Gustard X16 Balanced MQA DAC Review

[kopczas]

Otherwise what would be the point of the cap?

Gustard won a race for first low price dac from China based on new ESS chip. Nothing else matters. Propably another one is under development.

 

[Labjr]

Gustard won a race for first low price dac from China based on new ESS chip. Nothing else matters. Propably another one is under development.

Another one or two dozen. ES9068as will likely be the next trend in the Chi-fi evolution. Especially with AKM down for the foreseeable future. Delivering one for less than half the price of the X16 would be interesting.

 

[Justin Maynard]

Might be a noob question, but... Can I connect two devices to this, one over XLR and the other over RCA, and have them both play at the same time?

 

[ArturoKiwi]

Might be a noob question, but... Can I connect two devices to this, one over XLR and the other over RCA, and have them both play at the same time?

Amirm some post ago said yes:
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...x16-balanced-mqa-dac-review.17419/post-564609

 

[Justin Maynard]

Amirm some post ago said yes:
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...x16-balanced-mqa-dac-review.17419/post-564609

Thank you!

 

[Harmonie]

20 dollars will be refunded to your account for each month delayed since the date you ordered, the cap is 100 dollars. This compensation mechanism only adopts for the orders in SHENZHENAUDIO store.

Interesting development. Good on ShenzhenAudio.

Good indeed, but when you read = that would mean that they can expect more than 5 months delay ???

 

[Harmonie]

The 100usd cap is a bit funny. I mean do they anticipate the possibility of over 5 months delay? Otherwise what would be the point of the cap?
Makes you wonder. They have probably seen it all and thus want to protect all their angles/exposure. I assume anyway that that refund is coming out of Gustard pocked. Not Shenzhen Audio being a nice guy

Sorry, just noticed that we had the same mathematical thought

 

[Gringoaudio1]

Hi new to the forum. Looking to buy one of these balanced dacs. How do you connect a pair of passive speakers to these using the xlr out? Do i need an amp that has XLR in?

It appears to have both RCA and Balanced outputs. Since there appears to be no volume control it would have to go into something that does like a Reciever, or Integrated amp, or pre-amp/amp combo. It woud simply be another 'source' like a CD player or other source of music.

 

[cbayschm]

The 100usd cap is a bit funny. I mean do they anticipate the possibility of over 5 months delay? Otherwise what would be the point of the cap?
Makes you wonder. They have probably seen it all and thus want to protect all their angles/exposure. I assume anyway that that refund is coming out of Gustard pocked. Not Shenzhen Audio being a nice guy

Actually I think it has more to do with the price they have set inside China. Sale price in China is approximately USD399, so maybe they are just taking the extra margin off international sale price (USD499) for the delays? That's why the cap is set to 100?

 

[kopczas]

When I wrote yesterday to hifigo support for some reason reply was for me and bunch of other people, like email group. We shared few messages and finally some wrote:

"As far as I know, there is MQA certification issue of x16, so the production of x16 is suspended. No one knows how long it will take."

Info came "Form Gustard directly. In addition, I don't think ess chip supply is on shortage, akm chip is in shortage indeed. "

How is it @gustard ?

 

[cbayschm]

mmm, but this product already had a first production run and sold out. I feel if there was an issue with MQA certification it would have been an issue for the first production, not the second, or am I mistaken?

 

[pompecukor]

Even if the delay is just 3 months. At the pace we are going, there will be 3 newer/better units on the market by then. I am almost sure this is why the capped the amount to 100usd. They are experienced retailers. They know more than us.If there was no possibility for longer delay, then they would have not bothered to to add a cap.

Anyway as I said, in just 2-3 months Topping and Co will have their answers and if you asked for a full refund now, you will be thankful.

My 2 cents

 

[pompecukor]

mmm, but this product already had a first production run and sold out. I feel if there was an issue with MQA certification it would have been an issue for the first production, not the second, or am I mistaken?

Not entirely true. Just look at MATRIX MINI-I 3 PRO MQA Been selling for 2 months now and the Roon certification is still not sorted.

details are here if you are interested... https://community.roonlabs.com/t/matrix-mini-i-pro-3-roon-ready-or-not/123731/6

 

[cbayschm]

Not entirely true. Just look at MATRIX MINI-I 3 PRO MQA Been selling for 2 months now and the Roon certification is still not sorted.

But they haven't stopped production or delayed it because of it...

 

[kopczas]

mmm, but this product already had a first production run and sold out.

I have no idea but I guess certification might be unclear for chip with build-in mqa decoder. Someone here asked that question before : who pays for certificate: chips manufacturer or dacs? When mqa needed extra hardware answer was simple. And what if dac manufacturer uses chip with mqa but one would disable mqa decoding?I guess there must be some software trigger.

 

[pompecukor]

But they haven't stopped production or delayed it because of it...

You are right about that. My point was a product could be released with an ongoing cetmetification. However we do not know the complete circumstances. They might have a fallout with MQA who may have issues and CAD till it is sorted. For Matrix it is just a question of Roon not working on it yet. Roon has easier control as it has to be connected to it live. MQA is a different thing altogether.
Could be as easy as them not being able to tell how many devices are sold as in the fees owned per device to MQA or something like that.
Anyway I am just thoerycrafting with no merit. We shall see. Bottom line is I would not hold my breath.

 

[pompecukor]

I have no idea but I guess certification might be unclear for chip with build-in mqa decoder. Someone here asked that question before : who pays for certificate: chips manufacturer or dacs? When mqa needed extra hardware answer was simple. And what if dac manufacturer uses chip with mqa but one would disable mqa decoding?I guess there must be some software trigger.

Yeah. we are thinking along the same line...

 

[Morla]

There also was that 2nd Version of the A18 which had MQA but not had MQA officially.. which was never promoted on websites iirc. Maybe they got into legal trouble?

 

[JohnYang1997]

Gustard won a race for first low price dac from China based on new ESS chip. Nothing else matters. Propably another one is under development.

This isn't a race. They have been developing this dac since early this year. And with the support from Wolfx for the access of APx555B. But pretty impressive indeed.

 

[JohnYang1997]

I have no idea but I guess certification might be unclear for chip with build-in mqa decoder. Someone here asked that question before : who pays for certificate: chips manufacturer or dacs? When mqa needed extra hardware answer was simple. And what if dac manufacturer uses chip with mqa but one would disable mqa decoding?I guess there must be some software trigger.

You can turn on or off in the DAC register.
And both ESS and the end product manufacturer need to pay for licensing. There will be a separate certification process for the end product.