New DAC chip from ROHM

[GXAlan]

Announced 2019, claimed 131.6 SNR
https://www.electronicsweekly.com/news/products/analog/hifideluxe-rohms-super-fi-dac-2019-04/

Rohm is a big company with >21,000 employees
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohm

First released product to use this DAC is this SACD player from Luxman
https://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/luxman-launches-d-10x-flagship-sacdcd-player/
http://www.luxman.com/product/detail.php?id=37

No datasheet from Rohm yet, except that they talk about manufacturing as a key element of their sound quality since they are vertically intergrated in the design and fabrication
https://micro.rohm.com/en/mus-ic/

 

[Veri]

Datasheet

https://fscdn.rohm.com/en/products/databook/datasheet/ic/audio_video/audio_processor/bd34301ekv-e.pdf

Looks like SMSL implemented a DAC using one such chip!

S.M.S.L D300 Digital to Analog Convertor (DAC)

Description: - ROHM flagship DAC chip BD34301 EKV Fully optimized performance, THD+N as low as -116dB USB uses XMOS XU-208, a true 32bit USB solution, PCM supports up to 768kHz, and DSD supports up to DSD512. - New CK-03 clock processing circuit The new CK-03 clock processing circuit, in order...

shenzhenaudio.com

 

[voodooless]

It's not quite SOTA performance, but good to see that there is some new competition in the DAC market.

 

[RHO]

So... they claim the use of Au and Cu bondwires "Draws out the full expression of stringed instruments."?

 

[Lupin]

I hope they will be successful.
More competition is a good thing especially now that AKM is out of the picture for a while.

 

[RHO]

There is a whole lot of audiophile talk on that website that makes me suspicious.
See anything out of the ordinary here? I don't.

 

[voodooless]

So... they claim the use of Au and Cu bondwires "Draws out the full expression of stringed instruments."?

The latest marketing material does not anymore. Still, they claim some strange stuff:

No reasons why this would be though..

 

[RHO]

Choosing the right bondwire for the right application is important ... but why would a serious semiconductor company make such wild audiophile claims about it?

 

[Vini darko]

Choosing the right bondwire for the right application is important ... but why would a serious semiconductor company make such wild audiophile claims about it?

So the audiophile press can parrot it and drum up extra sales

 

[RHO]

So the audiophile press can parrot it and drum up extra sales

What about losing customers that are put off by the mumbo jumbo they put on their website?

 

[Berwhale]

Choosing the right bondwire for the right application is important ... but why would a serious semiconductor company make such wild audiophile claims about it?

Because serious semiconductor companies also have marketing departments?

 

[JSmith]

What about losing customers that are put off by the mumbo jumbo they put on their website?

This... and if it continues I will ensure I never purchase a device knowingly with one of their DAC chips. For a similar reason is why I decided not to purchase Gustard products after their "audiophile fuse" effort... that said I understand they are also looking to please the golden eared crowd and do make decent products, however there is a personal principal involved for me, YMMV.



JSmith

 

[Vini darko]

What about losing customers that are put off by the mumbo jumbo they put on their website?

We're in a minority of a small niche unfortunately.

 

[RHO]

We are not the direct customers. Companies designing audio products are.
If I was a designer of such products I would not consider Rohm because of the BS claims their marketing department makes about these ICs.

 

[JeffS7444]

So... they claim the use of Au and Cu bondwires "Draws out the full expression of stringed instruments."?

Well, it draws out something all right: 94.46 USD worth of something! In larger quantities, it is almost 2x as expensive as it's closest competitors. Catnip for audiophiles for sure.

 

[Veri]

WolfX also measured it https://www.l7audiolab.com/f/smsl-d300-dac/
looks like it has noise shaping to outside audible band, much like cirrus logic chips

 

[AnalogSteph]

Looks like the analog section might be a tad behind the times in terms of distortion (dominant 4th is weird, maybe the circuitry is dominant even order + some ESS style digital cancellation for 2nd/3rd?), but there don't seem to be any major eccentricities - linearity is flat as a pancake (unlike CS43198 etc.) and no apparent sign of an ESS hump either. Even what there is in terms of distortion (clearly <-95 dB SMPTE at all times) is safely inaudible. Always good to see some new entries in this field.

 

[SMSL_Liu]

The sound effect of BD34301 is very good. We sincerely admire the Japanese understanding of sound. We got its EVM very early. About 2019, its THD+N is not the best, but after we listened to its sound for a long time, we decided to mass produce it. Its definition is between AKM and ESS. It is very musical. It is a bit like Marantz CD63, but its definition is higher! The sound is firm and sweet, and you won't be tired after listening for a long time!

 

[Herbert]

The sound effect of BD34301 is very good. We sincerely admire the Japanese understanding of sound. We got its EVM very early. About 2019, its THD+N is not the best, but after we listened to its sound for a long time, we decided to mass produce it. Its definition is between AKM and ESS. It is very musical. It is a bit like Marantz CD63, but its definition is higher! The sound is firm and sweet, and you won't be tired after listening for a long time!

I want it, I want it! Just can´t wait to get back into the analog and warm sound of 14-bit audio!

https://vintage-audio-laser.com/marantz/cd63/marantz-cd63_135.png

 

[SRKRAM]

What about losing customers that are put off by the mumbo jumbo they put on their website?

I came this thread because the new ibasso DX320 uses a ROHM DAC chip. Interesting to see the claims of how the bond wire material affects sound. I suppose they saw that no other DAC manufactures had made similar claims and saw it as a way to differentiate themselves.
It gave me flashbacks to my previous job though where I got involved with semiconductor fabrication issues (only on the level that I was the product manager though, so I'm not a real expert). We swapped from aluminium bond wires to gold, but only because of reliability issues with aluminium, although different bonding techniques were also used for each; aluminium wires used wedge bonding (and a pretty old machine), and gold used ball bonding which eliminated some stress points on the wire. In the end though we started moving to flip chip assembly and got rid of the bond wires altogether.
These devices were used for detecting very low level signals, but the bonding techniques were primarily changed for reliability, rather than performance. The wafer processing, however, was extremely critical for the application so I can see that ROHM have a valid claim there.
One issue I have not seen any audio manufactures talk about is PCBA cleaning to remove ionic contamination. This can be a reliability issue, but it can also cause noise. The level of noise probably wouldn't be an issue in audio, but that wouldn't stop anybody making marketing claims about it. In the products I dealt with quantum noise was an issue, and the noise caused by ionic contamination was an issue.