SMSL D400EX DAC Review

[tabby]

Careful, I think the board is installed on the top (upside down).

 

[dtaylo1066]

I know those very well but that’s 2 in total. We get at least 2 more stereo DACs every month in comparison.
I just wish we had more budget options; 600€ for the DM7 is still a lot and for a 2.2 setup you don’t really need 8 channels.
I’m not a manufacturer but a dumb USB in 4 channel out DAC shouldn’t be hard to develop and produce.

The DM7 is in the D90 formfactor so why not make a 4 channel version in the D30 Pro formfactor; I would buy that in a heartbeat.

I think the new MiniDSP Flex Eight would be the way to go if multichannel and full DSP is one's desire.

 

[respice finem]

...Early CD-players had extreme sharp filters and a perfect frequency response because of that, but people complained it sounded "digital", possibly because of f*ed up phase...

I remember the "playground" of filters on my SONY CDP-XA50ES (long long time ago). Even back then, as a young person, I could barely hear the differences. I settled with the "spline" filter, but would I pass a blind test against the other ones, back then? Probably not. Today, aged 55? No chance.

 

[xeizo]

I remember the "playground" of filters on my SONY CDP-XA50ES (long long time ago). Even back then, as a young person, I could barely hear the differences. I settled with the "spline" filter, but would I pass a blind test against the other ones, back then? Probably not. Today, aged 55? No chance.

It's not possible to hear any difference on very clean music with a lot of air between instruments, aka demo music, but on a congested track with too many instruments it's actually pretty easy to spot. The sharpest filter tends to sound the most congested. Death Metal and similar music is sensitive to congestion.

 

[respice finem]

It's not possible to hear any difference on very clean music with a lot of air between instruments, aka demo music, but on a congested track with too many instruments it's actually pretty easy to spot. The sharpest filter tends to sound the most congested. Death Metal and similar music is sensitive to congestion.

Big symphonic works are "congested" too. But even with these, if a difference is just marginally noticeable, it IMHO doesn't really matter, being "peanuts" against our "daily shape", or the "sins" of even a good listening room. Everyday hearing is different to comparing stuff.

 

[xeizo]

Big symphonic works are "congested" too. But even with these, if a difference is just marginally noticeable, it IMHO doesn't really matter, being "peanuts" against our "daily shape", or the "sins" of even a good listening room. Everyday hearing is different to comparing stuff.

Yes, like I said, it is a very small difference. The feature can as well be left out, as it mostly is.

 

[mdsimon2]

You consider the DM7 to be (too) expensive? Is there a cheaper 8 channel DAC on the market?

2.2, i.e. 2 loudspeakers and 2 subs?
You are overlooking very important factors. The market for this configuration is very small and most use miniDSP.
With such small quantities, the manufacturer has to pass on the higher costs for housing, packaging, circuit board production and assembly. In addition, of course, there are also the development costs that have to be allocated to the small number of units.

I think you know this but there are many cheaper 8 channel DACs (audio interfaces) on the market but almost none have IR volume control and a display apart from the Topping DM7, Okto dac8 pro, miniDSP Flex Eight and much more expensive offerings like the Exasounds.

Honestly seems like an under explored market although I am sure it is rather niche. Would much rather see more interesting multichannel offerings than another two channel DAC with limited functionality, especially at this price point.

I understand why Topping / SMSL may not want to compete with miniDSP but it would be nice if they explored the Okto approach where you have digital inputs besides USB that can easily be routed to a computer for software DSP and back to the DAC for analog output.

Michael

 

[Sokel]

I understand why Topping / SMSL may not want to compete with miniDSP but it would be nice if they explored the Okto approach where you have digital inputs besides USB that can easily be routed to a computer for software DSP and back to the DAC for analog output.

Michael

I order to do that they have to be absolutely certain about the flawless operation of the device/firmware and put a lot of fail-safe condition triggers.
Sounds difficult and time consuming to test such a device and does not add up to the fast rate production philosophy.

 

[Toni Mas]

Of course It looks fine... Sadly It is once again a piece of state of the art 2 channels only stuff... And xmos async USB interface does not even allow to combine with other USB interfaces to get more output channels...

 

[DonR]

I expect we will see this level of performance in sub $200 DACs within 5 years. Having said that, I am already there as far as audibility is concerned as my hearing only reaches to 16 bits and 13.5KHz. "A man's got to know his limitations."

 

[noel_fs]

this is what peak performance looks like

 

[Mario Sanchez]

It's the sharp filters that screws with phase, their benefit is better frequency response/lower noise/lower distorsion, slow filter affects phase less but frequency response is worse and digital noise/distorsion comes through. The optimal filter is a balance of all that, and as you say it can be beneficial or detrimental depending on what music is playing.

Early CD-players had extreme sharp filters and a perfect frequency response because of that, but people complained it sounded "digital", possibly because of f*ed up phase.

And yes, the differences are very subtle, but can be easily heard. I have had switchable filters in my CD-players already >30 years ago, I've never preferred the perfect measuring default filter and some of the other filters may almost sound bad so one has to choose careful depending on personal taste.

I think these reconstruction filters are FIR-based, meaning a steep roll-off in amplitude response doesn't necessarily equal a stupendous amount of shift on the phase side of things. One can, of course, raise the argument of pre-ringing, but that shouldn't be much of a problem until you throw something with spectral content near or past the filter cutoff (usually near nyquist) frequency at near 0dBFS levels at the device, which "real world" stuff usually don't do. Things probably have changed for the better, and the again, one gets to pick.

 

[xeizo]

I think these reconstruction filters are FIR-based, meaning a steep roll-off in amplitude response doesn't necessarily equal a stupendous amount of shift on the phase side of things. One can, of course, raise the argument of pre-ringing, but that shouldn't be much of a problem until you throw something with spectral content near or past the filter cutoff (usually near nyquist) frequency at near 0dBFS levels at the device, which "real world" stuff usually don't do. Things probably have changed for the better, and the again, one gets to pick.

Yes, one gets to pick, according to AKM that's the point. Not everyone prefers the same. And as you say, filters have become much better than in early CD-players and the differences are subtle but at least measurable. The pre/post ringing are very different with the different filters, not only the roll off and the white noise. From AKM:

 

[BR52]

The next hump with AKM Topping E70V

 

[xeizo]

The next hump with AKM Topping E70VView attachment 250507

Much less than the ESS hump, and manufacturers seem to have been able to workaround that one, they probably will with this one too. If not, something to improve for the next chip. But I doubt anyone would hear the difference.

 

[BR52]

Much less than the ESS hump, and manufacturers seem to have been able to workaround that one, they probably will with this one too. If not, something to improve for the next chip. But I doubt anyone would hear the difference.

I replays like this

 

[xeizo]

I replays like this

Yes, obviously lost in translation, would you like to elaborate

Or did you just mean it "humps" with half the price?

TOPPING E70V AK4191+AK4499EX Digital to Analog Convertor (DAC)

Spec: PCM USB IN:44.1kHz-768kHz/16bit-32bit COAX/OPT IN:44.1kHz-192kHz/16bit-24bit BT IN:AAC/SBC/APTX/APTX LL/APTX HD/APTX-Adaptive/LDAC DSD(Native) USB IN:DSD64-DSD512 COAX/OPT IN:can not support BT IN:can not support DSD(DoP) DSD64-DSD256 COAX/OPT IN:can not support BT IN:can not support E70 ...

shenzhenaudio.com

 

[tcli]

No MQA ?

 

[respice finem]

No MQA ?

to justify the price

 

[duffer5]

No MQA ?

Good catch. Interesting. Wonder why they made this choice since the MSRP is at a premium. Saving the MQA liceinsing fee maybe the driver here but at this price point that should not be a factor. MQA should be included at this price and the user can elect to use it or not. Big miss regardless of where you stand on MQA.