SMSL VMV D3 Review (R2R DAC)

[Lambda]

Performs better, heavy build quality and double the price! How does that fit into your world?

Never said its a product for ME.
Of cause a R2R DAC is harder to make, way more expensive, and performs worse.
This shuld be clear to anyone knowing anything about DAC hardware design.

So the Analogy with an analog mechanical watch is in my mind ok.
Of cause its harder, costs more and performance won’t be as good. but dose this stop everyone from making analog mechanical watches? No
And no on in there right mind would compare a analog mechanical watch to digital quartz one based on accuracy alone.


If you don’t like the watch comparison look at cars.
People have lots of Preferences.
Turbocharger, compressor, naturally aspirated.
dual overhead cam vs. push rod.

Even if the Goal is easy an well defined like "go as fast as possible"
they compare them selves in there Classes.

The basics of Bonneville Speed Week engine classes - Hagerty Media

We’ll get you caught up on the most important land engine classes and lingo before Speed Week 2020 begins on August 8.

www.hagerty.com

Price does not = value. Sorry

Your right. this is what i meant to say!
forget the "not" some how... going to edit it


People don’t try to climb the Everest without Oxigen because they think its easier faster or cheaper..

The same way a manufacture is not limiting themselves from using modern of the shelf integrated DACs. because they think its cheaper or better. but because they can.

~100dB SINAD with R2R is a very impressive and respectable Engendering achievement.
Of cause it costs significantly more in Development and Part. compered to a Fully integrated IC solution.

But having an low price or price per "SINAD" was obviously never there priority/ goal with a product like this.

 

[Vini darko]

Were I so inclined a chip dac at this price doesn't appeal. I'd want the holo audio hand picked discrete jobby. It's just more luxurious.

 

[Veri]

Were I so inclined a chip dac at this price doesn't appeal. I'd want the holo audio hand picked discrete jobby. It's just more luxurious.

Yeah this product is just not competitive I'm afraid. Not a bad job by SMSL per sé, but to have J-class and not even PCM1704-K chips at $3000+ dollars, if one wants to chase the dragon you might as well buy a holo audio DAC of one were so inclined.. looks more luxurious, too...

 

[ROOSKIE]

Never said its a product for ME.
Of cause a R2R DAC is harder to make, way more expensive, and performs worse.
This shuld be clear to anyone knowing anything about DAC hardware design.

So the Analogy with an analog mechanical watch is in my mind ok.
Of cause its harder, costs more and performance won’t be as good. but dose this stop everyone from making analog mechanical watches? No
And no on in there right mind would compare a analog mechanical watch to digital quartz one based on accuracy alone.


If you don’t like the watch comparison look at cars.
People have lots of Preferences.
Turbocharger, compressor, naturally aspirated.
dual overhead cam vs. push rod.

Even if the Goal is easy an well defined like "go as fast as possible"
they compare them selves in there Classes.

The basics of Bonneville Speed Week engine classes - Hagerty Media

We’ll get you caught up on the most important land engine classes and lingo before Speed Week 2020 begins on August 8.

www.hagerty.com

Your right. this is what i meant to say!
forget the "not" some how... going to edit it


People don’t try to climb the Everest without Oxigen because they think its easier faster or cheaper..

The same way a manufacture is not limiting themselves from using modern of the shelf integrated DACs. because they think its cheaper or better. but because they can.

~100dB SINAD with R2R is a very impressive and respectable Engendering achievement.
Of cause it costs significantly more in Development and Part. compered to a Fully integrated IC solution.

But having an low price or price per "SINAD" was obviously never there priority/ goal with a product like this.

I think expensive analog watches are just as big of a waste as this product.
So while I understand what you are trying to say, ultimately you are discussion two (in my humble personal opinion) ridiculously stupid products.
Besides a better analogy would be a CRT T.V.
How much would you pay for a "SOFTA" implementation of a tube television? Or a state of the art implementation of a VHS, VCR?
Bring back the Trinitron!

 

[Lambda]

Besides a better analogy would be a CRT T.V.
How much would you pay for a "SOFTA" implementation of a tube television? Or a state of the art implementation of a VHS, VCR?
Bring back the Trinitron!

Oh your asking the wrong person
I have quite a collection of CRTs. including a professional production Trinitrons with RGB and SDI inputs... a 3 CRT projector that ways more then me and has water cooled tubes.

CRTs don’t have Pixel they have lines and can render Arbitrary vertical resolutions and non square "pixel".
combined with the scanning this gives a unique and unmatched look that is important for Arcade games.

"Light gun" only work with CRTs.
And wen it comes to latency.... Nothing can can get even closes to CRTs.

Bottom line is CRT is ab bad example because we don’t have a technology that can faithfully and inquisitional recreate the whole CRT experience.

But DACs its all just electrical signal in the and wen have the technolgy to recreate them exactly.
including distortion, coloration and EQ in DSP if we want to.

So the only difference is how the the end result is archived.
Some care about this some only care about the result.

If you don’t care about the Process, the technology and the engineering
Behind it, But you only care abut the end result per $$$ this is not the DAC for you.

 

[Johannes AU]

Oh no ... a shock indeed ... like earthquake ... a massive one ...
and the price make it even worse ... sorry....

 

[anphex]

I admit being an R2R fan for a few months because I thought it sounded so much nicer but seeing the high frequency sine mess made me come to my senses.

 

[Johannes AU]

The remote looks the same as the D1se, D1se manual says the remote use a CR2032 coin battery, D2 and D3 says 2xAAA .....

 

[PeteL]

For what it's worth, my cd player is a Sony CDP-D500 professional Unit that uses dual PCM-1702-J, which is essentially the same tech but 20 bits instead of 24. To my ears my CD do sound a bit different than when I use spdif out and play them trough a Topping E30. It may be bias, I know I should really do a DBT before saying something like this, Yes I know, blasphemy, you are allowed to throw tomatoes at me, I may do it one day, and I do believe in confirmation bias in general, but yes to my ears the CDP do sound a bit punchier and warmer, the E30 beeing seemingly more HIFI with a bit more instrument separation an with a bit more clarity on background subtleties like reverb tails. I'll still point that I do, humbly, consider myself a "trained listener" for what it's worth, but I do hear a difference and it's not as obvious all across the board On some recordings the difference seem to be more evident than others. I like them both equally, just different.

 

[Snoopy]

I admit being an R2R fan for a few months because I thought it sounded so much nicer but seeing the high frequency sine mess made me come to my senses.

I would buy one just for "fun" if I could get a good one around $500. Just because it's from a technical point interesting to me. But I wouldn't want to spend $1000 + for something that is just "ok".

SMSL etc need to release more audiophile looking devices with DS DACs. Most of the stuff looks really "cheap".

Imagine a smsl Su-9n for $550 instead of $400 with a better case and remote.

Singxer and Gustard are already going In that direction.

 

[Multicore]

Until the folklore around R2R DACs and anything unconventional goes away, I guess I can't blame SMSL for chasing that market.

The folklore exist for the purpose of selling kit like this. I haven't looked but I would expect SMSL's marketing for this DAC includes the kind of bafflegab that help to keep these memes circulating. Even if the marketing were purely engineering facts and devoid of rationalization, that they brought this product to market and stickered it at three and a half grand supports these memes survival.

We all know that expensive luxury goods like high-end cars, wrist watches, handbags, clothing, etc. generally serve social and individual psychological purposes quite separate from the base purposes of transportation, time-keeping, carrying stuff around and keeping warm. Consumers, vendors, and actors ancillary to the market play a game that develops whatever rationalizations work.

ASR has an interesting position in this since it serves in part to dismantle certain, less scientifically useful ideas. But it also serves supply consumers and vendors with rationales for spending money on stuff they want. It's appears to be important to some people, myself included, that the reasoning incorporate some objective thinking, but in the end it's not that different from the pleasure seeking of someone who wants a fancy coat, car, bag or wristwatch. The desire to have these things comes from somewhere too and if you trace that chain of causation back you'll have a hard time plausibly maintaining objectivity for long.

 

[MaxBuck]

This thing clearly needs tubes in the output stage.

 

[617]

Guys, nobody buys an R2R DAC for performance. We all know that a good Delta Sigma from Cirrus or AKM will outperform it. You get the R2R DAC to attract women.

 

[respice finem]

I don't think its a headless panther, because nothing is really broken. Its just surround receiver performance for too much money.

It depends... In absolute terms it's not "headless", in relation to the price it is.
Some DACs for 10% of its price measure much better.

I know, car analogies... but if I buy a Bentley, i don't expect it to perform like a Lada, although a Lada will bring me from A to B as well.

 

[voodooless]

Some DACs for 10% of its price measure much better.

$9 Apple dongle has the same performance but almost 400x less expensive.

 

[xema]

the thdn limit of 1704 is about -104
it's suprised me that smsl didn't reach the limit……

edit: they are using 1704uj not uk so the pdf spec shows uj is only -96db, so good job smsl for the -98db measurment

 

[xema]

View attachment 181686
$9 Apple dongle has the same performance but almost 400x less expensive.

not really , the apple dongle produce much much more noise and Near-end phase noise (just look at the wider turn-V of the 1khz bottom)

 

[AudioSceptic]

Yes it is rather odd... almost every other type of tech, people want the newest, the best performing etc. I find it quite strange that this goes out the window for some when buying audio products when the goal is performance... I mean, it's not like one would go down to the store to purchase a new refrigerator, then suggest to the salesman you want a 30 year old model, or ask your car salesman why the motor has no manual crank.


JSmith

Cars lost their cranks a long time ago, but audio never will...

 

[NiagaraPete]

When I came to this forum I would have argued the testing is wrong. I've learned a lot since joining and reading and thus have retired my golden ears for pure common sense. This is close to snake oil.

 

[ousi]

Kinda disappointed given the price point. That probably sums up “why we don’t have R2R audio DAC chips made by major manufacturers” these days. Even SMSL cannot match their current delta-sigma DAC performance.

IIRC, Sony found that even a single bit DAC performs better than multi-bit design back in late 90s as shown by their choice of “bit-stream” DAC for their professional and high-end gears, well before they moved to DSD which is always 1-bit.

Maybe folks should stick with their delta-sigma offer from VMV division

As always thanks for the measurement, @amirm !