Veri
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That's pretty terrible...
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Anyone seen these "Aimpire" Topping Copies/Fakes?
- Thread starter L5730
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That's pretty terrible...
graz_lag
Major Contributor
Of course we stay away ... (we tray to ...)
However for the sake of clarity, this Aimpire brand looks to be a properly officially registered one.
Source: WIPO Global Brand DB
graz_lag
Major Contributor
AIMPIRE brand's owners (Yufeng Xu) are in the process to get the approval - or refusal, of a bunch of other brands, including KOOBOSE and FIESAND, which can also be crossed by browsing thru the Amazon/eBay stores ...
It seems that aimpire was the seller. Not sure tho. Thanks for the information. And I'll get some more insights.
Hi,
i was in the process of buying a Topping D10 on Amazon Germany and did't pay enough attention while hitting the button to order.
So i got black Aimpire AD10.
The product was listed as "Topping OPA2134 HiFi-Decoder Verstärker für D10 Mini USB DAC CSS XMOS XU208 ES9018K2M" (and still is)
Fulfilled and shipped by Amazon - not some third party seller!
(The listing for the real Topping D10 is exactly the same wording)
It sold for basically the same price as the Topping D10 minus a couple of cents.
Date bought was January 6th 2020.
Basically Amazon germany sells the knock off (without knowing?). Kind of strange and frightening. At least they took it back without hassle and refunded me.
I returned the Aimpire Thing and ordered "the real ting". For a day i had both of them for visual comparison.
I did not make any audio comparisons.
If you get the listing for real Topping, underneath the product description is says that there is a "newer version available" (in german) and if you click on that you get another Aimpire clone...
As i got the clone, i investigated it a bit. There are some differences outside and inside.
At first i thought that the Aimpire AD10 was some kind of reject of the Topping production which did not meet spec.
The XMOS chip seems soldered badly with visual remains of flux. Maybe resoldered?
But by comparing both of them side by side there were more differences.
The Chassis is put together by different screws on the back. The "PCM - DSD" Display does not dim on the Aimpire as the bitrate display part does on both of them. Some parts on the pcb have (slightly) different markings. The rca jacks are slightly different. The ribbon cable to the display assembly is attached a different way. The "direct streaam" misspelling was mentioned before in this thread and is the same here. The "CE" logo looks different.
The pcb says Topping and stuff on the Topping were on the Aimpire this area is empty.
Interestingly they both report exactly the same to my Mac regarding their USB ID.
[EDIT] Link no longer active.
If someone wants to dig deeper i attached some pictures i took while both were here. Silver case is the Topping, black is the Aimpire.
Dropbox-Link:https://www.dropbox.com/s/dz51q6fjuc2r98s/Aimpire_AD10-Topping_D10.zip?dl=0
(i will delete this file some time in the future)
i was in the process of buying a Topping D10 on Amazon Germany and did't pay enough attention while hitting the button to order.
So i got black Aimpire AD10.
The product was listed as "Topping OPA2134 HiFi-Decoder Verstärker für D10 Mini USB DAC CSS XMOS XU208 ES9018K2M" (and still is)
Fulfilled and shipped by Amazon - not some third party seller!
(The listing for the real Topping D10 is exactly the same wording)
It sold for basically the same price as the Topping D10 minus a couple of cents.
Date bought was January 6th 2020.
Basically Amazon germany sells the knock off (without knowing?). Kind of strange and frightening. At least they took it back without hassle and refunded me.
I returned the Aimpire Thing and ordered "the real ting". For a day i had both of them for visual comparison.
I did not make any audio comparisons.
If you get the listing for real Topping, underneath the product description is says that there is a "newer version available" (in german) and if you click on that you get another Aimpire clone...
As i got the clone, i investigated it a bit. There are some differences outside and inside.
At first i thought that the Aimpire AD10 was some kind of reject of the Topping production which did not meet spec.
The XMOS chip seems soldered badly with visual remains of flux. Maybe resoldered?
But by comparing both of them side by side there were more differences.
The Chassis is put together by different screws on the back. The "PCM - DSD" Display does not dim on the Aimpire as the bitrate display part does on both of them. Some parts on the pcb have (slightly) different markings. The rca jacks are slightly different. The ribbon cable to the display assembly is attached a different way. The "direct streaam" misspelling was mentioned before in this thread and is the same here. The "CE" logo looks different.
The pcb says Topping and stuff on the Topping were on the Aimpire this area is empty.
Interestingly they both report exactly the same to my Mac regarding their USB ID.
[EDIT] Link no longer active.
Dropbox-Link:
Last edited:
As opposed to Western Sounding: Klipsch? Linn-Sondek, and the, not-so-veiled reference to excrement, Schiit? Among many others ...
Full tilt Xenophobia?
restorer-john
Grand Contributor
Veri
Master Contributor
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That's just ridiculous :/Received a third AIMPIRE unit. Maybe this is a sign to give up
Did you buy from the same seller?Received a third AIMPIRE unit. Maybe this is a sign to give up
elberoth
Member
Received a third AIMPIRE unit. Maybe this is a sign to give up
Did you report this as fake to Amazon ?
Selling fakes is a big problem on Amazon.
graz_lag
Major Contributor
Hmmm ... It is not a fake but rather a copy, a bad one apparently.
So Amazon can freely sell this joke of Aimpire AD10 unless Topping (Guangzhou Topping Electronics and Technology Co. Ltd.) legally claims some sort of infringement provided they copyrighted the case design and PCB, or part of it.
The issue is the total lack of customer care by Amazon as @Lafayette was assured a Topping D10 would have been shipped to him.
All of them were sold by Amazon, and on the third rebuy they told me to buy from Amazon again. I'm going to try from Apos Audio and see how it goes. They price matched the drop pretty quickly which was nice. I chatted with Amazon customer service each time it happened so they should be aware I just don't know if they care to look into it.
I've noticed this brand substitution thing happening more and more on Amazon. In some cases it's hard to tell which company makes the original product, for example Nobsound and XDuoo seem to have a lot of virtually identical products. Ideally I'd want to reward the original innovator.
(Just to rant, I got my first counterfeit product the other day too. Who counterfeits a gravy fat separator? And if you're going to counterfeit it, don't put a sticker on it with a QR code to a weird website, that pretty much gives it away.)
(Just to rant, I got my first counterfeit product the other day too. Who counterfeits a gravy fat separator? And if you're going to counterfeit it, don't put a sticker on it with a QR code to a weird website, that pretty much gives it away.)
Received a third AIMPIRE unit. Maybe this is a sign to give up
Get the Drop for the D10 for $65.
https://drop.com/buy/topping-d10
Sure, it will take you awhile to get it. But that's because drop is getting them direct from Topping.
I wanted to point out that just because Topping says they are a fake doesn't mean they are.
It is not uncommon for the factory that makes an audio component in China to make the same product for another brand that is either exactly the same or has minor tweaks. Perhaps the most famous example of this is the Yoga CD 880/Brainwavz HM5/Fischer Audio FA-003/NVX XPT100/Lindy HF-100/Jaycar headphones.
It would be worth seeing if Amir would measure the AIMPIRE and see if it performs the same.
It is not uncommon for the factory that makes an audio component in China to make the same product for another brand that is either exactly the same or has minor tweaks. Perhaps the most famous example of this is the Yoga CD 880/Brainwavz HM5/Fischer Audio FA-003/NVX XPT100/Lindy HF-100/Jaycar headphones.
It would be worth seeing if Amir would measure the AIMPIRE and see if it performs the same.
I actually ordered from Apos Audio, they price matched Drop's $65 price. There's a few other people who have said they ordered through them so I thought I would give them a try. Ordered yesterday night, they price matched within the hour via credit, and I received a tracking number this morning. So far their service seems quick...now we will wait and see if AIMPIRE strikes again.
D10 is designed by topping A-Z. Anything not coming from/with topping name is fake and counterfeit, period.
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