salmo
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I invite you to a short measurements made by a beginner. 
I present the ESI Audiotrak DR. DAC nano - I found it at the bottom of a drawer during a desk change, then I figured it is a good specimen for initial measurements:
The DAC/AMP itself is equipped with a mini USB input (it's slowly a vintage thing?) and a combo optical and line output. The manufacture date on the packaging is 2009, so you could say it's already slightly old. The hardware itself is equipped with an AKM AK4421 chip, which supports sampling up to 192kHz, but the maximum performance provided by DR. DAC nano is 96kHz at 24 bits.
Measurements made with an E1DA Cosmos ADC and an ATOM AMP 2 as a buffer. Software - Multitone by @pkane
Let's start with the basics - the FFT spectrum for a 1kHz signal and 0dB gain:
Oh boy... it doesn't look good. The harmonics themselves are very high, but so is the noise level. Let's see if the situation improves with lower gain:
The noise has definitely decreased, but the harmonics are still powerful, especially H5 and H3, which have even gained in strength. I got the best result and a compromise of sorts at a gain of -22dB, but TD+N of -72.9dB is still not an outstanding result:
The Multitone test doesn't look good either:
Let's have a look at frequency response:
Excuse me, but what happened here!? Low frequencies between 20-1000 Hz are definitely boosted, and at the highest level exceeds more than 2dB. At higher frequencies the situation is reversed, but not at as spectacular level as on the bass section. I thought something was wrong here, but I found another measurement on the Internet and it coincides with my measurement. Could it be one of those famous DAC/AMPs with a sonic signature?
Jitter (USB) looks quite reasonable for such a class of equipment:
Now the TD+N versus frequency graphs. I took the first measurement at -2dB gain due to strong clipping at low frequencies:
Finally, a summary plot of noise, TD+N and N+D versus generator signal level. You can see well here that above a gain of -22 dB the distortions starts to increase strongly:
It's hard to sum it up, because on the one hand, this is a mobile DAC/AMP from ~2009, but on the other, ESI Audiotrak itself is a professional company. The manufacturer also doesn't post any specific information on its website, other than the parameters of the used DAC chip. I did a short test on 'light' HD560s headphones, comfortable listening level was with the volume set to about 20-25 in Windows 11 (this is also the level roughly equivalent to a -22dB gain from the generator). There is far too much bass for my tastes and the whole thing is muddled. I think the only sensible combination is this DAC/AMP with headphones, which are very bright and have a lot of bass deficiency.... or simply for people for whom bass is mostly important.
If you have any advice (for a newbie) on measurements - I am more than open to any suggestions!
I present the ESI Audiotrak DR. DAC nano - I found it at the bottom of a drawer during a desk change, then I figured it is a good specimen for initial measurements:The DAC/AMP itself is equipped with a mini USB input (it's slowly a vintage thing?) and a combo optical and line output. The manufacture date on the packaging is 2009, so you could say it's already slightly old. The hardware itself is equipped with an AKM AK4421 chip, which supports sampling up to 192kHz, but the maximum performance provided by DR. DAC nano is 96kHz at 24 bits.
Measurements made with an E1DA Cosmos ADC and an ATOM AMP 2 as a buffer. Software - Multitone by @pkane
Let's start with the basics - the FFT spectrum for a 1kHz signal and 0dB gain:
Oh boy... it doesn't look good. The harmonics themselves are very high, but so is the noise level. Let's see if the situation improves with lower gain:
The noise has definitely decreased, but the harmonics are still powerful, especially H5 and H3, which have even gained in strength. I got the best result and a compromise of sorts at a gain of -22dB, but TD+N of -72.9dB is still not an outstanding result:
The Multitone test doesn't look good either:
Let's have a look at frequency response:
Excuse me, but what happened here!? Low frequencies between 20-1000 Hz are definitely boosted, and at the highest level exceeds more than 2dB. At higher frequencies the situation is reversed, but not at as spectacular level as on the bass section. I thought something was wrong here, but I found another measurement on the Internet and it coincides with my measurement. Could it be one of those famous DAC/AMPs with a sonic signature?
Jitter (USB) looks quite reasonable for such a class of equipment:
Now the TD+N versus frequency graphs. I took the first measurement at -2dB gain due to strong clipping at low frequencies:
Finally, a summary plot of noise, TD+N and N+D versus generator signal level. You can see well here that above a gain of -22 dB the distortions starts to increase strongly:
It's hard to sum it up, because on the one hand, this is a mobile DAC/AMP from ~2009, but on the other, ESI Audiotrak itself is a professional company. The manufacturer also doesn't post any specific information on its website, other than the parameters of the used DAC chip. I did a short test on 'light' HD560s headphones, comfortable listening level was with the volume set to about 20-25 in Windows 11 (this is also the level roughly equivalent to a -22dB gain from the generator). There is far too much bass for my tastes and the whole thing is muddled. I think the only sensible combination is this DAC/AMP with headphones, which are very bright and have a lot of bass deficiency.... or simply for people for whom bass is mostly important.
If you have any advice (for a newbie) on measurements - I am more than open to any suggestions!
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