This is a review and detailed measurements of the Tempotec Sonata HD Pro. It is on kind loan from a member and costs US $54 on Amazon including Prime shipping.
The Sonata HD Pro comes in the usual rectangular dongle size:
The differentiation as you can barely see are the volume control indicators. Alas, they are very coarse so unless you get lucky, I doubt that you can set them to the volume you require.
The cable is removable and the connector is micro-USB. A micro-USB to USB-C cable is provided as you see in above right which I used for my testing.
Tempotec Sonata HD Pro Measurements
As usual, we start with our dashboard of 1 kHz tone:
This is excellent performance for a dongle. It ever so slightly saturates as otherwise it could produce a SINAD that wuolld be above 110. As it is, performance is quite competitive:
Dynamic range is also excellent:
As is jitter test result:
Multitone test shows slight weakness in lowest frequencies, likely indicating lack of power supply capacitor reservoir:
Let's measure power starting with 300 ohm load:
Switching to 32 ohm load caused clipping and with it, lower power than I was hoping for:
Tempotec Sonata HD Pro Headphone Listening Tests
I was pleased with the performance of the unit with my Sennheiser HD-650 high impedance test headphone. For the other extreme, I use the 25 ohm Drop Ether CX headphone. Here, I only had adequate amount of power so not quite enough for me.
Conclusions
The Tempotec Sonata HD Pro is prices as much as half as much as the next tier up dongle and produces performance along those lines. If you don't have an inefficient headphone, it is a very good choice and very well executed. If you want to be obsolete proof though, I would pay more and get one that has more power especially with low impedance headphones.
I am going to put the Tempotec Sonata HD Pro on my recommended list.
------------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
The Sonata HD Pro comes in the usual rectangular dongle size:
The differentiation as you can barely see are the volume control indicators. Alas, they are very coarse so unless you get lucky, I doubt that you can set them to the volume you require.
The cable is removable and the connector is micro-USB. A micro-USB to USB-C cable is provided as you see in above right which I used for my testing.
Tempotec Sonata HD Pro Measurements
As usual, we start with our dashboard of 1 kHz tone:
This is excellent performance for a dongle. It ever so slightly saturates as otherwise it could produce a SINAD that wuolld be above 110. As it is, performance is quite competitive:
Dynamic range is also excellent:
As is jitter test result:
Multitone test shows slight weakness in lowest frequencies, likely indicating lack of power supply capacitor reservoir:
Let's measure power starting with 300 ohm load:
Switching to 32 ohm load caused clipping and with it, lower power than I was hoping for:
Tempotec Sonata HD Pro Headphone Listening Tests
I was pleased with the performance of the unit with my Sennheiser HD-650 high impedance test headphone. For the other extreme, I use the 25 ohm Drop Ether CX headphone. Here, I only had adequate amount of power so not quite enough for me.
Conclusions
The Tempotec Sonata HD Pro is prices as much as half as much as the next tier up dongle and produces performance along those lines. If you don't have an inefficient headphone, it is a very good choice and very well executed. If you want to be obsolete proof though, I would pay more and get one that has more power especially with low impedance headphones.
I am going to put the Tempotec Sonata HD Pro on my recommended list.
------------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
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