Insufficient volume from Topping DX9D when playing classic music

[TheHermitViolinist]

Good day folk.
I listen to highres FLAC (24/96) from a dedicated windows11 PC connected via USB to a Topping DX9 Discrete and a pair of Sennheiser 660x.
My music taste is 98% classic music, and most of my files are recorded with a relatively low volume, occasionally riddiculously low.
I never have problems when I watch netflix or listen to modern music, but with classic music I find myself lacking in volume, despite selecting the high gain from the DAC/Amp.
In all honesty: the volume is acceptable at maximum, but it makes me wish for more.
I recently upgraded to the DX9 from the Atom Amp+ and that one was significantly more powerful than the current DX9
The question for you then is how I should go by it in the correct way. How do I crank the volume further?

Foobar sends at the maximum volume with no DSP (and obviously no EQ).
The Amp part of my DX9 is already on high gain and I normally enable the EQ with a curve adjusted for my headphones and for slightly warmer sound. The EQ gain is here revised downwards to prevent distortion.

I considered creating a new EQ profile (with a less conservative gain) that I would use only with classic music, but maybe you have something better to offer?
Have I missed out on some important feature of my DX9?
Thanks in advance

 

[nerdstrike]

There is the free but hard work option of modifying the FLACs to increase the source rather than stacking gains through components. That's safest from the position of not blasting your ears in when you forget to turn it down.

I think it would be labour intensive or require you to start programming to rewrite all the files with volume normalised volume.

You might increase oomph from the DX9 if you're using balanced cabling rather than unbalanced.

 

[staticV3]

but maybe you have something better to offer?

Replay gain.

 

[JamesYeomans]

Replay gain.

You beat me to it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ReplayGain

 

[Panelhead]

What model headphone are you using?

 

[Chrispy]

Better transducers for your particular amp perhaps. Perhaps simply better transducers.

 

[shuppatsu]

ReplayGain, definitely. But it’s still a mystery why it sounds louder with your Atom+.

Looking at the specs/measurements, the DX9 has both more power and higher gain than the Atom+, though it’s close in single-ended mode. Are you maybe using PEQ with the DX9 and lopping off a bunch of headroom?

If so, you could get a $20 balanced cable and that should solve the problem.

 

[DVDdoug]

A balanced connection should go 6dB louder. More analog gain and more available analog peak-power is usually the answer.

You may just need more output from your headphone amp or more sensitive headphones, although what you have is already better than average in that respect.

ReplayGain may help a bit, but classical is still going to be quieter unless you change the defaults and allow ReplayGain to push the peaks into clipping/distortion. And generally, you'd want to use the Album Gain setting to keep quiet and loud tracks/movements with the same relative loudness (one loudness adjustment for the whole performance).

Audacity can normalize ("maximize"), setting the digital peaks to the 0dBFS digital maximum. Again, you'd probably want to normalize the performance as a whole. But a few "loud" peaks don't necessarily sound loud and classical music has a lot of dynamics (loud and quiet parts) so it's never going to sound as loud as a modern production. And it may already be peak-normalized.

Normalizing should be about the same as ReplayGain, since ReplayGain will be boosting these quiet tracks as much as possible without clipping.

The Loudness War is "won" with lots of dynamic compression and that's not how classical music is supposed to sound. (A lot of us don't like what it does to rock either...)

 

[Roland68]

Good day folk.
I listen to highres FLAC (24/96) from a dedicated windows11 PC connected via USB to a Topping DX9 Discrete and a pair of Sennheiser 660x.
My music taste is 98% classic music, and most of my files are recorded with a relatively low volume, occasionally riddiculously low.
I never have problems when I watch netflix or listen to modern music, but with classic music I find myself lacking in volume, despite selecting the high gain from the DAC/Amp.
In all honesty: the volume is acceptable at maximum, but it makes me wish for more.
I recently upgraded to the DX9 from the Atom Amp+ and that one was significantly more powerful than the current DX9
The question for you then is how I should go by it in the correct way. How do I crank the volume further?

Foobar sends at the maximum volume with no DSP (and obviously no EQ).
The Amp part of my DX9 is already on high gain and I normally enable the EQ with a curve adjusted for my headphones and for slightly warmer sound. The EQ gain is here revised downwards to prevent distortion.

I considered creating a new EQ profile (with a less conservative gain) that I would use only with classic music, but maybe you have something better to offer?
Have I missed out on some important feature of my DX9?
Thanks in advance

You may have overlooked the fact that the power output of the DX9 D headphone amplifier at its unbalanced output at 300 ohms isn't actually much higher than that of the Atom Amp+ (approximately 270 mW vs. 260 mW).
However, at lower impedances, the DX9 D is significantly superior (32 ohms: 1 W vs. 2.1 W).

With a balanced headphone cable, this power output at 300 ohms increases by a factor of approximately four to around 1060 mW.

 

[shuppatsu]

You may have overlooked the fact that the power output of the DX9 D headphone amplifier at its unbalanced output at 300 ohms isn't actually much higher than that of the Atom Amp+ (approximately 270 mW vs. 260 mW).
However, at lower impedances, the DX9 D is significantly superior (32 ohms: 1 W vs. 2.1 W).

With a balanced headphone cable, this power output at 300 ohms increases by a factor of approximately four to around 1060 mW.

Power shouldn’t matter because the signal is low. Gain matters, where the DX9 is supposed to have +20dB in high gain single ended, vs the Atom Amp’s +13dB.

My guess is PEQ.

 

[Panelhead]

What model headphones are being used?

 

[kemmler3D]

What model headphones are being used?

Good day folk.
I listen to highres FLAC (24/96) from a dedicated windows11 PC connected via USB to a Topping DX9 Discrete and a pair of Sennheiser 660x.

 

[Panelhead]

There are several models with similar names. Are these HD 660X, 660S, or HD 6XX?

 

[TheHermitViolinist]

I should have written HD6xx.
I was reluctant in boosting the gain from the PEQ equaliser for fear it would lead to distortion or clipping, but replaygain is a great option for me! Thanks

With regards to the difference between the Atom and the DX9: first of all I don't (yet) use a balanced cable; secondly I enabled the PEQ on the DX9 whereas on the Atom the signal was always clean. When I enable the PEQ and boost some frequencies the reccomended gain lowers, and indeed, if I disable the PEQ I get a signal boost. But my ultimate goal was to not induce distortion or clipping with the PEQ enabled.
I did not know that balanced cables gave such a large boost! With an inaudible noise floor on the DX9 I really had difficuly justifying the investment, but now I am intrigued so I will buy that as well.
The solution with replaygain insures that I can use the PEQ with the appropriate gain which scales dynamically based on the track, which is ultimately what I needed!

 

[JIW]

Power shouldn’t matter because the signal is low. Gain matters, where the DX9 is supposed to have +20dB in high gain single ended, vs the Atom Amp’s +13dB.

My guess is PEQ.

You have misread the specs. Single ended high gain maximum output for the DX9 Discrete is 18.5 dBV. Balanced, it is 24.5 dBV. With the typical single ended output DAC output of 6-8 dBV, that is a gain of 10.5 to 12.5 dB single ended and 16.5 to 18.5 dB balanced.

I should have written HD6xx.
I was reluctant in boosting the gain from the PEQ equaliser for fear it would lead to distortion or clipping, but replaygain is a great option for me! Thanks

With regards to the difference between the Atom and the DX9: first of all I don't (yet) use a balanced cable; secondly I enabled the PEQ on the DX9 whereas on the Atom the signal was always clean. When I enable the PEQ and boost some frequencies the reccomended gain lowers, and indeed, if I disable the PEQ I get a signal boost. But my ultimate goal was to not induce distortion or clipping with the PEQ enabled.
I did not know that balanced cables gave such a large boost! With an inaudible noise floor on the DX9 I really had difficuly justifying the investment, but now I am intrigued so I will buy that as well.
The solution with replaygain insures that I can use the PEQ with the appropriate gain which scales dynamically based on the track, which is ultimately what I needed!

I have listened to plenty of classical music with my HD600 and DX5 II single ended with the same maximum output and have rarely had the need to use high gain. Most times, low gain and -10 dB is the most I needed. Can you give an example of a problematic recording? What DAC did you use before? Do you use exclusive mode in foobar?

 

[shuppatsu]

You have misread the specs. Single ended high gain maximum output for the DX9 Discrete is 18.5 dBV. Balanced, it is 24.5 dBV. With the typical single ended output DAC output of 6-8 dBV, that is a gain of 10.5 to 12.5 dB single ended and 16.5 to 18.5 dB balanced.

Yes, read off the preamp gain rather than the headphone amp gain. Though really it’s close enough.

I’m not sure I understand the second part of what you’re saying, not to say you’re wrong.

 

[JIW]

Yes, read off the preamp gain rather than the headphone amp gain. Though really it’s close enough.

I’m not sure I understand the second part of what you’re saying, not to say you’re wrong.

You said 20 dB gain. Topping state full scale output in dBV under gain (as indicated by V RMS/FS) not gain relative to line output, which in this case would be 10.5 dB for single ended high gain. Quite different.

 

[shuppatsu]

You said 20 dB gain. Topping state full scale output in dBV under gain (as indicated by V RMS/FS) not gain relative to line output, which in this case would be 10.5 dB for single ended high gain. Quite different.

Got it. Didn't understand the dBV part so my brain conveniently elided it.