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Review and Measurements of Topping DX3Pro DAC and Headphone Amp
- Thread starter amirm
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I just realized I got the V2, from amazon.de
and I have no idea if this is a good thing or a bad thing since I have a Beyerdynamic DT1990Pro with high Ohm impedance (or whatever is called) , and I cannot find a way to send it back or replace it with the first version.
Anyhow. I got a question.
the output of the quality of the audio is controlled by windows (I got the 10)
is there a way to have a system automatically recognizing the flac/mp3/streaming quality and send the appropriate settings to the DAC?
my musicplayer is musicbee, and I do not want to change it.
Thank you
and I have no idea if this is a good thing or a bad thing since I have a Beyerdynamic DT1990Pro with high Ohm impedance (or whatever is called) , and I cannot find a way to send it back or replace it with the first version.
Anyhow. I got a question.
the output of the quality of the audio is controlled by windows (I got the 10)
is there a way to have a system automatically recognizing the flac/mp3/streaming quality and send the appropriate settings to the DAC?
my musicplayer is musicbee, and I do not want to change it.
Thank you
Went ahead and got one of these. I used to have and love the OPPO HA2-SE. To my subjective ears, this thing sounds better than the HA2. I can hear new things in my music, such as the subtle breathing of vocalists, reverberations inside snare drums, and really quiet support instruments that used to get lost in the mix. Mids don't sound plasticky, which is often a pet peeve with me. Loud sections in music don't squelch quieter parts. You can do focused listening for quiet artifacts and actually succeed in finding them. My Senn HD598SE cans shine so well with this, i'm thinking about shelving my plans to get a balanced setup.
Observations: the DAC via USB is the ballgame. TOSlink did not match detail of USB. My model has very short Bluetooth range - the sound is good, but paired iPhone has to be no more than 3ft away to work without dropouts and disconnects. Going into my tube HA supplies much better power than the built-in amp.
The DAC portion is money though. To my 56-year-old ears there's virtually no way to do better.
I give the DAC via USB a perfect 10. HA portion seems perhaps a little under powered and subjectively a little sterile. Did not try COAX. Blutooth signal strength in my model is somewhat inadequate. TOSlink solid but did not bring out best for me. My overall score: still 9/10 because I never heard a DAC this good before when using USB (and testing using external tube HA).
Observations: the DAC via USB is the ballgame. TOSlink did not match detail of USB. My model has very short Bluetooth range - the sound is good, but paired iPhone has to be no more than 3ft away to work without dropouts and disconnects. Going into my tube HA supplies much better power than the built-in amp.
The DAC portion is money though. To my 56-year-old ears there's virtually no way to do better.
I give the DAC via USB a perfect 10. HA portion seems perhaps a little under powered and subjectively a little sterile. Did not try COAX. Blutooth signal strength in my model is somewhat inadequate. TOSlink solid but did not bring out best for me. My overall score: still 9/10 because I never heard a DAC this good before when using USB (and testing using external tube HA).
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It's a 250 ohm HP, so it shouldn't have any issue with V2's 10 ohm output.
Frankly speaking, those with low ohm HP should compare for themselves first if there's any difference in sound if using high output amp, some HP does not change it's sound even when using high ohm amp. And if there changes, whether they'll like the difference, instead of just simply assume it is worse.
For some programs, like Foobar2000, it can use ASIO or WASAPI as output which will send bit-perfect audio to DAC. I doesn't know if Musicbee able to do that.
Frankly speaking, those with low ohm HP should compare for themselves first if there's any difference in sound if using high output amp, some HP does not change it's sound even when using high ohm amp. And if there changes, whether they'll like the difference, instead of just simply assume it is worse.
For some programs, like Foobar2000, it can use ASIO or WASAPI as output which will send bit-perfect audio to DAC. I doesn't know if Musicbee able to do that.
I have the Topping DX3Pro running off USB from my Windows 10 tower PC (a Dell XPS 8910 SE) with the Topping ASIO drivers. Had it for sometime now, and think it is a fantastic unit. However, just recently, playback has started to be interrupted with frequent clicks, sputters, hiccups, and pauses. This is with any program material; Roon, YouTube, etc. If I restart my PC, all is well for a while, but then, a day or so later I'm back to the same issue. I don't think this has anything to do with the Topping itself. Both the active speakers and my HPs are driven via the Topping USB ASIO. It's likely a problem with the PC itself, since a restart corrects it for a while. Has anybody noticed this behavior with their PC setups, or have any clues as to what could be going on? A PC USB Bus going bad? I imagine what I will have to do is try some different PC outputs/Topping inputs to see if the issue is replicated, but the PC is a little inaccessible and the inputs/outputs on the Topping are also hard to reach, so if anybody has a good idea what might be going on, it could avoid some hassle. Any troubleshooting suggestions are welcome.
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I was thinking on connecting my new unit using the optical cable instead of the USB
Would it change the performance if I connect the DX3 to the computer with the toslink instead of the usb? I don't think so as both should just be digital data, but I am not sure if maybe the computer sound card can mess with that data.
Would it change the performance if I connect the DX3 to the computer with the toslink instead of the usb? I don't think so as both should just be digital data, but I am not sure if maybe the computer sound card can mess with that data.
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Just responding to my own post (which really wasn't appropriate in this thread anyway). As my post indicated, I was pretty sure that my issues were not related to the DX3Pro, but posted just to see if anyone had some ideas about what was causing my problems. So, this additional post is mainly a FYI for anyone encountering similar issues as mine. For you computer and audio Pros, my findings are probably pretty obvious and elementary, but some of this was new (or long-forgotten) to me.
After doing some troubleshooting and experimenting, it seemed that some of my programs (namely my graphics driver's being the worst) may have been at the root of my problem. After I ran LatencyMon, I found my NVidia GeForce GTX 1070 drivers, which I continually updated by the GeForce Experience program, were causing huge (off the chart) latency issues with my PC. My PC (my bedroom PC which I use for music listening while working on my computer) is an Intel i7 4-core 6700K 4GHz CPU-based PC that I setup to be able to run Oculus VR programs about 2+ years ago, so it is no slouch. I hardly even use Oculus anymore, but these new NVidia driver updates, that I have been installing, thinking they would keep me current, seem to be increasingly very unstable and have processes that I assume run in the background and cause latency issues with frequent IRQ interrupts - thus causing pops, clicks, and dropouts in HD Audio play. I rolled-back the NVidia drivers to ver.388.59, the last stable version to be completely compatible with Oculus VR (the current drivers' version was around 454.xx?) -- and the latency toll on my PC decreased to about 1/6 of what it previously was during normal operation, and, now, never off the charts.
Anywhose, long story made short, LatencyMon may be a good diagnostic program to run on your PCs, if you are having pops, clicks, and dropouts with your PC-based HD audio. Sorry for the long OT post.
PS. And I could be wrong -- there could be other issues, but time will tell.
After doing some troubleshooting and experimenting, it seemed that some of my programs (namely my graphics driver's being the worst) may have been at the root of my problem. After I ran LatencyMon, I found my NVidia GeForce GTX 1070 drivers, which I continually updated by the GeForce Experience program, were causing huge (off the chart) latency issues with my PC. My PC (my bedroom PC which I use for music listening while working on my computer) is an Intel i7 4-core 6700K 4GHz CPU-based PC that I setup to be able to run Oculus VR programs about 2+ years ago, so it is no slouch. I hardly even use Oculus anymore, but these new NVidia driver updates, that I have been installing, thinking they would keep me current, seem to be increasingly very unstable and have processes that I assume run in the background and cause latency issues with frequent IRQ interrupts - thus causing pops, clicks, and dropouts in HD Audio play. I rolled-back the NVidia drivers to ver.388.59, the last stable version to be completely compatible with Oculus VR (the current drivers' version was around 454.xx?) -- and the latency toll on my PC decreased to about 1/6 of what it previously was during normal operation, and, now, never off the charts.
Anywhose, long story made short, LatencyMon may be a good diagnostic program to run on your PCs, if you are having pops, clicks, and dropouts with your PC-based HD audio. Sorry for the long OT post.
PS. And I could be wrong -- there could be other issues, but time will tell.
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I've had my DX3 Pro, version 1 - s/n 1901, for over a year now . Other than very few random shutdowns, around 7 in total over a year, it runs perfectly fine. HOWEVER, I did notice one thing. Sometimes it gets really warm when it's turned off, while connected (USB) to my laptop, which is also plugged in and turned off. Same thing also happens sometimes when both are running with headphones plugged into the DX3 Pro.
Any ideas what might cause the DX3 getting warm? I'm using the original power supply US version with a EU adaptor (2-pole). The laptop has a 3-pole desktop power supply adaptor. Both power supplies are plugged into the same power strip.
Any ideas what might cause the DX3 getting warm? I'm using the original power supply US version with a EU adaptor (2-pole). The laptop has a 3-pole desktop power supply adaptor. Both power supplies are plugged into the same power strip.
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When you say turned off, you mean it still plugged into the power socket and still have the small led light? I believe that is standby mode, the unit never totally off unless unplugged.
Even when DX3 in standby mode while my PC is on or off I noticed DX3 can still feel some warmth. The most hottest it have been is playing music for hours, and also when the PC and DX3 is turned on and Windows default sound device is DX3, it gets really hot after few hours even when I didn't play any sound to it. If Windows default sound device is not DX3 then the unit just feel warm even if it's turned on but not playing any music, I have set Foobar output to DX3 so I don't necessarily need Windows default sound device to be DX3. I didn't notice if running in HP mode is different temperature than in DAC mode.
I think the reason it get hots is because if there's signal from the USB it will be processing it and gets hotter. Then maybe if Windows default sound device is DX3, it will continuously sending signal to DX3 even when there's no sound so that's why it became hot. When your laptop is off but charging, maybe there's still electrical signal being sent through the USB. But it will be really weird if DX3 is still processing when it is in standby mode.
Even when DX3 in standby mode while my PC is on or off I noticed DX3 can still feel some warmth. The most hottest it have been is playing music for hours, and also when the PC and DX3 is turned on and Windows default sound device is DX3, it gets really hot after few hours even when I didn't play any sound to it. If Windows default sound device is not DX3 then the unit just feel warm even if it's turned on but not playing any music, I have set Foobar output to DX3 so I don't necessarily need Windows default sound device to be DX3. I didn't notice if running in HP mode is different temperature than in DAC mode.
I think the reason it get hots is because if there's signal from the USB it will be processing it and gets hotter. Then maybe if Windows default sound device is DX3, it will continuously sending signal to DX3 even when there's no sound so that's why it became hot. When your laptop is off but charging, maybe there's still electrical signal being sent through the USB. But it will be really weird if DX3 is still processing when it is in standby mode.
Yes, by turned off I meant in standby mode. And the USB port is not in "always on mode", so when I turn off the laptop, even though it's always plugged in because I use it without the battery, nothing happens when I plug in an iPhone/iPod.
Unfortunately, I'm not very knowledgeable in the field of electric engineering, but maybe there is still some sort of current flowing from the laptop through the DX3 or vice versa. I am saying this, because I noticed when the DX3 is only plugged into the socket and unplugged from the laptop, you can feel a contact current when touching the DX3's surface. I guess this is the case since it only has a 2-pole adaptor. The laptop an the other hand has a 3-pole adaptor and when the DX3 is connected to the laptop by USB the contact current on the DX3's surface disappears.
Maybe the contact current/ leakage current is responsible for the warmth of the DX3's casing and a 3-pole adaptor power supply for the DX3 would solve this warmth problem...
Unfortunately, I'm not very knowledgeable in the field of electric engineering, but maybe there is still some sort of current flowing from the laptop through the DX3 or vice versa. I am saying this, because I noticed when the DX3 is only plugged into the socket and unplugged from the laptop, you can feel a contact current when touching the DX3's surface. I guess this is the case since it only has a 2-pole adaptor. The laptop an the other hand has a 3-pole adaptor and when the DX3 is connected to the laptop by USB the contact current on the DX3's surface disappears.
Maybe the contact current/ leakage current is responsible for the warmth of the DX3's casing and a 3-pole adaptor power supply for the DX3 would solve this warmth problem...
If my recently posted entries made anyone think I didn't love this little DX3Pro, you're very wrong -- it has never failed me (never shut down on me, never gone bad, not even once), and it is a fantastic performer for the price. For the most part, I have solved most of my latency issues with my PC - nothing to do with the DX3Pro (updating things with your PC CAN alter performance greatly [sometimes toward the negative], but updating things, with a little bit of hard-knocks-gained experience can also fix things). I don't have the newest HD Wi-Fi version of this unit, and I think I was fortunate enough to get an updated original version, before the version 2 came out -- the original updated version has very adequate power to drive all my HPs just fine. Topping is a great producer. I'm looking forward to getting the Topping D90 (with MQA - don't really care about MQA that much, but I am a TIDAL subscriber, so whatever) for my bedroom audio system DAC setup. I don't think you can really go that wrong even with the newest iteration of the DX3Pro, unless you have very demanding headphones to drive. Happy Listening -- and Stay Healthy and Safe !!!
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Somebody with better knowledge than me - please correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think you can run a US 110 VAC 60 Hz unit on european 220V 50 Hz power by just using a simple adapter -- you would actually need a step-down transformer. Don't know if the the DX3Pro has dual-country capable power inlet, but if it doesn't, Artburda, you could be slowly burning out your unit. My US DX3Pro runs very cool, even when playing. Using it with an incorrect mains supply could cause it to run very hot. Maybe I'm missing something . . .
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I believe it's USB is always on mode, whenever I turn on my PC the DX3 will detect it and turn on by itself.
Mine is with 3 pole adaptor and when in standby with USB attached to PC it still feel warm, if I remove the USB cable it become less warm. But it doesn't have contact current no matter USB cable were plug in or not. Mine is V2. It is just a bit warm feel, not as hot as when playing sound through it. I think there's some that write before V1 leak current.
Mine is with 3 pole adaptor and when in standby with USB attached to PC it still feel warm, if I remove the USB cable it become less warm. But it doesn't have contact current no matter USB cable were plug in or not. Mine is V2. It is just a bit warm feel, not as hot as when playing sound through it. I think there's some that write before V1 leak current.
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