Time for measurement and review of another budget DAC: the Hifime Sabre 9018 USB audio DAC. It retails for $80 shipped from Amazon. The closest device I have to it is the Fiiio E10K USB audio DAC which costs nearly the same at $76 on Amazon. Click to see the detailed review of Fiio E10K.
Overview
The Hifime comes in one of the lowest budget packages I have of any DAC. It is a tiny, plastic unit with permanently attached 3-4 inch USB cable and a 3.5mm headphone jack. It has a sole red LED light indicating it is on. Even the plastic package it came in screams low-budget. It is the kind of thing that hangs at check-out counter asking to be bought on impulse.
In this comparison, the Fiio E10K blows it away with larger brushed aluminum case, independent line and headphone output, analog volume control, detachable USB cable and blue LED for what that is worth.
The low budget theme continues with standard support up to 96 Khz as detected in Roon player:
Thankfully it also supports 88.2 Khz which the Fiio strangely leaves behind.
Compatibility was excellent with simple plug-and-play in Windows 10 Creator's edition.
Measurements
Let's start with J-test and see where the noise floor and jitter components land:
We see increased noise floor over Fiio E10k with those jagged pulses indicating deterministic sources. This one is a win for Fiio E10K then. But, the Hififme Sabre 9018 DAC has higher output by a db or two which is an advantage.
Moving right along to Harmonic distortion with 1 Khz we get:
The same higher noise floor is seen here. But on distortion front, the Hifime Sabre 9018 pulls way ahead with far less distortion spikes. The Fiio E10 is especially bad here with distortions that seemingly go forever.
Let's look at how good the two DACs are in resolving a very low level sine wave at -90 db:
The higher noise level of Hifime Sabre 9018 comes to bite it again showing all those wild oscillations instead of the much cleaner output of Fiio E10k.
Final test is that of anti-aliasing and frequency response. White noise at 44.1 Khz is played and spectrum is shown up to 130 Khz:
Here, we see that the Hifime Sabre 9018 DAC does much better in suppressing ultrasonic images.
Since both of these have headphone amplifiers, here is the output impedance test:
It is kind of hard to summarize here as the outcome is mixed. I guess if I were to pick one as a DAC, I would pick the Hifime DAC because deterministic distortion is more audible than increased noise. Better to spend a bit more and get rid of this difficult decision!
As a headphone+DAC combination, the much lower output impedance of Fiio E10K wins by a mile as does its higher output power.
Listening test
As a first test, I compared the two as DACs, taking the line out from Fiio E10K and headphone out from Hifime to my Stax Pro headphones powered by srm-007t amplifier. In quick AB test, the Hifi me sounded better with more detail, openness, etc. All of that disappeared like a fart on the wind once I matched its level with the Fiio E10K in Roon. Then the two were in a tie.
Next I tested the two as headphone amps, powering my Sennheiser HD650 directly. Here, the Fiio E10K comes out ahead with at least 25% more power. While the Hifime Sabre E10K is louder than my laptop output, it just can't compete with Fiio E10K DAC.
Left as louder output, the Fiio E10k sounds better. But again, once the levels of equalized, the difference goes away.
Summary
The higher volume and better controls/connectivity of the Fiio E10k is the winner here for headphone listening. As a DAC, neither excites me and I encourage you to spend another $40 and get something much better (such as the Topping D30 USB DAC as of this writing).
As always, comments, corrections, etc. are welcome.
The Hifime comes in one of the lowest budget packages I have of any DAC. It is a tiny, plastic unit with permanently attached 3-4 inch USB cable and a 3.5mm headphone jack. It has a sole red LED light indicating it is on. Even the plastic package it came in screams low-budget. It is the kind of thing that hangs at check-out counter asking to be bought on impulse.
In this comparison, the Fiio E10K blows it away with larger brushed aluminum case, independent line and headphone output, analog volume control, detachable USB cable and blue LED for what that is worth.
The low budget theme continues with standard support up to 96 Khz as detected in Roon player:
Thankfully it also supports 88.2 Khz which the Fiio strangely leaves behind.
Compatibility was excellent with simple plug-and-play in Windows 10 Creator's edition.
Measurements
Let's start with J-test and see where the noise floor and jitter components land:
We see increased noise floor over Fiio E10k with those jagged pulses indicating deterministic sources. This one is a win for Fiio E10K then. But, the Hififme Sabre 9018 DAC has higher output by a db or two which is an advantage.
Moving right along to Harmonic distortion with 1 Khz we get:
The same higher noise floor is seen here. But on distortion front, the Hifime Sabre 9018 pulls way ahead with far less distortion spikes. The Fiio E10 is especially bad here with distortions that seemingly go forever.
Let's look at how good the two DACs are in resolving a very low level sine wave at -90 db:
The higher noise level of Hifime Sabre 9018 comes to bite it again showing all those wild oscillations instead of the much cleaner output of Fiio E10k.
Final test is that of anti-aliasing and frequency response. White noise at 44.1 Khz is played and spectrum is shown up to 130 Khz:
Here, we see that the Hifime Sabre 9018 DAC does much better in suppressing ultrasonic images.
Since both of these have headphone amplifiers, here is the output impedance test:
It is kind of hard to summarize here as the outcome is mixed. I guess if I were to pick one as a DAC, I would pick the Hifime DAC because deterministic distortion is more audible than increased noise. Better to spend a bit more and get rid of this difficult decision!
As a headphone+DAC combination, the much lower output impedance of Fiio E10K wins by a mile as does its higher output power.
Listening test
As a first test, I compared the two as DACs, taking the line out from Fiio E10K and headphone out from Hifime to my Stax Pro headphones powered by srm-007t amplifier. In quick AB test, the Hifi me sounded better with more detail, openness, etc. All of that disappeared like a fart on the wind once I matched its level with the Fiio E10K in Roon. Then the two were in a tie.
Next I tested the two as headphone amps, powering my Sennheiser HD650 directly. Here, the Fiio E10K comes out ahead with at least 25% more power. While the Hifime Sabre E10K is louder than my laptop output, it just can't compete with Fiio E10K DAC.
Left as louder output, the Fiio E10k sounds better. But again, once the levels of equalized, the difference goes away.
Summary
The higher volume and better controls/connectivity of the Fiio E10k is the winner here for headphone listening. As a DAC, neither excites me and I encourage you to spend another $40 and get something much better (such as the Topping D30 USB DAC as of this writing).
As always, comments, corrections, etc. are welcome.
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