• WANTED: Happy members who like to discuss audio and other topics related to our interest. Desire to learn and share knowledge of science required. There are many reviews of audio hardware and expert members to help answer your questions. Click here to have your audio equipment measured for free!

Any Chinese brands going to make any interfaces?

Kane1972

Active Member
Joined
Dec 11, 2018
Messages
298
Likes
103
I wish Topping or SMSL etc would have a go at an interface or at least an ADC to go along with their DAC's. Does anyone think it will happen? I realise many interface are made in China, so why are there no Chinese branded ones? I don't mean a simple rebadged version of something they make for Focusrite or Motu etc, but something new.
 

Tks

Major Contributor
Joined
Apr 1, 2019
Messages
3,221
Likes
5,494
Tough to sell. Many interfaces are used in professional environments, and as such demand reliability, and latency performance that requires good hardware design (reliability, not simply performance) and driver support (not as simple as making a DAC-only driver), and just generally good customer support (prompt/quick). The Chinese can make these things, but support is an issue due to geography (warranty service isn't simple in case fast turn-around is required). So they simply lack the pedigree since most interfaces are sold by brands with history in the pro industry.

But most importantly, it doesn't seem as profitable having an "all-in-one" box that functions like an AMP, a DAC, and an ADC. And certainly not as profitable it seems as selling "Audiophile" devices.

You can ask around, but getting a device like the Motu M4 and it's price, won't be easy (heck you barely see spectral analyzers, if any, on Chinese DACs to begin with). Now I'm sure you can get one-off interfaces that aren't billed as pro-ready, and I presume a company like Matrix Audio that makes very high end audio devices, can muster something. But if you're not selling to the pro-market, and the audiophile market doesn't care about ADC's... Who exactly are you going to be selling the device to?
 
OP
K

Kane1972

Active Member
Joined
Dec 11, 2018
Messages
298
Likes
103
Great response. I guess my question was really “will any of these companies enter the pro audio market”?
 

Tks

Major Contributor
Joined
Apr 1, 2019
Messages
3,221
Likes
5,494
Doubtful, unless they're able to establish a presence (not simply market presence, but a whole EU/USA branch with autonomy).

Otherwise, the best one could hope for, is something like simple all-in-one's catoring to specific markets (like the Twitch streaming community, or simply gamers looking to have dedicated headphone and microphone ports). So something like the Schiit Hel. But even that is a tough sell since most computers come with mic and headphone jacks (actually they come with more than just that).

It's the same problem of why Chinese companies aren't offering AVR's. Very complex, and not the sort of market pace they're into (the Chinese manufacturers seemingly like fast iterations with older devices slowly being phased out). Trying to put out something like 2-3 AVR's per year seems impossible in that sort of production culture. But as mentioned previously, without brand staying-power (people don't like having their newest purchases simply invalidated a few months later with a newer, better iteration) - it's tough to find people to sell such things to. And even tougher to take a future-considerate design approach of making products that don't lose value so quickly.
 

cyruz

Active Member
Joined
Sep 13, 2020
Messages
100
Likes
83
Location
Italy
I'm questioning instead why there are several "holes" in the multi-channel/DSP audiophile market (I don't consider professional devices).

Aside from Okto and MiniDSP there's basically no choice. Moreover MiniDSP offer is not well representative of current DACs performance, jumping from a bunch of active crossovers with a low quality DAC to a set of streamers with only 4 channels output.

There's definitely a place for a well designed DSP with 6/8 channels and a high class DAC with a honest price tag.
 

Tks

Major Contributor
Joined
Apr 1, 2019
Messages
3,221
Likes
5,494
Seems simply, that such a market is quite small. I'm surprised you could get the miniDSP or Okto at the price they currently are. Especially the Okto since it's a very limited supply output.

Multi-channel setups themselves are rare to begin with.

Also, if your question pertains to asking why the Chinese won't fill such holes, it is because requires almost a mini-OS to handle such DSP processing. That stuff requires software engineers. Software engineers' salaries aren't too friendly with the expectations of Chinese companies running on razor thin margins, and even the Chinese companies that do opt for it, their software has lots of growing pains and rough edges (take a look at Matrix Audio, who offer pretty much my favorite looking and well finished products this side of humanly-affordable hardware). But even they are riddled with software bugs which they are chiseling away at.
 
Last edited:

rdenney

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Dec 30, 2020
Messages
2,235
Likes
3,856
There doesn't seem much of a market opportunity, and after all, the usual suspects are all made in China anyway. By "not much of a market opportunity", I mean that prices are already low on good stuff.

I have a Presonus Studio 24C that is an average DAC and an average ADC--but that's average compared to high-end commercial ADCs. Average = SINAD in the 95-100 dB range. But what is the point of an ADC with better dynamic range than that? No analog source being digitized is anywhere near that good, even if the recording leaves half a dozen dB empty at the top for later normalization to 0 dB. I paid $130 for that Presonus unit, and it has fairly decent microphone preamps with 50 dB of gain, plus a very good way of mixing recorded tracks with the microphones/line-level inputs into a headphone amp (which is admittedly not powerful enough). It's ideal for laying tracks in a home studio. It also comes with a license to the Presonus DAW software, which seems to be regarded well. That's an awful lot for $130 (yes, it was on sale). And they have a cheaper version that costs $99.

If I'm making needledrops, my cartridge will do well to deliver 70 dB of dynamic range. The phono preamp and tape outputs of my 30-year-old Adcom preamp are well into the 90's in terms of SINAD--so I have plenty of headroom for making needledrops. Any other analog source will be worse. In a well-equipped vintage studio, I might have a better analog source than 70, but it won't be better than the ADC on that Presonus. Even with microphones, it takes a pretty specialized application to be able to use more than 95 dB--peak recorded signals have to be well over a hundred dB SPL at the microphone to be 95 dB over the noise floor of even quiet studios. And people who have quiet studios are not shopping downmarket for electronics. My Benchmark ADC is wasted on that duty, but it sure does make it easy to set the gain and really know what it is.

So, Topping or SMSL making one with 110 dB SINAD on the ADC side (which would make it better than my much pricier Benchmark ADC) would have to find somebody who even thinks they need that. People who record may not all chase specs the way people have been doing with inexpensive DACs. For recording, there are many other features much more important, including gain management, mic preamps, phantom power (which the Presonus has), low latency, clock management, etc. Pros use their DAWs but they also use physical controls on the devices, and those drive up costs, too.

I needed a way to lay tracks on recordings during Covid, and tried to use Behringer analog mixer (which had the needed mic gain and phantom power) into my Benchmark ADC1. But the Behringer mixer had developed a -40 dB 60-cycle hum. The Presonus was what I could get for cheap that let me plug a real microphone into it. And it's really amazingly good--I lay tracks directly into Audacity with it, while listening through headphones plugged into the thing and not a hint of latency. I'm not sure Topping could, um, top that in any meaningful way at a lower price point.

I'll take all that back if Topping or SMSL makes a $75 "sound interface" like the Creative X-fi HD with much better specs and no crapware. That would be cheap enough that one could buy them for lots of low-fi duties like making review videos for YouTube, etc.

Rick "except that nobody is mixing in the analog domain any more" Denney
 
  • Like
Reactions: MGP

RickSanchez

Major Contributor
Cartographer
Joined
Sep 4, 2019
Messages
1,168
Likes
2,490
Location
Austin, TX
I wish Topping or SMSL etc would have a go at an interface or at least an ADC to go along with their DAC's.

Just curious: what would you be hoping for from Chinese brands entering the audio interface market? Compared to, say, what you can currently buy from Motu or Focusite are you looking for:
  1. More features (for about the same price)?
  2. Lower prices (with the equivalent feature set)?
  3. Better measurements?
I've got a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 and for what I paid for it (used off eBay) it's an impressive device: decent measurements (the ADC and DAC portions; I don't use the headphone out), feature set, and build quality.
 
Top Bottom