Review and Measurements of SMSL M8 DAC

[NewbieGarcia]

Hi Guys,
I'm digging out of the topics grave this one as I've just got a second hand SMSL M8A Mk2.
I'm an absolute beginner with DACs and I decided to pull the trigger after reading so many great reviews and recommendations, especially here.
I've just received it and connected it and the volume is ridiculously low!
I'm going out from my iMac into the DAC and when every other source would make my windows shatter, this DAC is barely making any noise.
Did I get a lemon or is there something I'm not doing correctly here?
Many thanks for your help!

 

[Katji]

The computer is the source.
Output from headphone/AUX or what? iow, USB or S/PDIF coaxial/Toslink?
DAC to...? what amplifier? powered speakers?
? ? ?

 

[NewbieGarcia]

Computer connected via USB to the DAC, RCA into Amp (Roksan Kandy LIII) and then to the speakers (Quad S2).
Sorry, should have mentioned but frustration and wanting this to work took the upper hand.

Now it is working fine, after a few hours it just 'unblocked' itself, no idea why. Letting it play for the whole day today and fiddling with the various filters. No idea what each of them does, although sound is pretty pretty good from what I can understand.

 

[Katji]

i suppose something changed on the iMac side.
The filters...i tried them, once, for a few seconds...the 2 others sounded wrong, so I left it on the default FAST, forever after, never changed it again.

[imo] still a good DAC. A DAC, not a headphone amplifier, and I don't need another volume control either. ...Not then, not now. So if I ever need to buy another DAC, the choice is more simple, because I would cancel any that include headphone amps, unless there was some good reason to override that.

 

[NewbieGarcia]

I hear you Katji! I'm on the same spectrum to be fair, no need for an headphone amp, for me would be a waste of components, possibly a degradation of the components I would actually use in order to fit the unit in a budget...not for me.

I don't know if something was wrong on the iMac side, I've tried both on the iMac and on my ancient Macbook and both time the result was the same, then left the M8A play for a bit and all of a sudden *magic* sound happened. It did disappear shortly after to then reappear again minutes later...no idea what caused that but ever since it hasn't stopped working so that's a good sign I guess.

I was running it on MINI until now, swapped for FAST just now and it sounds a tad softer. Will experiment more but so far the increase in detail, depth and width of the sound compared to the standard Mac DAC is outstanding.

So glad I've bumped on this thread!

 

[Jimster480]

To this day its still a good DAC. I sold it to my friend who is still using it today.
Still sounds good as most music doesn't exceed its specs.