Review and Measurements of Topping DX3Pro DAC and Headphone Amp

[bleachershane]

Today I had a power outage and after that...The Miracle ! I've the bluetooth device on and it works

That is just weird! But hey, good stuff.

 

[noel_fs]

I use 32-bit 44Khz. For movies I use mpc-hc with Exclusive mode (48Khz) which sets the sample rate automatically so it can stay on 44KHz at all times.

Works fine.

what do you exactly mean by exclusive mode, can you screenshot or something

 

[Veri]

what do you exactly mean by exclusive mode, can you screenshot or something

For MPC-HC (consider madVR for excellent video), you can find exclusive mode here. It's basically WASAPI exclusive:

For foobar you need WASAPI (or asio) plugin to achieve the same. Exclusive mode will set audio device to source sampling rate and disable any audio enhancements (this includes any surround filtering or equalizerAPO too).

 

[Tatteredmidnight]

BTW, with that said, usually the cost to manufacture a DAC is very low. AK4493 is around $5 each. xu208 costs $7.5. Various analog components (OPA1612, OPA2140 op-amp) are all sub $5. AK4118 bluetooth receiver is around $2.

PCM5102A is half the price of AK4493, and cost around $2. so if you compare MX3 and DX3, their raw material costs don't differ too much. The actual component price makes up very little in the total device price.

Another example. ES9038Pro is roughly $74. ES9038Q2M is $13.8. Dual ES9038Q2M costs $27, so less than $50 difference. But usually ES9038Pro devices have much higher price than ES9038Q2M devices (for instance, compare $1300 SMSL VMV D1 and $250 dual chip SMSL SU-8), whereas other costs (power, firmware/driver dev, pcb, etc) are almost the same.

So I would say DX3 is 2x the price of MX3 is solely because premium grade devices sell for a premium price. That's where the profits come from.

Today's DAC chips are so good that even PCM5102A is way beyond human hearing range, and why it's chosen for Objective DAC. But people want better spec products. That's why there's premium grade products selling for 5x-10x the price

This is an overly-simplified view of the situation. You are ignoring many factors: margins are multiples of cost (typically 4x manufacturing cost min), older chips mean less cost and time in development (behavior and implementation are well classified and understood), complexity of the design/implementation may not be equivalent, products with higher BOM incur higher risks and costs around warranty and support, higher BOM products represent higher sunk costs in raw material and warehoused goods, wastage is more expensive with more expensive components, etc.

 

[Tatteredmidnight]

Your theory cannot explain iphones with more storages costs a lot more. storages are super cheap. Apart from storage chip, there's almost no difference between a 16GB iPhone vs a 256GB iPhone.

I'm not saying that there is no such thing as overpriced products, just that the story isn't as simple as just reading the BOM. Comparing Apple (and price tiers of the same product) to two different products from a relatively small company is comparing apples to oranges (I really couldn't resist). You're entitled to your opinion of course, just wanted to highlight some factors you may not have considered.

Product segmentation is a real thing, but so are the challenges of design and manufacturing.

 

[ngs428]

Got my dx3 pro today. Revision 1.04 its latest firmware? What settings with headphones should I use? Max rate 384hz 32 bit or other sample rate like 24 bit 48hz? And how can i set 768hz rate? Only have 384hz max, its ok?

1.4 is the newest

 

[Megatronic]

I use 32-bit 44Khz. For movies I use mpc-hc with Exclusive mode (48Khz) which sets the sample rate automatically so it can stay on 44KHz at all times.

Works fine.

Ok, thanks. So there is no point in setting a higher sample rate? There will be no difference in the sound? And is it possible to somehow customize foobar in wasapi event mode, so that the sound was in the games and the browser? Because when i listening music in foobar i dont have sound in other apps, like games or browser. Do i need to use other player?

 

[pwjazz]

I'm not saying that there is no such thing as overpriced products

In a competitive market, excepting Veblen goods, such products tend not to stay overpriced for very long.

 

[Tatteredmidnight]

In a competitive market, excepting Veblen goods, such products tend not to stay overpriced for very long.

That's an entirely different conversation. Are you really calling the Dx3 overpriced for its functionality? If so, buy what makes you happy. I am pretty impressed with everything this devices does for the price, given its excellent measured performance. There is no right choice for everybody, but that goes both ways, for some other people the dX3 might the be that product. For me, it wasn't BTW.

 

[777]

My Dx3Pro finally arrived. Here is a picture with the noise of the power adapter supply.

 

[noel_fs]

My Dx3Pro finally arrived. Here is a picture with the noise of the power adapter supply.

Like other one said, dx3 will probably filter most of that, i still think that dx3 needs a slightly better power supply,

 

[Veri]

Ok, thanks. So there is no point in setting a higher sample rate? There will be no difference in the sound? And is it possible to somehow customize foobar in wasapi event mode, so that the sound was in the games and the browser? Because when i listening music in foobar i dont have sound in other apps, like games or browser. Do i need to use other player?

No point no, the DAC oversamples everything anyway. You can just use DirectSound/ standard output in foobar, then other audio will work.
Exclusive mode is mostly nice in mpc-hc for movies, so you get 48Khz sample rate without internal resampling

 

[777]

This noise it is witout loading the power supply. I'll repeat the measurement with 15ohm resistive loading. Did you see the frequency of the chopper ?

 

[kukocz]

D50 has external power supply too

 

[777]

Adapter power supply with 30 ohm resistive load, so 0.5A. The high frequency spikes grow up over the 0.2 Vp-p. In my opinion it is a must to change that power adapter to another one, more quiet.

 

[777]

The output impedance of the power supply adapter it is 0.5 ohm. I suppose if we put a capacitor at the output, or LC filter, things will go much better.

 

[yue]

Adapter power supply with 30 ohm resistive load, so 0.5A. The high frequency spikes grow up over the 0.2 Vp-p. In my opinion it is a must to change that power adapter to another one, more quiet.

If this frequency shows up in the fft chart I would worry about it. but here in fft we can't see related frequncy, why switching power supply would improve the performance?

 

[yue]

The output impedance of the power supply adapter it is 0.5 ohm. I suppose if we put a capacitor at the output, or LC filter, things will go much better.

On the PCB, close to the power supply (left bottom), between 15VDC and GND, it does have a capacitor. so why would you worry about the power supply so much?

 

[777]

We will see....I'll do another measurement, step by step, inside the unit and at output RCA for high frequency noise.

 

[777]

you need an audio analyzer to measure RCA.

Nope, for high frequency noise an audio analyzer is useless. The oscilloscope it is much better.