SMSL M500 MKIII DAC & Amp Review

[AndreaT]

I'd consider the difference between SINADs of 119 and 123 to be insignificant. You're not going to hear that difference. Measure it? Yes. Hear it? No.

When I was in the business, it was the world's worst industry secret that some manufacturers souped up the products they sent out to reviewers to show better numbers. It cost them a little money to do it, but benefited them with increased sales that more than offset the cost. Examples purchased at retail didn't even come close.

I am not in the business of selling electronics, but I wonder how could you “soupe-up” the reviewer’s sample with the likely automated manufacturing of electronic boards. Maybe handpicking the ESS chip? Select those not made on Mondays and Fridays? Calibrate the voltages with greater care?

Instead of performance, I would use "measurement", because even if the retail units had 119dB SINAD instead of 123dB, they may very well perform as good as this unit, in the sense of "performance" being the transparency of the device to get quality sound, more than numbers (unless the numbers shows a real problem).

 

[AndreaT]

It is game over. SMSL and others are offering DACs for $500 that outperform audiophile brands costing 10 to 50x more. I wish Amir could measure one of the top-of-the-line DACs made by dCS. I feel it would show how many $ you pay for looks and the perverse pleasure to drop into a casual conversation that your DAC is more expensive than his new car. Short of a need to use balanced digital input, this SMSL M500 is impeccable. Thank you Amir!

 

[Kitarist]

Did anyone upgrade from MK2 to MK3 and did they notice any difference in sound as a dac and also as headphone amp?

 

[pseudoid]

Thanx @amirm,
It is probably too late to re-title the review to read as:

'SMSL M500 MKIII DAC & HP Amp Review'​

 

[Anander1]

It is game over. SMSL and others are offering DACs for $500 that outperform audiophile brands costing 10 to 50x more. I wish Amir could measure one of the top-of-the-line DACs made by dCS. I feel it would show how many $ you pay for looks and the perverse pleasure to drop into a casual conversation that your DAC is more expensive than his new car. Short of a need to use balanced digital input, this SMSL M500 is impeccable. Thank you Amir!

I mean if we want to bring comparisons into the picture, the c200 is incredibly, incredibly close for 40% of the price. Why give such high praise to a product when it is 2.5x the price of the c200, for no tangible difference in the metrics that this community is concerned with?

 

[amirm]

Why give such high praise to a product when it is 2.5x the price of the c200, for no tangible difference in the metrics that this community is concerned with?

Because it is superbly engineered. And it has features like that color display I like. Whether you should buy it is up to you, not me. No one is forcing you to buy it either.

 

[AndreaT]

I mean if we want to bring comparisons into the picture, the c200 is incredibly, incredibly close for 40% of the price. Why give such high praise to a product when it is 2.5x the price of the c200, for no tangible difference in the metrics that this community is concerned with?

Yes, agree somewhat about the intangible difference. However, in my budget, it is acceptable to spend a couple of hundreds more for a better color screen, a SINAD among the highest and the recommendation from Amir. It is verboten to spend tens of thousand more to own a famous name in the audiophiles Olympus and a bomb-proof over engineered case.

 

[mctron]

I mean if we want to bring comparisons into the picture, the c200 is incredibly, incredibly close for 40% of the price. Why give such high praise to a product when it is 2.5x the price of the c200, for no tangible difference in the metrics that this community is concerned with?

Would you say it is not excellent product based on this review because it costs $500?

 

[okok]

one of the top-of-the-line DACs made by dCS

dcs actually measures very best, it was one of the best at its time (before the high performance war)
but we think it can't compare with the now modern chips

 

[juanvicentefont]

Thanks Amir for all your great and enlightening reviews.
Question for you: are those headphone output power measurements for the balanced or the unbalanced output? I assume that the 4.4 mm output is balanced while the 6.35 mm is not. In this case the balanced output would deliver twice the voltage or four times the power to a given headphone. But which output corresponds to your measurements?

 

[kchap]

I'm surprised that so many manufacturers are still not using USB C connectors. USB B is supposedly deprecated.

 

[amirm]

Thanks Amir for all your great and enlightening reviews.
Question for you: are those headphone output power measurements for the balanced or the unbalanced output? I assume that the 4.4 mm output is balanced while the 6.35 mm is not. In this case the balanced output would deliver twice the voltage or four times the power to a given headphone. But which output corresponds to your measurements?

I only measured the 1/4 inch. Pretty sure the 4.4 mm is for convenience and you don't get more power from it.

 

[oscar_dziki]

Or a DAC with 2 independent outputs for Line and HP outputs, so you can apply two different PEQ, even on the software side, instead of, for example, having one set for your speakers, but once you use your headphones, you have to change the PEQ.
In Roon, if it sees the two ouputs, each one can has its own PEQ and as soon as you switch to the other outputs, the right PEQ is used
Same thing if you use the DAC to mix music, having separated outputs for Line and HP let you apply two different corrections and once set, you have nothing more to do.

It would certainly be 1000% more useful than continuing to reach another step in SINAD
The cost of using 2 x ES9038Q2M is $38, the cost of 1 x ES9038PRO is $91... the difference cover the changes and added other pieces.
Or they can use the ES9038PRO as 8 channels outputs (I think it's only Mono, 2Ch or 8ch, but not 4ch but I may be wrong)

Agree, but maybe not Roon exclusive, but some open source API. Roon ain't cheap, and nothing roon does is so brilliant it can't be achieved with FOSS.

 

[GXAlan]

Can you explain what does mean in sound perception ? Can you hear that noise ?

Everything that can be heard can be measured. Everything that is measured cannot be heard.

If you think transients make a difference, please find
A) specific track that you think there is a consistent difference
B) two products at the extremes where the difference is as large as possible

The closest I have gotten is a PK Metric of -65 dB. I thought I had stumbled upon an easy way to measure the difference but there was a technical error with my first set of measurements.

 

[bequietjk]

Any channel balance on this bad boy?

 

[amirm]

Any channel balance on this bad boy?

Due to digital volume control, no.

 

[777]

Did anyone upgrade from MK2 to MK3 and did they notice any difference in sound as a dac and also as headphone amp?

As a DAC, MK3 is better like MK2. It has a better sound, more solid, more contrast between instruments. MK2 is already very good but MK3 is excellent, near highend DAC's.

 

[JSmith]

Why give such high praise to a product when it is 2.5x the price of the c200, for no tangible difference in the metrics that this community is concerned with?

It's not $20000... and it's very similar in price to the previous M500 models. People complained the ES9038PRO implemented in the last models were only using 2 channels of the 8 available with this chip. This now uses all 8, which is what people wanted apparently... even though it makes zero difference to the analogue output. This has 9 op-amps instead of 3 and uses a new XMOS, nicer screen, different form etc... some people will see value in that, others won't.


JSmith

 

[evan123]

ESS chip should also be upgraded to the 9068PRO

Did you mean ES9039PRO or ES9068AS? Maybe it should do the dishes too?

Any comparable separate DAC + headphone amp combination on Shenzhen costs about the same or even
much more, and some people might place value in a single box solution (simplicity, digital volume, and small light equipment like E30+L30 never sits nicely together on the table, being moved as headphone cable moves). I’m not sure what people complaining about price/value are expecting.

 

[maros.zr]

still wondering, there is Topping DX7Pro+ with better measurements in sense of HP Amp. The price difference is just +€100.
It sounds better, looks better, no issue with cables...Therefore, there is no reason to buy SMSL when you can get almost 10% better HP Amp than SMSL M500III for just a 100?