I want to give my review on 8 devices: smsl su-x, smsl sh-x, topping a70 pro, smsl su-10, smsl do400, aune s17pro, sound blaster ae-9, sound blaster ae-5. Overall, in the order of purchase, briefly: sound blaster ae-5 works the same as sound blaster ae-9. I didn't understand it back then, but later I learned that I should have bought an amplifier, but by that time I had decided to buy something else. Rating 3/10. Then I bought smsl do400. I bought it at a discount for $386.09. This one is top-notch, I really liked it, the soundstage is large and detailed everywhere, except for the height, meaning it's hard to say at what height exactly the sound is, but the sound is detailed around the sides, and I'm satisfied. I only listen to pop and electronic music depending on my mood, classical music. I'd rate it 6/10, for its price, you can't find a better device, and I'll still sell it in a few days. I want to say that the sound is perfectly balanced only with the native amplifier, as I connected it to aune s17pro. I bought it for $492.64 on Black Friday discount, the sound was better, but my headphones had 16 ohms resistance, and the amplifier was for 32, it was my mistake, there were distortions at high volume, in general, this amplifier lacks volume, and I can't say much about it because I returned it right away. I bought both s17pro and su-10 at the same time, I immediately understood that su-10 is better than my do400 at 8/10, it's warm by 40% and precise by 20%, so the sound as if warms the ears, and it's nice in music, but not always good in games. I wanted to keep it for myself, but then the new smsl su-x came out, and I immediately understood that while I could return it, I bought su-10 for $658.46 on Black Friday discount. Topping a70 pro, I bought it for $412.30 and connected it to smsl do400, the sound was the same, nonsense, I thought, I increased the volume and was very surprised that it muted the sound at 10 dB and above, and I was afraid that the headphones would suffer from abrupt turning on and off at high volume, I thought, the DAC is crap, now the new smsl su-x will come, and it will be fine, no, it's the same, the firmware was the newest from the factory, and I didn't change anything in the settings, as it arrived, I even reset the settings to factory ones, it didn't help, it still muted, in short, I didn't like it both in design and in sound, because my built-in amplifier for $200 sounded the same, I wrote to the seller, asked, he said, there's power protection, why the hell give such power, idiotic device, rating 5/10, maybe you need to use it only with topping, I switched all the settings, but you can't disable the protection, my headphones are Hifiman XS. smsl sh-x, the sound is the most transparent, it will sound as you set it up, namely, there are 3 types of amplification: low, the sound sounded simple, and I lacked bass, MID — this is my favorite sound, very strong bass, strong and fast, high I haven't tried, it arrived only 2 days ago, I bought it for $602.30, I want to say that when connected to do400 it sounded better, but at high volume there were distortions in the mode without filter, if you switch the filter, there's almost no noise, in general, the amplifier interfered with the balanced sound of do400, my rating for smsl sh-x is 10/10, the best I've listened to, for its flexible adjustment, design, it's louder than all the amplifiers I've listened to here, and I like everything about it, and in my new DAC smsl su-x 10/10 I bought smsl su-x $854.05 — it's my perfect sound for both music and games, I'd define the sound as 25% warm, 25% precise — it's the perfect balance for all kinds of music and games, the soundstage is the widest of all, the detail is perfect in terms of balance, precision, and warmth, it's pleasant to listen to. It perfectly matches the sound of SMSL SH-X, definitely much better than Topping. Topping just suffocates the sound of SMS SU-X. The filter settings are audible and not at the level of seeming, but definitely with a sound tint, I like to listen without filter and sound tint, standard, I'll post my review in other topics of these devices' data. If you have any questions, I'll be happy to answer in more detail.
