Dell XPS 8930 RealTek HD Audio Interface Review

[amirm]

Bootcamp or Parallel's software?

Oh, had not considered putting Windows on it. Folks are OK if I test it that way? And how much of a hassle is it to install on it?

 

[majingotan]

Oh, had not considered putting Windows on it. Folks are OK if I test it that way? And how much of a hassle is it to install on it?

IIRC, Apple has drivers provided already when you enable the Bootcamp partition, but I'm not sure if running Windows as a VM on a Mac can alter the audio performance of the DAC. At least with Bootcamp, its on a hardware level of communication so you should have no problems with software compatibility

 

[amirm]

Thanks. With bootcamp, do you lose MacOS? Or does it create a partition after the fact and install there?

 

[Veri]

Thanks. With bootcamp, do you lose MacOS? Or does it create a partition after the fact and install there?

It's just a partition pretty nifty OS X feature.

 

[jony_m]

Thanks. With bootcamp, do you lose MacOS? Or does it create a partition after the fact and install there?

Creates a partition and you can select which to boot on each restart. You regain the space back into your macos install if you remove the partition as well.

 

[amirm]

Got it. Thanks guys.

 

[DivineCurrent]

I've always had a terrible issue with my 2015 Dell Inspiron 7559 Laptop that can't be fixed no matter what I try.

Using the headphone jack (or even speakers), whenever sound starts playing, it starts at max 100% volume for a split second and then goes down to the correct set volume. That means whenever I use sensitive earphones with the headphone jack, it blasts my ears with sound first. Now, this would be tolerable if it only happened once after turning on, but this happens every time I pause a video or music and wait a few seconds. So the only way to get around this is to have a quiet sound play through Windows like adjusting the volume in the bottom right corner, and then immediately play the music or video before the audio resets again.

I can't believe how bad the audio implementation is with Dell computers, they basically force you to use an external dac/amp.

 

[PolkFan]

All jokes aside i bet a controller or nintendo ds from 2004 would do better

 

[Jimster480]

best

 

[d73b3e]

Hi @amirm,
Did Lenovo conform to the WHQL standards that your team at Microsoft set?

Thanks

 

[Steve Dallas]

I have a Schiit stack (Modi 3 and Magni Heresy) at work. I am a software engineering manager, so I oversee a few dozen nerds. Many colleagues have asked me if the fancy DAC makes a difference over the awesome audio in my high end Dell laptop with Realtek something or other and some kind of trademarked bloatware driver. I am happy to oblige any demo request. "Whoa!" is the most common response, followed by, "Damn!" as the second most common. "The Schiit isn't shit, it's the Dell that's shit!"

 

[protagon1st]

bruhh it's better than never

 

[Lighthouselp95]

How good is impedance of an amp? And what scientific evidence for lower impedance amp is better? Guys? Through some calculation, I reason that with an amp having relatively high impedance, the output voltage can change (lower) but its frequency is unchaged. So sound quality is unchanged.
As far as I know, some laptop audio interfaces has almost 20 - 100 ohm impedance. And its sound quality I assume good enough.
And
"I hear the airy (guess about more than 13khz) and lack of musicality and brightness of the Apple type-C dongle. Or my laptop boost some where at 8khz and 12khz and roll-off from around 14 khz. The difference in bass deep when listened with input speaker is more sensible. And I love to listen to 3.5 jack laptop usually.
Can it related to Harmonic excitement phenomenon in here? Music need some harmonic frequency mixing to sound good! https://mixingmonster.com/audio-frequencies"

 

[staticV3]

How good is impedance of an amp? And what scientific evidence for lower impedance amp is better? Guys?

For efficient impedance bridging, you want as low of an output impedance as possible.

This is basic electronic engineering stuff and applies to many different circuits, not just audio.

Asking for evidence is like asking for evidence that lower rolling resistance is really better for cars, bicycles, etc. It just is.

 

[Jimster480]

How good is impedance of an amp? And what scientific evidence for lower impedance amp is better? Guys? Through some calculation, I reason that with an amp having relatively high impedance, the output voltage can change (lower) but its frequency is unchaged. So sound quality is unchanged.
As far as I know, some laptop audio interfaces has almost 20 - 100 ohm impedance. And its sound quality I assume good enough.
And
"I hear the airy (guess about more than 13khz) and lack of musicality and brightness of the Apple type-C dongle. Or my laptop boost some where at 8khz and 12khz and roll-off from around 14 khz. The difference in bass deep when listened with input speaker is more sensible. And I love to listen to 3.5 jack laptop usually.
Can it related to Harmonic excitement phenomenon in here? Music need some harmonic frequency mixing to sound good! https://mixingmonster.com/audio-frequencies"

Higher impedance often causes phase shift in many headphones.
This will cause the headphones frequency response to be all over the place and sometimes cause abnormally high distortion. It really does depend on the headphones technology that it is built around. For example, balanced armatures do not like to have impedance mismatch. So it is best to have low output impedance. Therefore, you have better headphone compatibility.
What's worse is that without a low output impedance and without the ability for you to actually test the frequency response of headphones using a scientific testing apparatus, you actually do not know how the headphone will respond to any specific impedance just by looking at the two numbers (headphone impedance & Amp impedance).

 

[Lighthouselp95]

Higher impedance often causes phase shift in many headphones.
This will cause the headphones frequency response to be all over the place and sometimes cause abnormally high distortion. It really does depend on the headphones technology that it is built around. For example, balanced armatures do not like to have impedance mismatch. So it is best to have low output impedance. Therefore, you have better headphone compatibility.
What's worse is that without a low output impedance and without the ability for you to actually test the frequency response of headphones using a scientific testing apparatus, you actually do not know how the headphone will respond to any specific impedance just by looking at the two numbers (headphone impedance & Amp impedance).

I think the fun lay at the damp factor, my dell laptop audio interface has output impendance about 20 to 100 ohm approximately and when hearing, the bass is more loose and natural, but the opposite is with my Apple type C dac dongle with impedance just 0.9 ohm the sound is dry and the bass is tight although its fs is rule flat. I see somewhere on the page optimized df is from 2.5 - 8. I see the lower DF the better bass or something repsonse.

 

[Jimster480]

I think the fun lay at the damp factor, my dell laptop audio interface has output impendance about 20 to 100 ohm approximately and when hearing, the bass is more loose and natural, but the opposite is with my Apple type C dac dongle with impedance just 0.9 ohm the sound is dry and the bass is tight although its fs is rule flat. I see somewhere on the page optimized df is from 2.5 - 8. I see the lower DF the better bass or something repsonse.

I think you are mistaking the impedance from the output power. it is possible that your desktop has way more output power available than the apple dongle which has a very anemic output. I suggest you pick up something like the Fiio KA13. I recently bought one and it has quite a bit of power and sounds great while being small enough to use with anything.

 

[Lighthouselp95]

This is a detailed measurement of the RealTek HD audio interface in my Dell XPS8930 Desktop system. The XPS 8930 retails for US $1,200 as of this writing so not a low-end desktop tower. Try as I might, I could not find the identity of the RealTek CODEC (ADC/DAC) used in it. Nothing shows up in device manager in Windows, nor can I find anything about it on Dell website.

I am using the Dell to create this review so all I could do for a picture is to use a stock image:

View attachment 42623​

The panther is real though.

There are both front and rear connections. I tested both and performance is the same.

Note that I am focusing on output only. Did not test the microphone.

As an aside, overall I have been happy with the reliability and performance of this Dell machine. Crapware in the form of invasive McAfee anti-virus has been my only issue (it was dumping most of my emails in junk folder).

Motherboard DAC Audio Measurements
I set the system level to 100% and ran my dashboard (using ASIO4ALL):
View attachment 42624

Ouch. Even at anemic 1 volt output we are clipping badly. As such, it takes the dishonor of showing the worst distortion and noise rating of any DAC tested:
View attachment 42625

Even without clipping, performance is poor:
View attachment 42626

If you are going to use this output, best keep the levels below -2 dB. Then again that may cause the downstream amplifier to not be able to reach its full power.

Multitone shows the performance when not clipped:

View attachment 42627

Sad.

Jitter test shows spurious tones and high noise floor:

View attachment 42628

Linearity is better than one would predict:
View attachment 42629

Reason being that linearity test filters out distortion and noise so provides better results.

Dynamic range test shows the high noise floor/low output level:

View attachment 42630

Headphone Power Measurements
Assuming you may be tempted to use the port just for headphone listening, I ran my usual power tests starting at 300 ohm:

View attachment 42631

Yuck! We can't even get one milliwatt of power before clipping? In a desktop with plenty of power?

Surely we can do better with 33 ohm load since that is not voltage hungry:
View attachment 42632

Are you kidding me? Once again it can't go beyond 1 milliwatt? What is going on here?

This is what is going on:
View attachment 42633

130 ohm output impedance! This internal impedance is eating power even with high impedance loads.

Conclusions
When I was at Microsoft my team was responsible for setting WHQL standards for PC OEMs. In a nutshell, if the PC OEM met those quality standards, they would get a discount on their Windows license. This was our way of enticing the PC OEMs to build better PCs. When I took on the program, the standards were so poor, you could do better with a cassette tape than a PC! So I asked that we raise this level. No sooner than we released the program that I heard cries from Dell/HP like you would not believe. They escalated up to CEO level I think. We stuck to our guns even though what we were asking them to achieve was still way less than what you can expect from 16 bit audio.

We see the results to driving costs down regardless of performance. A headphone amplifier that can't even produce 1 milliwatt of power. Yet Dell wastes money on crapware on effects and such for this interface. Shame on you guys for not spending another 50 cent interface to produce better audio.

Needless to say, you better use an external DAC/amp with these computers. If you don't, I will personally visit you so you do!

Total junk. Not remotely recommended.

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As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.

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Can you test the affect of soundcard to some IEMs. I predicted the fluctuations that.
I am suspecting that my laptop interface is adjusting iems much more than Apple dongle follow the unpredicted trends

 

[staticV3]

Can you test the affect of soundcard to some IEMs. I predicted the fluctuations that.
I think that my laptop interface is adjusting iems much more than Apple dongle follow the unpredicted trends

Any particular IEMs that you're intrested in?

 

[Lighthouselp95]

Any particular IEMs that you're intrested in?

Whatever IEMs. The setup is plz one with impedance 16 ohm, and one around 32 ohm. The considering is big affect of 3.5mm audio interface laptop and expect a little affect from Apple dongle type-C to IEMs (you can use a type C female to USB adapter with the same laptop), I wanna see the frequency response of IEMs for 4 test. Can u. Thanks. Sorry for my English because I'm from Asian as well sir.
P/s: I also wanna say that the Apple dongle can change a little its fr and power from source to source, I did compare by perception
I'm currently using QKZ HBB and KZ Castor