My Topping E70 is defective. Skipping issue

[Human Bass]

See the same issue in the E50 topic.
Happens with ESS dacs.
For example, my E50 does this with my LG TV.

Man, quite sad it is already a common old issue that has not being fixed. This is way more important than pushing - 129db to -130.

 

[Human Bass]

It is about the quality of the input signal, 'they' say.

I dont expect the cleanest result 0.00001% thd from the optical out of my TV. But between that and severe audio skips there is a huge gap.

 

[peanuts2]

almost with every dac they put out there is a series of new issues.

 

[Human Bass]

,

One would think after 40 years, connecting 2 devices with a TOSLINK cable would be as problem free as using an electrical extension cord.

Same with connecting two USB-C devices together, although obviously much less mature.

The weird thing with Toslink is that the standard is old, but the problems seem rather new. The cheap generic dacs do the job mostly fine, while the fancy news ones are hiccuping

 

[Ziroz]

I reached out to topping about this, they said they will implement DPLL settings that will solve the toslink issue in the next firmware update.

 

[Ziroz]

Same with connecting two USB-C devices together, although obviously much less mature.

The whole type-c to adapter, to usb-a, then back to type-c solution is so janky, it is almost meme worthy.

 

[Human Bass]

I reached out to topping about this, they said they will implement DPLL settings that will solve the toslink issue in the next firmware update.

Yaaaaaay

 

[NiagaraPete]

@JohnYang1997 would a firmware that makes the E70 less picky about this matter possible? I mean, the D30pro doesn't have this problem afterall.

Which I’m surprised to hear. Te D30pro is famously picky.

 

[Roland68]

This is true. DACs built with AKM chipsets typically did not display issues with TV's and Toslink. However, after the AKM fire some new ESS based DACs started showing dropouts with TV/Toslink connections. It's a learning curve for new designs and it demonstrates how all TV configurations were not tested before release. You would think by now Topping would have a red flag out for this specific testing configuration as it showed up in the D90SE as well.

What you mean has nothing to do with the ESS, AKM or other DAC chips, but was due to the AK4118 receiver chip that was mostly used in the past. This chip is extremely good and there is no alternative. AKM was not the market leader in this area for nothing.
This can also be seen from the fact that there is still no alternative to usable processing of the SPDIF/Toslink data garbage that most TV manufacturers (and also many DVD, Blu-Ray and CD players) put out.
And as already said, it cannot be the task of topping or other DAC manufacturers to check the different TVs of all manufacturers. Where do all the problems with Toslink, soundbars, AVRs and even Sonos devices with TVs come from? It is also amazing how many of these problems are mentioned in connection with LG Oled TVs.
What is the SPDIF standard for?

 

[gvl]

No doubt the AKM part is superior but somehow this issue wasn’t as widespread for 2 decades or more of CS8416 being used in all sorts DACs until Topping started to put it in theirs. To me it sounds like there’s some kind of fundamental issue with their SPDIF input design, their PLL maybe running too tight because they want to hit low jitter numbers on ASR or there’s some sort of signal level incompatibility. Topping stopped responding to questions about this problem on ASR. The firmware mod will likely allow to tweak the internal ESS chip PLL, which may not help if the issue occurs upstream.

 

[Gradius]

For toslink ALWAYS use glass (real fiber) optical cable only.

The plastic ones are a complete JUNK.

 

[Trell]

For toslink ALWAYS use glass (real fiber) optical cable only.

The plastic ones are a complete JUNK.

A generic one works fine, which is what RME sent with my audio interface.

 

[PyramidElectric]

For toslink ALWAYS use glass (real fiber) optical cable only.

The plastic ones are a complete JUNK.

This is nonsesne, I have a bunch of plastic ones of various lengths and they all play 24/96 files without errors, and most of them actually play 24/192 as well. Sure, a glass one might be "better" espcially at longer lengths, but if your DAC is decent re reclocking the Toslink input it won't care.

 

[Roland68]

It's really interesting that in this and other threads, the root problem is completely ignored.
Is it too inconvenient that the TV manufacturers (and also newer players of all kinds) cause the problem because they don't adhere to the SPDIF standard?

I have a Sony DSC-88 here, no, not a camera but a "Digital Signal Checker". The comes from the Sony Professional series and for over 20 years it was the standard for repairing and checking DAT, MD and CD players as well as professional studio equipment on the digital side.
In my circle of friends I had 2 x E30, 1 x Gustard and 2 other DACs that did not work on TVs via the optical connection.
On the DSC-88 all DACs worked without any problems. I connected the DSC-88 to two of the TVs and it couldn't do anything with the signal.
With an AK4118 board that converts SPDIF/Toslink to i2s and from i2s back to SPDIF/Toslink, both the DSC-88 and the DACs on the two TVs worked.

So if someone has a Topping E70 that doesn't work on their TV, they can send it to me for testing on the Sony DSC-88.

 

[gvl]

It's really interesting that in this and other threads, the root problem is completely ignored.
Is it too inconvenient that the TV manufacturers (and also newer players of all kinds) cause the problem because they don't adhere to the SPDIF standard?

I have a Sony DSC-88 here, no, not a camera but a "Digital Signal Checker". The comes from the Sony Professional series and for over 20 years it was the standard for repairing and checking DAT, MD and CD players as well as professional studio equipment on the digital side.
In my circle of friends I had 2 x E30, 1 x Gustard and 2 other DACs that did not work on TVs via the optical connection.
On the DSC-88 all DACs worked without any problems. I connected the DSC-88 to two of the TVs and it couldn't do anything with the signal.
With an AK4118 board that converts SPDIF/Toslink to i2s and from i2s back to SPDIF/Toslink, both the DSC-88 and the DACs on the two TVs worked.

So if someone has a Topping E70 that doesn't work on their TV, they can send it to me for testing on the Sony DSC-88.

Ok, TVs are outputting out of spec, fine. Clearly it’s not complete garbage as the AKM part locks reliably. What I want to know if it was possible to design around these issues with non-AKM parts perhaps at the cost of measured performance. If yes then Topping and Co. should have done that. Do low jitter measurements really matter if you can’t use the DAC for your application?

 

[NiagaraPete]

Ok, TVs are outputting out of spec, fine. Clearly it’s not complete garbage as the AKM part locks reliably. What I want to know if it was possible to design around these issues with non-AKM parts perhaps at the cost of measured performance. If yes then Topping and Co. should have done that. Do low jitter measurements really matter if you can’t use the DAC for your application?

I read somewhere a firmware update was coming. Might not be true but hopefully it is.

 

[Atanasi]

What I want to know if it was possible to design around these issues with non-AKM parts perhaps at the cost of measured performance. If yes then Topping and Co. should have done that. Do low jitter measurements really matter if you can’t use the DAC for your application?

E30 II tries to maximize compatibility. It has proprietary signal processing for S/PDIF. Jitter performance is respectively worse. I don't know why they didn't add the same to other products.

 

[gvl]

I read somewhere a firmware update was coming. Might not be true but hopefully it is.

I suspect this will tweak ESS internal processing, I guess we’ll see but I have a hunch that the issue is with the spdif receiver circuit that’s hardwired and no f/w update can fix that.

 

[Human Bass]

It's really interesting that in this and other threads, the root problem is completely ignored.
Is it too inconvenient that the TV manufacturers (and also newer players of all kinds) cause the problem because they don't adhere to the SPDIF standard?

I have a Sony DSC-88 here, no, not a camera but a "Digital Signal Checker". The comes from the Sony Professional series and for over 20 years it was the standard for repairing and checking DAT, MD and CD players as well as professional studio equipment on the digital side.
In my circle of friends I had 2 x E30, 1 x Gustard and 2 other DACs that did not work on TVs via the optical connection.
On the DSC-88 all DACs worked without any problems. I connected the DSC-88 to two of the TVs and it couldn't do anything with the signal.
With an AK4118 board that converts SPDIF/Toslink to i2s and from i2s back to SPDIF/Toslink, both the DSC-88 and the DACs on the two TVs worked.

So if someone has a Topping E70 that doesn't work on their TV, they can send it to me for testing on the Sony DSC-88.

The DAC inside my speakers has no problem. Other DACs I used thru the years had no problem also. So it's a problem whose solution is extremely viable.

 

[Roland68]

The DAC inside my speakers has no problem. Other DACs I used thru the years had no problem also. So it's a problem whose solution is extremely viable.

Then everything is actually fine and the solution to the problem is very simple.
The E70 doesn't work as it should for you, just get another DAC from another company. In addition to all the DACs tested at ASR, there are many more on the market.