• WANTED: Happy members who like to discuss audio and other topics related to our interest. Desire to learn and share knowledge of science required. There are many reviews of audio hardware and expert members to help answer your questions. Click here to have your audio equipment measured for free!

Generic Budget USB to AES Converter Review

Rate this USB to AES Converter

  • 1. Poor (headless panther)

    Votes: 98 83.8%
  • 1. Waste of money (piggy bank panther)

    Votes: 16 13.7%
  • 3. Fine (happy panther)

    Votes: 3 2.6%
  • 4. Great (golfing panther)

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    117
Looks like H3240 is the crystal oscillator.

Also given the sub circuit-board mounted onto the main circuit board, they are using some kind of standard USB->SPDIF converter (with a qualcomm 5128 for the Bluetooth. XMOS for the USB) and then just use a center-tapped transformer to generate the balanced output from an unbalanced input.

Note that better and more accurate converters will present with two crystal oscillators, one for 44.1K rates and their multiples, the other for 48K rates and their multiples.

Another thing to note is a lack of power-supply regulators -- that may be what is ultimately causing the jitter problems is power-supply noise coming from the computer.

Contrast with the complexity, usb-isolation and reclocking and multiple power supplies of the matrix xsdpdif-3 (which is ridiculously expensive, but very nice).

1735673830664.png
 
I got this (Quloos QU02 USB Bridge) one coming in from shenzenaudio, assuming it ever leaves the airport in China. Was trying to be cheap (again, lol). This one is using Accusalicon AS338 and I think the XPDIF-3 uses the prior version AS318B. Not that it matters, as its splitting hairs at this level.
 
The human ear can't tell the difference after 44kHz, right? unless , you are a mastering engineer who works with EQ files



Yes, I wanted to try it! there I ordered a Topping D10

But I don't listen to music at more than 44khz or 48khz

The issue is that Tidal or other services now offer a lot of music at 96K and some at 192K. Playback a 192k file through a transformer and you'll get silence unless you have a player e.g. USB-Audio-Player-PRO, that allows setting the maximum sample rate for the DAC to 96K.

There's plenty of reason to want sample rates higher than nyquist frequency needed to represent 20-20Khz. For one, higher sample rates push the output filter artifacts of a DAC completely out of the audible-range and allow for a very simple, non-phase-damaging-to-human-hearing-range filter. Also, perhaps you don't want your high-frequency signals represented by two samples (e.g. 22.05Khz signal sampled at 44.1K comprises two samples), completely throwing out all high-frequency phase information that may help spatialize audio....

We need an update to Nyquist that is also cognizant of spatialization cues and a better model of human spatialization to properly capture all aspects of human sound perception.
And engineers need to stop thinking you can't perceive "imaginary numbers" and that throwing out the phase information they represent, from their frequency-domain perspective, is a scientifically valid assumption.

It would be awesome to conduct an experiment showing bats crashing into objects while echolocating, because they're wearing special headphones that digitize the sound at the corresponding Nyquist rate of bat-hearing.
 
The issue is that Tidal or other services now offer a lot of music at 96K and some at 192K. Playback a 192k file through a transformer and you'll get silence unless you have a player e.g. USB-Audio-Player-PRO, that allows setting the maximum sample rate for the DAC to 96K.

There's plenty of reason to want sample rates higher than nyquist frequency needed to represent 20-20Khz. For one, higher sample rates push the output filter artifacts of a DAC completely out of the audible-range and allow for a very simple, non-phase-damaging-to-human-hearing-range filter. Also, perhaps you don't want your high-frequency signals represented by two samples (e.g. 22.05Khz signal sampled at 44.1K comprises two samples), completely throwing out all high-frequency phase information that may help spatialize audio....

We need an update to Nyquist that is also cognizant of spatialization cues and a better model of human spatialization to properly capture all aspects of human sound perception.
And engineers need to stop thinking you can't perceive "imaginary numbers" and that throwing out the phase information they represent, from their frequency-domain perspective, is a scientifically valid assumption.

It would be awesome to conduct an experiment showing bats crashing into objects while echolocating, because they're wearing special headphones that digitize the sound at the corresponding Nyquist rate of bat-hearing.
I understand, thank you

In my case, I'm on Deezer HiFi so maximum 44kHz/16bits and I record a little in 48khz with my music studio

So I'm not concerned by everything you say, am I?


before the Matrix, which DAC did you have? a Topping?
 
I got this (Quloos QU02 USB Bridge) one coming in from shenzenaudio, assuming it ever leaves the airport in China. Was trying to be cheap (again, lol). This one is using Accusalicon AS338 and I think the XPDIF-3 uses the prior version AS318B. Not that it matters, as its splitting hairs at this level.

Interesting... but at $389.99 + $50.00 (Shipping) it does get close to the ridiculous $499 cost of the matrix xspdif-3 which I got direct-shipped from amazon, returnable for free, including shipping. I'd say the QU02 is probably several years newer than the XSPDIF3 and thus uses the older Accusilicon clocks.
 
Interesting... but at $389.99 + $50.00 (Shipping) it does get close to the ridiculous $499 cost of the matrix xspdif-3 which I got direct-shipped from amazon, returnable for free, including shipping. I'd say the QU02 is probably several years newer than the XSPDIF3 and thus uses the older Accusilicon clocks.

Shipping is free if bought from shenzenaudio, only $50 if bought directly from them. I also had a holiday coupon for shenzenaudio. Amazon also has it but at a markup, even though seller is still shenzenaudio.
 
I understand, thank you

In my case, I'm on Deezer HiFi so maximum 44kHz/16bits and I record a little in 48khz with my music studio

So I'm not concerned by everything you say, am I?


before the Matrix, which DAC did you have? a Topping?

ADI-2 PRO FS-R BE :) which probably doesn't need something as fancy as the XSPDIF3 feeding it, but also nicely isolates it from a potentially noisy computer. I actually needed 3 different USB inputs to the ADI-2, the other, connecting to my NVIDIA Shield at 192k, is a Douk Audio U2 PRO. Whereas the actual USB input on the ADI-2 PRO is used for music production, DJing, etc and I need that USB input free to plug in to whatever computer/laptop I'm using for that task.
 
It is basically an admission of crime to stick this POS in front of your Genelecs.
well, you can already congratulate me for switching to the Topping D10 instead of the aliexpress USB converter hehehe

next step may be Matrix xspdif-3 ^^
 
Looks like H3240 is the crystal oscillator.
Took a closer look again, it ended up being a C at the end - H324C

But a brief google and perplexity AI search of it didn't come up with anything.

Screenshot 2024-12-31 at 12.58.48 PM.png
 
So the value of this review, it seems to me, is more about not ordering generic, cheap stuff under any circumstance unless and until there's more transparency about the actual manufacturer and its track record.
ASR has shown over and over again that expensive gear from "respected" manufacturers dosnt guarantee good performance either.
 
Shipping is free if bought from shenzenaudio, only $50 if bought directly from them. I also had a holiday coupon for shenzenaudio. Amazon also has it but at a markup, even though seller is still shenzenaudio.
Actually the Quloos unit ( https://www.qlshifi.com/en/wzcapi/qu02.htm ) looks pretty interesting.

The clocks and I/O section appear to be opto-isolated (or transformer??) from the USB section with separated ground-planes. There's a linear/analog power supply with a relatively large filter cap, old-school linear regulator w/ heatsink, and what appears to be a separate switching supply to the USB interface and computer. Even a separate power supply to the onboard microcontroller. The case ground (see screws) is decoupled from the main-board ground-plane.

1735680869255.png
 
For one, higher sample rates push the output filter artifacts of a DAC completely out of the audible-range
48kHz is already high enough - though I'll admit 96 gives a lovely warm fuzzy feeling of headroom - even if it is audibly identical.

completely throwing out all high-frequency phase information that may help spatialize audio....
No, it doesn't. The band limited signal is still perfectly reconstructed - including phase. Don't make me post monty again :)
 
I would think one of the Douk Audio units connected via short RCA to XLR cable would work. They work with many DACs even though the signal voltage is lower than AES/EBU spec. Though it would be nice to test that idea. Or maybe the Canare transformers with a Douk Audio USB to SPDIF unit would work better.
 
Possibly the most interesting part of this review is how much the jitter effects the output of the DAC. I had been under the impression that the DAC clock recovery/PLL were much better at jitter rejection than that.
 
The 16bit issue needs to be resolved first (thanks @pma) before jumping to conclusion, or at least the comparison must be made at equal rates.
At any rate it is clear that the digital output jitter performance won't be stellar, given the bare-bone implementation.

Whether a DAC can handle this is another question but the plot shown for the D70 doesn't look nice, almost like if an improper window had been used which would suggest a brutally high jitter. And if a DAC cannot handle it, it's the DAC problem. Since @amirm doesn't test jitter reduction of DACs in his tests we have a pretty large blind spot there. Some DAC may be great (and some are known for excellent jitter reduction like the RME ADIs) and some may be bad.

In general, parts of this review are not technically correct.
Notably the first plot, the spectrum of the J-test signal in digital loop-back through the DUT does not actually test the DUT jitter. The spectrum will always look like those (for 16bit and 24bit) and is not affected by the DUT at all because, well, it is digital loopback.

Why @amirm did not test the jitter of the digital output of the DUT and compare it to the AP's own reference output is beyond me. The AP has a high-speed high precision ADC for exactly that purpose, analyze the timing properties of digital signals.
 
Even if we found such a converter at a small price which did measure well, the state of the market is such that we wouldn't necessarily know if we were actually being provided with the good one when we order. AliExpress and Amazon have so many identical-appearing products under different, obscure (and often silly) brand names that I simply don't trust any of them. So the value of this review, it seems to me, is more about not ordering generic, cheap stuff under any circumstance unless and until there's more transparency about the actual manufacturer and its track record.
Monoprice enters the conversation… well we do know some of their manufacturers, ATI being one
 
ADI-2 PRO FS-R BE :) which probably doesn't need something as fancy as the XSPDIF3 feeding it, but also nicely isolates it from a potentially noisy computer. I actually needed 3 different USB inputs to the ADI-2, the other, connecting to my NVIDIA Shield at 192k, is a Douk Audio U2 PRO. Whereas the actual USB input on the ADI-2 PRO is used for music production, DJing, etc and I need that USB input free to plug in to whatever computer/laptop I'm using for that task.
I used one of those RME's connected via SPDIF to my Neumann's and the right speaker constantly dropped out. I wanted volume control for SPDIF but ended up having to use analog out.. Ended up selling it because it was overkill for my situation at the time and wanted to avoid so many conversions.

That said, it is a GREAT preamp/DAC connected to a Purifi or ncore directly in low gain mode.
 
Last edited:
Back
Top Bottom