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Gustard X16 Balanced MQA DAC Review

Veri

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Just imagine if ESS artificially holds back chips now that AKM will have inventory problems. Price hikes incoming? :p
 

deafenears

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Just imagine if ESS artificially holds back chips now that AKM will have inventory problems. Price hikes incoming? :p
Maybe good time for large chip makers Intel, AMD, NVIDIA to get into the audio chip business.
 

kopczas

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Well, it looks like they may not be shipping these on the proposed release date due to lack of chips.

Note about shipping is changing ones every few days. When I put an order was said that unit would be shipped at the end of november. Then it changed to "unit would be delivered by middle of december. Now it says that will be ship when in stock.
So I hope that they have built some initial number of units for first orders. Otherwise If 50$ discount was to catch buyers and market investigation, we will wait forever for our units.
 

abdo123

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Note about shipping is changing ones every few days. When I put an order was said that unit would be shipped at the end of november. Then it changed to "unit would be delivered by middle of december. Now it says that will be ship when in stock.
So I hope that they have built some initial number of units for first orders. Otherwise If 50$ discount was to catch buyers and market investigation, we will wait forever for our units.

wtf i just checked and you’re right! What a shame!
 

pimy

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With AKM factory fire I guess demand for ESS chip is high
 
OP
amirm

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It makes sense that there is a run on ESS chips as the retail business is going to shift to products based on their chip. No doubt there are middlemen who also try to corner the market as well.
 

mocenigo

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Maybe good time for large chip makers Intel, AMD, NVIDIA to get into the audio chip business.

ROTFL. Well, intel perhaps, since we (at ARM) are now humiliating them, they may have to get out of the computer chip business :p
 

mocenigo

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It makes sense that there is a run on ESS chips as the retail business is going to shift to products based on their chip. No doubt there are middlemen who also try to corner the market as well.

Or maybe just more demand as expected for the ES9068...
 

kopczas

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Or maybe just more demand as expected for the ES9068...

I`ve checked the price of chip in Mouser right after Amir published review. It was available then, 15th of november all stock has gone.
 

Matias

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The informed guess is that volume attenuation in the DAC is transparent, at least to reasonable levels (-30Db or so). If at max output the noise and distortion are inaudible, even assuming that they worsen linearly with the attenuation (so that a SINAD of 121 would become 91 at 30Db attenuation), which is a pessimistic approach, the effect is usually less detrimental than using a potentiometer.
And yet an analog preamp keeps -30 dB attenuation with SINAD above 100.

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...ext90-preamplifier-extender.17635/post-573276

@amirm I think this area needs further clarification (an article with measurements, that is :) ), as we are always assuming -20 dB to - 40 dB attenuation on digital volume is transparent, impacting the SINAD directly, while a good analog attenuator keeps SINAD higher. Instead of chasing 2 to 5 dB more SINAD on the latest and greatest DAC, IMO it makes more sense to care for the attenuation, or better yet the overall gain structure of the system, as it can bring 10+ SINAD to the end results.
 
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mocenigo

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And yet an analog preamp keeps -30 dB attenuation with SINAD above 100.

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...ext90-preamplifier-extender.17635/post-573276

apples and oranges. I was talking about a DAC and not about a resistor ladder based preamplifier. Also, note that I said “potentiometer” :)

And even for DACs i indeed said these are upper estimates and because of the existence of various types of contribution to noise and distortion which behave differently the SINAD decrease may be better than a simple linear extrapolation...
 

Matias

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The main issue with pots is not distortion or noise, and the preamp you mention has no pot ;).
Exactly, I think we are chasing super numbers on the latest DACs, and the general consensus is assuming all analog attenuation is done by cheap and noisy pots. But when going high end, SINAD is better preserved with either with stepped attenuator or variable gain. This is significant.
 

Matias

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And going further, I would love to see how fixed analog attenuators impact SINAD compared to digital volume.

The article would be simple: get a high end measuring DAC like this X16, attenuate -20 dB digital, measure SINAD. Then test a -24 dB analog attenuator, measure SINAD, and see who wins. Repeat for -10 dB, as probably people doing DAC to amp would end up using a mix of analog attenuator + digital attenuation.

Rothwell are considered to be high end attenuators.
https://rothwellaudio.16.ekm.shop/ekmps/shops/rothwellaudio/balanced-in-line-attenuators-3-p.asp
 

boXem

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Exactly, I think we are chasing super numbers on the latest DACs, and the general consensus is assuming all analog attenuation is done by cheap and noisy pots. But when going high end, SINAD is better preserved with either with stepped attenuator or variable gain. This is significant.
Main issue with pots is unbalance, which is far more audible than their impact on SINAD. So between DAC alone and DAC + pot, the DAC alone wins.
 

Cortes

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Main issue with pots is unbalance, which is far more audible than their impact on SINAD. So between DAC alone and DAC + pot, the DAC alone wins.

Do you mean to leave all the volume control to the analogue path of the signal with integrates/pres ?.
 
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