Ask me questions.

[Toku]

Yes, and I will keep making it. Not grounding a conductive chassis of an appliance when it's powered by voltage of more than 20 V is unacceptable, and that's what I was taught when I studied for my degree. And not everyone likes the sensation of touching 38 V, even if it won't kill you.

Safe or not, I avoid using any mains-powered appliance that lacks proper certification.

I've never heard that anything above 20V must be grounded.
Which country do you live in?

 

[tmtomh]

Not at all, I just don't worship them and don't hesitate to point out flaws in their business practices — potentially even compromised product safety, like ungrounded amplifier enclosures with supply voltages exceeding 20 V or uncertified power supplies.

Matthias Carstens, for instance, interacts way more with customers, both here and on the RME forum. And you know, most vendors even employ people whose specific job is to interact with customers (at least in the pro and enterprise segments), but some perceive this as a kind of favor being done to them.

This comment is impressive in how many rhetorical and logical fallacies it fits into so few sentences.

 

[pseudoid]

This comment is impressive...

...but where is the meat question?
We could all sympathize with aversion to sticking our tongues on live-voltages (even a 9V battery is no fun); and as a consumer we have the option to not purchase ungrounded floating chassis audio products.

The best solution for someone that may have developed such a phobia (beyond OCD); recommendation would be a system made up of rack mount equipment. But that would be OT.

 

[morpheusX]

Mr. @JohnYang1997, could you please address the following questions?

1. Given that Topping acknowledge that the PA5 I is a faulty design, shouldn't the company allow the PA5 I owners to return the product to the distributors, and credit part of its value to a swap to a PA5 II or other Topping amplifier? For example, lets say a user payed $349 for the PA5, it would receive $200 in store credits on a swap for a Topping amplifier! I think the current behavior, i.e., not doing anything while knowing that there are customers with a unit that can fail at any time, is disrespectful to your customers.
Its basically Topping saying that they don't care about their customers, but only their credit cards!

Moreover, the financial loss with a move like this would be minimal, but the gains in brand recognition and trust would more be way more worthy that any minimal and probably non-existent) financial loss.

2. When is expected that the TP line will be available in regular distributors in Europe, such as audiophonics?

Thank you in advance.

 

[Zek]

When is expected that the TP line will be available in regular distributors in Europe

As I recall, John said that the TP line would only be sold directly through them.

 

[pseudoid]

Given that Topping acknowledge that the PA5 I is a faulty design,

Do you realize that each return of an item (independent of price) back to amazon, costs them (avg.) $26 per?
...and that is just a return not a replacement.
May I ask when did you purchase your PA5? and
May I also ask what the stipulated/written warranty was on the product?
I am curious to understand your demands.

 

[morpheusX]

I am curious to understand your demands.

Its not a demand, just an observation!

It doesn't matter how much it would cost them, they sold a defective product (as was acknowledge by them), any reputable brand would do whatever it takes to address the situation. Topping as a brand would gain a lot of trust if they stood up for their mistakes.

In the long run, they will loose much more money (and potential customers) with the way they handled the PA5 defects, than what they would loose by addressing the situation.

 

[hira]

PA5II use the same volume as RA3?

 

[threni]

We have been working on better alternatives but would woth it improve it now. Currently we have tests on the range of IR before production on every product. And recently we have heard some people reporting the newer e30ii have poor ir range and then we tested found out some devices have poorer ir performance. As ir is difficult to test in production we are changing to better receiver supplier.

It's not the remote which is the problem. I use the RC-15A which came with my E30, and I've figured out how to decode it so that I can use it on the Raspberry Pi connected to the E30 (so I can pause, skip tracks etc). I've literally got the E30 at an angle compared to the Pi/amp etc it's connected to so that I can control it from where I sit when I listen to music - remembering, of course to point below the E30 as the remote signal doesn't go in a straight line. Conversely, I can control the IR receiver I've connected to my Pi from anywhere in the room by pointing the remote just about anywhere - the light bounces off the walls/ceiling etc. So either you're using really cheap IR receivers in your devices (mine cost £2 for a single receiver off eBay), or they're too directional, or there's paint or something preventing them from receiving the incoming signal. Maybe investigate that?

 

[Toku]

PA5II use the same volume as RA3?

The TP RA3 uses a rotary encoder for digital control. PA5/PA5 ll/PA7 use a normal volume pot.

 

[Jukka]

Yes and no. It's not so difficult to just slap a dsp chip in a dac.
What's difficult:
Performance doesn't get hit
Available with all inputs
Supporting higher sample rate
UI design and display related

Not that those aren't achievable but everything takes time.

Plus you know the new es9039 ak4499ex chips took a lot of resources. Also there are many other things planned. Dsp equipped products have to be somewhat niche not many people want to buy or know how to use and are easily replaceable by software on pc or other platforms in normal use case.

I got a TV, PC and BR player hooked up into the same sound system. Pushing all sources through the same DSP is a challenge even today and I'd guess that's one reason why DSP isn't more widely used. Before I bought a miniDSP SHD, I looked into separates, but it became a swamp of never ending problems with point of volume control, power management (auto on/off) and even the existance of a display.

What I would have gone forward with, was a DSP unit that would have fed external DACs with signal and power through USB and having some automatic power management and source selection. And naturally everything must be controllable with one remote control. My current setup uses the remote of my TV, CEC for the BR and taught commands into the SHD (volume control disable in TV). If you can solve this puzzle with separates (eg. normal DACs, but a separate DSP unit with command and control), you got better changes of success.

Nowadays I use active speakers with digital in and all 4 channels are in use, so that was two requirements for me.

 

[solderdude]

I've never heard that anything above 20V must be grounded.

> 20mA is potentially lethal.
20V can be under certain (wet mostly) conditions when the path resistance < 1kohm.
It's all about the current and how it passes through the body.

The thing is the AC and DC voltage are floating (but do have a leakage current opposite ground) but in the end are very likely to connect to audio ground which may be connected to the enclosure.

Unless one is standing barefoot in a puddle of water and the leakage current is higher than 20mA using audio equipment run with DC voltages up to 48V DC is pretty safe (assuming low leakage current to ground).

The safety standards are usually higher in voltage than 20V and assume no wet conditions for indoor appliances (not counting wet rooms) and is for possible fault conditions where voltages referenced to ground can be touched.

 

[pseudoid]

Are uze-guyz trying to tell the rest of that uze'awl don't wear electrician's gloves around ur hw/eqpt?

Rubber for shock/currect protection >> Leather for burns/puncture wounds.
Oh, my...
-----------------------
OT: ASTM-D120 details the voltage levels for insulating-gloves in six classes.

You probably can tell what the following image is about, if you know how bureaucracies work:

[drops MIC]

 

[Toku]

It's time to get back to talking about Topping products!

 

[pos]

We have always been serious about reliability not just the measured performance. But it may not be enough. It's more difficult to test reliability than performance. It takes longer time etc. Were it not for the issues reported we never knew the usual methods(raising temp of environment, test for 8 hours straight etc) don't work very well. We had to test it to fail then we can make it better(almost full on signal but without load, and test for weeks) Who would have thought we have to test like this.

@JohnYang1997

Things can be made to handle worst case scenarios, like having conservative default volume settings so that a reset of user settings (due to a firmware bug or an hardware failure) does not lead to a catastrophic failure of both the drivers (earphones, loudspeakers) and the driven (ears, brain cells).

That is why I asked what the default volume setting was on the TP ra3. 0dB/mute seems like a good default value there.
Also having a remote control volume is always a risk, as another remote might always cause an involuntary change in settings.
Can the remote "controllability" be switched off in a menu somewhere?

All in all I feel like many failure cases could be mitigated with appropriate firmware behavior, like additional checks (checksum to ensure settings are not corrupted, muting everything if anything does not match expectations) and sensible defaults.

Volume control in at the heart of these kind of problems, and as such should be handled with caution by both the user (and his remote) and firmware.
One possible strategy would be to have two volume settings: one "hard limit" setting that can only be changed in the menu, with confirmation (some pro device even use passwords for sensitive settings), which would represent the absolute maximum volume one would want to use in a given system (depending on gain stating, loudspeaker sensitivity, etc.), and a soft one that would be set by the dial and remote. In this scenario the dB displayed on the screen would be relative to that maximum hard limit set in the menu.
What do you think?

 

[Toku]

@JohnYang1997

MQA went bankrupt in April, and I think that the supply of MQA will disappear in the future. How will Topping handle future products with MQA?
Will it completely withdraw from MQA or preserve MQA for some products?
Far from withdrawing from MQA, some companies are trying to make all products, including new products, compatible with MQA.

 

[muslhead]

@JohnYang1997

MQA went bankrupt in April, and I think that the supply of MQA will disappear in the future. How will Topping handle future products with MQA?
Will it completely withdraw from MQA or preserve MQA for some products?
Far from withdrawing from MQA, some companies are trying to make all products, including new products, compatible with MQA.

MQA did nopt go bankrupt. They filed for bankruptcy protection. Whether they eventually do is up to the courts and their creditors

 

[Toku]

MQA did nopt go bankrupt. They filed for bankruptcy protection. Whether they eventually do is up to the courts and their creditors

According to the bankruptcy documents I read before, I believe the deadline for the recovery plan was early July.
Until now, there is no prospect of getting support, and it seems that it will eventually go bankrupt completely.

 

[poxymoron]

According to the bankruptcy documents I read before, I believe the deadline for the recovery plan was early July.
Until now, there is no prospect of getting support, and it seems that it will eventually go bankrupt completely.

Oh no.

 

[manudrz]

Ok, this is a funny thread. I like the idea !
Don't you like subwoofers ? (I need a tiny mono AMP, or at least a bridge-able one). Otherwise I will go DIY with Hypex. Thanks