S.M.S.L PO100, PO100 PRO & PO100 AK - Measurements (Digital Interfaces & DAC)

[ChenHui]

Thank you for your detailed testing! This is great!

 

[thanrl]

How do I find out the power consumption of my PO100 AK (and dongle DACs in general)? Some of my DAP works with it (Hiby R3 II), but some are extremly quiet even at max digital volume (FiiO M5).

 

[Nango]

W= V x I so V = 3,7 from the battery you just need to know how much Ampere you dongles draw from the battery. Commonly this is something in the range 25-300mA. The higher the Ampere the sooner the battery drains off.

 

[thanrl]

My PO100 AK doesn't seem to be able to play DSD to the Toslink output (no light from the optical cable), despite that the indicator light on the PO100 AK turns white. Does anyone have a similar issue?

 

[Saponetto]

My PO100 AK outputs DSD64 via the optical output without hassle.
I use it as a bridge USB-in to Toslink-out, bolted on the case of my PC.

 

[thanrl]

My PO100 AK outputs DSD64 via the optical output without hassle.
I use it as a bridge USB-in to Toslink-out, bolted on the case of my PC.

Are you doing DoP or D2P? Does the indicator light on the PO100 AK turn white? Thank you

 

[Saponetto]

Sorry for the delay.
I only use this little guy in D2P, and preliminary tests (before bolting it) showed the white led on.

 

[thanrl]

Sorry for the delay.
I only use this little guy in D2P, and preliminary tests (before bolting it) showed the white led on.

D2P is PCM so should be blue, no? Mine plays D2P, shows blue; doesn't play DoP, but shows white.

 

[Saponetto]

Honestly I'm confused.
afaik, blue should mean a PCM sample rate of 88.2-96, leaving the white for only DSD stream.

My question now is: which player do you use to feed the PO100 AK?
I'll take as an example JRiver installed on my PC, it can feed any DAC either in DSD or in DoP, and of course the DAC itself just adapts its protocol for getting the stream but the final result is anyway a DSD file played, only change is the media protocol used to forward it to the DAC.
This way, DoP packets are sent as PCM getting blue light, or red, or cyan etc. depending on the sampling, but final output should anyway be the DSD content.

 

[klirren_65]

2 x SMSL PO100AK: The converting from USB to SPDIF/Coax works fine.

but: Malfunction as a DAC (44,1 and 48 kHz), because the RCA output level is very low.

I did check this problem with Linux and Android (driverless); Windows 7 is okay.

Any hints or ideas?

Thanks in advance.

 

[taner]

Hi,
Since ES9028Pro DAC in E70 runs as MASTER mode (the clocks coming from SPDIF is ignored), we actually measured the performance of the E70's ability of the reconstruct the SPDIF data, not the PO100's SPDIF signal quality. This explains the similarities of the measurements since we actually measured the same thing all over again...

I think we have to measure these devices with a DAC in SLAVE mode (just like AK version), in order to get the idea of the quality of the SPDIF signal that produced by these devices, am I wrong?

 

[thanrl]

Honestly I'm confused.
afaik, blue should mean a PCM sample rate of 88.2-96, leaving the white for only DSD stream.

My question now is: which player do you use to feed the PO100 AK?
I'll take as an example JRiver installed on my PC, it can feed any DAC either in DSD or in DoP, and of course the DAC itself just adapts its protocol for getting the stream but the final result is anyway a DSD file played, only change is the media protocol used to forward it to the DAC.
This way, DoP packets are sent as PCM getting blue light, or red, or cyan etc. depending on the sampling, but final output should anyway be the DSD content.

I have two Hiby players that can output native DSD, DoP and D2P
- When outputting native DSD, PO100 AK's indicator light turns white, RCA output works, Toslink outputs nothing.
- When outputting DoP, PO100 AK's indicator light turns green, RCA output works, Toslink outputs nothing.
- When outputting D2P, PO100 AK's indicator light turns blue (DSD64 to 24/96), RCA output works, Toslink output works.

Have not tried the coax output. Have not tried another USB C host.

2 x SMSL PO100AK: The converting from USB to SPDIF/Coax works fine.

but: Malfunction as a DAC (44,1 and 48 kHz), because the RCA output level is very low.

I did check this problem with Linux and Android (driverless); Windows 7 is okay.

Any hints or ideas?

Thanks in advance.

This has happened to me when the host's output voltage was very low and cannot sufficiently power the PO100 AK: FiiO M5, Toslink worked fine, but RCA was very quiet.

 

[klirren_65]

@thanrl: I suppose people here use PO100 AK with the DAC-functionality only with M$ and not with Linux.

 

[Onira]

@thanrl
I use PO100 Pro with Windows, Linux and MAC having always the same good level output but I suggest that you check volume settings (linux has own setting for each output)

 

[lordvader]

Hey all,
I finally got this working against my Topping D70s DAC via IIS.
I think it was mentioned in another post in this thread, but i also had to ...

1. Disable pin 16 on the HDMI cable
2. Set the DSD flag to pin 14 even though the PO100 document states pin 15

So is the manual incorrect for this device?

 

[Maxrunner]

Can't seem to find the po100 AK anywhere in Europe stores. Not even AliExpress sells it.

 

[MNMLSM]

Can somebody explain the I²S Output of the PO100 Pro?

I can't find a fitting explanation.
Maybe I'm completely wrong but it's basically a HDMI-connection which can be modified and only transfers the audio signal?

Why can I change between the UAC1/UAC2 and I²S Mode 1 & 2?
and probably a more difficult question:
would this I²S output work with the KEF LS50 Wireless II and their supported HDMI eARC input?

 

[VintageFlanker]

and probably a more difficult question:
would this I²S output work with the KEF LS50 Wireless II and their supported HDMI eARC input?

It's the easiest one, on the contrary: absolutely not.

Why can I change between the UAC1/UAC2 and I²S Mode 1 & 2?

Why not? It's all specified in the manual:

 

[Roland68]

Can somebody explain the I²S Output of the PO100 Pro?

I can't find a fitting explanation.
Maybe I'm completely wrong but it's basically a HDMI-connection which can be modified and only transfers the audio signal?

You are completely wrong.
External i2s (digital) is transmitted using the industry standard LVDS. But that has nothing to do with HDMI/ARC/eARC. The HDMI connector and the cables were only used for this purpose, but depending on the manufacturer there are other connectors.
Not a problem with the same manufacturer, but with devices from different manufacturers you have to read up on it, as the whole thing is not well standardized or documented.

 

[MNMLSM]

@Roland68
Thanks that explanation helped a lot, learned something new.