Received my Khadas and I'm just going to spit it out.
Any burn in difference registered with any of you guys? Because to me it doesn't sound that great. My old ES9018 beats it and the DX3 Pro too. Don't know what the fuzz is about.
Yes the DAC apparently measures good but doesn't sound very good to my ears... Yes it has detail, thick ( a bit overbloated bass) and in your face sound but lacking refinement and almost no sound stage present. Sounds a bit colored too. a bit anxious. After a while of listening I need to turn the volume down because I start feeling annoyed with something. The voices sound a bit like in a swimming pool too (the coloration).
Maybe I overexpected seeing it's measurements. Maybe those measurements don't translate very well into listening experience.
Maybe it's flavor and taste coming into play here but I compared it to my unmodified DX3 Pro and that unit is just a way better in many areas. More musically pleasing package, more natural voices. More sophisticated. And with a case, bluetooth, display, remote control and optical in. At twice the price though. But still dirt cheap.
I'll give it a few days of running.. see if any burn-in will change anything.
Hi,
Some say there is no burn in for this type of electronic device, they attribute any change to a adaptation of your brain to the new sound. It may be so, but not in my opinion. I´ve felt a slight improvement in this month i have it. Not by much i must say. My topping d30 sounded great from the start, with apparently livelier dynamic and less harsh. And i felt it more "communicative" from the beggining: it is like when someone is talking to you and uses gestures to better express what he is saying. The Topping seems to have this quality, it "pulls" some sounds and musical passages, like a human would do (don´t take this too litteraly...). The TKB has a somewhat more ethereal sound, like someone talking to you in a beautifull voice but without the gestures, and that might be taken as less entertaining.
But, i would give it more time. My Rega Saturn took ages to open up, and was, at least to me, a proof that some gear take a long time to blossom. If it was a question of adaptation it was the longest adaptation i experienced (500 hours plus). Back to KTB, the sound seems to adapt better to some types of music than others (but we are talking marginally things here...), the sound is more frontal (in my experience you benefit from putting yourself closer to the speakers), and the sound though clean and with insight, lacks just a little bit ...is difficult to put it (and english is not my mother language) of amplitude in the punch, in the swing. I consider it a good by and it softens a little with time, no doubt about it, might it be from burn in time or whatever cause. And i would not consider by any means the bass is overbloated, in fact i think the bass is in the soft side with great extension, maybe is a system thing...
Hope it helps
