I know actual audibility and all that jazz but 100 dB or better in SINAD in 2025 isn't a big ask in my humble opinion, especially when a bog standard Apple dongle easily outperforms it in SINAD.
What is the point of this silly spec-chasing? Do you think you're going to be running your IEMs at 2Vrms? It has a respectable enough noise floor that's lower than the Apple dongle's if I recall correctly (not that Amir bothered to test its low-gain mode, and as measured by other users here, it dramatically outperforms Amir's 50mV measurement when you use the on-device volume control as opposed to digitally attenuate at full-scale), which is a more important metric than distortion-limited SINAD at full scale output (and I won't pretend to understand why Amir decided that is a sensible metric for ranking headphone dac/amps).
Thank you but understand that this is not what I am asking for, with all due respect. Again, while I appreciate the exuberate and opinionated responses, when push comes to shove, if there is the option for higher quality at an equal or lower price, I will go for it which is why I ask and I would appreciate going the way I had requested. Besides, the bigger issue here from the users responding is the joint assumption that I am going to use this with IEMs, when I am not. Some further inquiry into this would have been helpful, as well as noticing my post history here and my previous posts here in-thread about output power which would clue you in that I am not looking at this for IEMs. No, actually, it is for Dan Clark Audio Noire X which needs substantially higher power than a mere IEM. Hence my post earlier in this thread:
Can Qudelix 5K technically power Amir's Ether CX? Yes, but I would prefer a more ideal power pairing that has a bit more headroom and flexibility for powering full-size headphones, not necessarily a more IEM-centric DAC-amplifier setup.
To that, my only concern then is full-size headphone use. Do you happen to know the output power of the Qudelix-5K?
I measured it myself and gave that information in my earlier post:
I always prefer to think of this issue on RMS voltage scale and covert it to dB scale because that is mapped better onto our perception. Sure, if you use wattage (e.g., mW), the difference may look larger (578 vs. 281 mW), but that does not mean the former is as twice loud as the latter.
Yes! I usually work within mW myself but understand the difference is appreciable with power-to-volume scaling (a logarithmic function). Not to hijack this thread further but is the Qudelix-T71 a worthy upgrade, noting over course that the return-on-investment is far less appreciable if there even is an objectively measured improvement?
