them, without having to compress or equalize the signal to suit lesser systems and casual listening conditions. These recordings seem to have been made with great care and manifest affection, by engineers trying to please themselves and their peers. They sound like it, label after label. High-resolution audio discs do not have the overwhelming majority of the program material crammed into the top 20 (or even 10) dB of the available dynamic range, as so many CDs today do."

 

[Krunok]

I'll take you up on that challenge. Let's go with this track for the blind test:
Artist: Grateful Dead
Album: American Beauty
Track: Ripple
CD Release: Warner Brothers (no. 1893-2, UPC 07599-27190-2)
HD Release: HDTracks 24/192

You sent me 2 files, 192/16 and 192/24. Funny thing is I can tell them apart from the beginning by the sound of the lead acoustic guitar from the left channel. In 192/24 guitar appears to sound with more "body" to me, while in 192/16 is a little "hollow".

Is this the same analog recording?

 

[έχω δίκιο]

You sent me 2 files, 192/16 and 192/24. Funny thing is I can tell them apart from the beginning by the sound of the lead acoustic guitar from the left channel. In 192/24 guitar appears to sound with more "body" to me, while in 192/16 is a little "hollow".

My apologies for the inadvertent transcoding of the 44.1/16 CD version to 192/16. Audacity did that and I didn't catch it at the time. I suspect it is because I imported both tracks into the same project (to sync them by deleting silence at the beginning) and it transcoded in order to make the sampling rates match. I'll privately send you a link to a non-transcoded version at 44.1/16.

Funny thing is I can tell them apart from the beginning by the sound of the lead acoustic guitar from the left channel. In 192/24 guitar appears to sound with more "body" to me, while in 192/16 is a little "hollow".

I agree and I just find it to be a better sound throughout. BTW, I love that track for evaluation of audio gear. People don't realize what perfectionists the Grateful dead were when it came to recording. It's hard to believe that recording was made in 1970.

Is this the same analog recording?

Yes -- they line up to the millisecond and, though the Grateful Dead were talented musicians, no musician is that talented. This is an example of remastering for high definition releases. They can do a new digital transfer, often with better, more modern ADCs, and revisit compression, EQ, and even mixing. That's what makes the big difference -- not sampling rate or bit depth.

 

[Krunok]

My apologies for the transcoding of the 44.1/16 CD version to 192/16. Audacity did that and I didn't catch it at the time. I suspect it is because I imported both tracks into the same project (to sync them by deleting silence at the beginning) and it transcoded in order to make the sampling rates match. I'll privately send you a link to a non-transcoded version at 44.1/16.

I don't hear the difference between 44.1/16 and 192/16, so comment from my previous post still stands. So, you're sure that both of those files are coming from the same analog source recording that has been converted to different digital formats?

 

[έχω δίκιο]

I don't hear the difference between 44.1/16 and 192/16, so comment from my previous post still stands.

You might want to reread your comment:

If nothing else, most of the HiRes stuff has been more carefully mastered.

Is that really so? For all we know it can as well be poorly mastered and upsampled to so called HiRes.

You heard it for yourself: The Warner Brothers CD recording of Ripple clearly sounds inferior to the HDTracks 24/192 recording of the same song.

So, you're sure that both of those files are coming from the same analog source recording that has been converted to different digital formats?

The same 1970 studio analog recording was the source for both. As I mentioned in response to your edit, "they line up to the millisecond and, though the Grateful Dead were talented musicians, no musician is that talented."

 

[Krunok]

I'm guessing that was a tape master, right? Was the same tape player used for making both digital files? Were they made the same day and the only difference was the bitrate of the ADC?

Maybe the test would be better if you downsample 192/24 file to 44.1/16?

 

[έχω δίκιο]

I'm guessing that was a tape master, right?

The album was recorded in 1970 on analog tape.

Was the same tape player used for making both digital files? Were they made the same day and the only difference was the bitrate of the ADC?

No. The whole point of this exercise is to support my statement that "the HiRes stuff has been more carefully mastered." and to refute yours that " [f]or all we know it can as well be poorly mastered and upsampled to so called HiRes."

"Mastering" doesn't mean playing a two-track analog tape and feeding the signal to an ADC. It's everything from compression to EQ to limiting to, in some cases, mixing. It can also involve digital signal processing to reduce the audibility of tape hiss. That's why it matters so much.

Maybe the test would be better if you downsample 192/24 file to 44.1/16?

So if I downsampled to 44.1/16 and you still heard that the HDTracks version was superior to the Warner Brothers CD, would you then concede that you were wrong when you wrote "f you do a proper blind test I'm pretty sure the difference won't exist at all, especially given our age" and "[f]or all we know it can as well be poorly mastered and upsampled to so called HiRes"?

 

[Krunok]

The album was recorded in 1970 on analog tape.


No. The whole point of this exercise is to support my statement that "the HiRes stuff has been more carefully mastered." and to refute yours that " [f]or all we know it can as well be poorly mastered and upsampled to so called HiRes."

"Mastering" doesn't mean playing a two-track analog tape and feeding the signal to an ADC. It's everything from compression to EQ to limiting to, in some cases, mixing. It can also involve digital signal processing to reduce the audibility of tape hiss. That's why it matters so much.


So if I downsampled to 44.1/16 and you still heard that the HDTracks version was superior to the Warner Brothers CD, would you then concede that you were wrong when you wrote "f you do a proper blind test I'm pretty sure the difference won't exist at all, especially given our age" and "[f]or all we know it can as well be poorly mastered and upsampled to so called HiRes"?

I think we're having a misunderstanding here - I thought we were discussing if the difference between RBCD and HiRes of the same analog source can be heard.

In general, I'm sure that some HiRes files are product of carefully done remasters, others much less so, but I don't really think the sampling rate is important factor here as good remaster IMHO will sound equally well on RBCD as on HiRes format.

P.S. thank you for the lecture about what mastering is, but, as I was working for many years on national TV&Radio I believe I'm quite familiar what mastering means.

 

[έχω δίκιο]

I think we're having a misunderstanding here - I thought we were discussing if the difference between RBCD and HiRes of the same analog source can be heard.

In general, I'm sure that some HiRes files are product of carefully done remasters, others much less so, but I don't really think the sampling rate is important factor here as good remaster IMHO will sound equally well on RBCD as on HiRes format.

I think we wandered off. This was what I was addressing:

Me: "If nothing else, most of the HiRes stuff has been more carefully mastered."​

You: "For all we know it can as well be poorly mastered and upsampled to so called HiRes."​

Me: "...having heard high resolution versions of CDs that I own, the difference is usually striking."​

You: "If you do a proper blind test I'm pretty sure the difference won't exist at all, especially given our age."​

​

My example was meant to show that HiRes recordings often were sonically superior (even to us old folks) because they were more carefully mastered.

I quoted from that AES paper said:

A NOTE ON HIGH-RESOLUTION RECORDINGS Though our tests failed to substantiate the claimed advantages of high-resolution encoding for two-channel audio, one trend became obvious very quickly and held up throughout our testing: virtually all of the SACD and DVD-A recordings sounded better than most CDs— sometimes much better. Had we not “degraded” the sound to CD quality and blind-tested for audible differences, we would have been tempted to ascribe this sonic superiority to the recording processes used to make them. Plausible reasons for the remarkable sound quality of these recordings emerged in discussions with some of the engineers currently working on such projects. This portion of the business is a niche market in which the end users are preselected, both for their aural acuity and for their willingness to buy expensive equipment, set it up correctly, and listen carefully in a low-noise environment. Partly because these recordings have not captured a large portion of the consumer market for music, engineers and producers are being given the freedom to produce recordings that sound as good as they can make them, without having to compress or equalize the signal to suit lesser systems and casual listening conditions. These recordings seem to have been made with great care and manifest affection, by engineers trying to please themselves and their peers. They sound like it, label after label. High-resolution audio discs do not have the overwhelming majority of the program material crammed into the top 20 (or even 10) dB of the available dynamic range, as so many CDs today do.

Their experiment showed that resampling HiRes to the RBCD standard does not cause an audible degradation. I agree. I also agree with their observation above, that virtually all of the HiRes recordings sound better, not due to the sample depth or sample rate, but rather to the care and focus on audio quality in their mastering.

 

[Krunok]

I think we wandered off. This was what I was addressing:

Me: "If nothing else, most of the HiRes stuff has been more carefully mastered."​

You: "For all we know it can as well be poorly mastered and upsampled to so called HiRes."​

Me: "...having heard high resolution versions of CDs that I own, the difference is usually striking."​

You: "If you do a proper blind test I'm pretty sure the difference won't exist at all, especially given our age."​

​

My example was meant to show that HiRes recordings often were sonically superior (even to us old folks) because they were more carefully mastered.

I quoted from that AES paper said:



Their experiment showed that resampling HiRes to the RBCD standard does not cause an audible degradation. I agree. I also agree with their observation above, that virtually all of the HiRes recordings sound better, not due to the sample depth or sample rate, but rather to the care and focus on audio quality in their mastering.

Yep, I got you wrong. And I fully agree that results of a good remastering can easilly be heard. I would also expect that, as HiRes products are targeted toward audiophiles, they are done with higher quality than usual, although when I heard the full story behind "loudness wars" I'm not really sure to what extent is that really so.

 

[έχω δίκιο]

And I fully agree that results of a good remastering can easilly be heard. I would also expect that, as HiRes products are targeted toward audiophiles, they are done with higher quality than usual, although when I heard the full story behind "loudness wars" I'm not really sure to what extent is that really so.

I think we are in violent agreement.

I read that Elvis used to listen to his music on an AM radio as a final check on the recording studio because that's how most of his listeners heard his music. That obviously didn't make for the finest sound quality on good equipment (insofar as they had it then).

We still see the same kind of thing today, with compression and limiting being used to produce music optimized for car stereos in vehicles going down the road. I've heard some of my audiophile recordings in my cars and it doesn't always work out well, with road and wind noise drowning out quiet passages.