TOPPING D90 III Sabre DAC Review

[martin900]

Yay, destroying the value of the previous models by releasing a 'new' one for a dB of measurement difference. This is why I stay well clear of chinese audio products, crazy depracation because of this.

 

[amirm]

@amirm are the filter names/colors correct? According to the ES9039PRO datasheet, "Minimum Phase" and "Linear Apodizing" should not be as slow as the graphs here show. Also, "Slow Minimum" and "Min Phase Slow" sound like they should be the same filter, but clearly are shown not to be the same, and "Slow Minimum" has a surprisingly fast roll-off for a "slow" filter

I reused some of the names from previous review so they may not be right.

 

[thewas]

I wonder if its legally allowed to be sold in the EU without a CE logo?

 

[Yoku-San]

When do they finally release a DAC with HDMI input? That would solve my problems.

 

[Saponetto]

Topping usually places the certifications on the below panel.

 

[thewas]

Topping usually places the certifications on the below panel.

Thank you.

 

[poopy]

Not sure why someone would buy this DAC while the D70 pro Sabre offers exact same performance, bigger display, Aurora UI and a lower price tag...

 

[welwynnick]

I think DACs are at an asymptote.

Or they've just reached the limits of measurements.

 

[EdW]

Not sure why someone would buy this DAC while the D70 pro Sabre offers exact same performance, bigger display, Aurora UI and a lower price tag...

Does look like a better remote using Bluetooth though? As reported by @KenA #8 above
Also for direct to power amp operation without a preamp the balance control facility ( similar to D90 SE/LE) might appeal?

 

[DHT 845]

Not sure why someone would buy this DAC while the D70 pro Sabre offers exact same performance, bigger display, Aurora UI and a lower price tag...

Actually D70 Pro Sabre offers slighly better multitone.
I'm very curious how the D70 Pro octo would fare compared to these two...

 

[welwynnick]

When do they finally release a DAC with HDMI input? That would solve my problems.

Just buy a $900 AVR. Apparently nobody can hear the difference.

Seriously, HDMI is mainly for AV and multichannel audio, and this is purist stereo. Most equipment with HDMI output also has toslink or spdif. Doesn't yours?

The other problem is that when HDMI carries audio in the conventional sense (not I2S) the audio is embedded in a video signal. One of the reasons that top-tier DACs perform so well is because they DON'T have any digital video processing. The HF noise and interference always impacts audio quality.

 

[IAtaman]

Technically perfect.

At this price range I would start looking into eg RME with tons of features, good HP amp, excellent customer support and quality.

If Topping wants to play in that league they have to work on the latter two.

I agree with the overall message but I believe what they need to work on is features. RME support is great, and given all the functionality of their products, that is useful. I don't think customer support would make a big difference for a DAC like this however. Plug in the cables, chose a filter and that's that.

 

[delta76]

Technically perfect.

At this price range I would start looking into eg RME with tons of features, good HP amp, excellent customer support and quality.

If Topping wants to play in that league they have to work on the latter two.

yeah who would buy this over a RME is beyond me. You save a few hundred $, and you get a few more dB in SINAD, but you loose track record of reliability and support which would be critical in this price range.

 

[Lero]

This is a review and detailed measurements of the TOPPING D90 III Sabre balanced stereo DAC. It was sent to me by the company and costs US $899.
View attachment 342759
As you can see, the design is what we have know about most of the Topping products. I do wish at this price that we had a high resolution display that showed VU meters and such. Usability would be better that way although the included remote is easy to use. Back panel is as you would expect:
View attachment 342760
Nice to see Topping continuing to provide trigger support for automatic turn on of the downstream amplifiers and such.

TOPPING D90 III Sabre Measurements
The DAC has two output setting modes. One that provides max of 5 volts nominal and one that is 4 volts. For fairness I tested using the latter. DAC was allowed to warm up which improved its performance by about 1 dB.

As usual, we start with our dashboard:
View attachment 342762
This is the best performance we have seen from Topping and is in a virtual tie with the previous king of DAC SINAD measurements:
View attachment 342763

RCA performance is still superb and fully transparent:
View attachment 342764

Dynamic range is exceptional as you would imagine as it is setting the SINAD:
View attachment 342765

Multitone shows the exceptionally low distortion:
View attachment 342766

As does 50 Hz response for compatibility with other sites using it:
View attachment 342767

Jitter could be a hair better given the performance elsewhere:
View attachment 342768

IMD performance is excellent:
View attachment 342769

Linearity is perfect:
View attachment 342770

We have the typical filters but I would stay with default (F3):
View attachment 342771
View attachment 342772

The filter selection impacts wideband THD+N measurements so I stayed with the default:
View attachment 342773

Story is told....

Conclusions
Topping aimed to capture the top spot in the rankings and it got there, besting every other DAC it has produced, albeit with very small margin. If the cost is not a concern and you are buying a new DAC, might as well opt for D90 III.

I am happy to recommend the TOPPING D90 III Sabre.

------------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.

Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/

wow

 

[IAtaman]

yeah who would buy this over a RME is beyond me. You save a few hundred $, and you get a few more dB in SINAD, but you loose track record of reliability and support which would be critical in this price range.

Fully agree. This is in fact one of the DACs that make me think are we hitting a bump in the golden age of cheap audio electronics.

 

[asrUser]

The power brick of SU-X is supposed to be better than Topping D90 III?

 

[HarmonicTHD]

I agree with the overall message but I believe what they need to work on is features. RME support is great, and given all the functionality of their products, that is useful. I don't think customer support would make a big difference for a DAC like this however. Plug in the cables, chose a filter and that's that.

Yes features too.

 

[Talisman]

I always thank Amir for the review.
However, this product is just the umpteenth version of a DAC with microscopically better performance than thirty other similar products in terms of configuration and features. Transparency is 20 db behind, we continue to beat a dead horse.
Do you need more, multiple inputs (does it seem so absurd to ask for MORE inputs of each type at that price?) HDMI inputs, equalization capability and possibly filters and sub output.
But I know the next great one from Topping will be the same as this one but with 0.3 db better sinad

 

[Sokel]

yeah who would buy this over a RME is beyond me. You save a few hundred $, and you get a few more dB in SINAD, but you loose track record of reliability and support which would be critical in this price range.

Let's don't forget that their internal market is 1.5 billion people.
I suspect that all they need is the western "certification" as the audiophile market there is probably more about woo,fame and pedigree than even the western HEA market.
You can tell by the gazillion knock-offs.

I stopped caring about DAC performance as long as they reached a decent THD+N vs freq result.

Thanks Amir!

 

[boXem]

The other problem is that when HDMI carries audio in the conventional sense (not I2S) the audio is embedded in a video signal.

That's not the case. HDMI connector has dedicated pins for audio.