The difference between using the Topping E30 in pure DAC mode vs Pre AMP

[Hotwetrat]

Hi,

The E30 I use in pure DAC mode, and control volume on my AMP.

There is a pre amp mode on the E30 where you can control voume, with the remote I believe.

May I ask, is there ANY negative to using the E30 in PRE AMP instead of pure DAC mode, and controlling volume with the E30 remote, with regards to audio fidelity?

Thank you

 

[Hotwetrat]

I removed the question mark as seemingly it caused confusion.

I edited my entire post because.... Yes

 

[gvl]

Unless your amp has a lot of gain that you have to run E30 way down at less than -30db output for normal listening levels there's not much downside to using DACs volume control.

 

[VintageFlanker]

May I ask, is there ANY negative to this (using the E30 i PRE AMP mode and controlling volume with the E30 remote) with regards to audio fidelity? vs using only pure DAC mode.

When running preamp mode, you're using digital attenuation of the DAC chip, meaning it reduces SNR (as SINAD) of each dB according to this attenuation. It is not an audible concern IMHO. Better would be to go with fix output to 2V and then control volume with a decent (transparent) preamp part. But since we don't know the real performance of your amp volume control, it may often be noisier than the E30 attenuation + risk of channel mismatch if you're dealing with old school analog plot.

 

[Atanasi]

If you want DSD, the DAC mode allows direct DSD, avoiding conversion to PCM. If you have a low-noise amp like L30 or A90, attenuating about 20 dB analogically takes advantage of the lower noise floor.

 

[Hotwetrat]

Many thanks.

This is actually a Stereo HiFi setup.

Currently with TV Optical Out to E30, to SA300, to Dali Opticon 1 MK2 with 2x SB 1000 Pro.

I was considering a power amp or something as I need more power than the SA300 has for these very hard to drive speakers and I am looking at several options

 

[Kegemusha]

I do connect the cd player, Streamer and TV to the DAC.
I tested all variants and I can not hear anything strange, I would never guess from what source the volume is controlled.
I usually put the DACas pure DAC and I control the volume from streamer and from cd player, my Ncore amp does not have volume.

 

[Vivek Cariappa]

does it make any difference to audio quality ,while selecting auto select mode on on e 30

 

[threni]

does it make any difference to audio quality ,while selecting auto select mode on on e 30

Auto select mode? You mean auto power on??

 

[DeepFried]

Short answer is no. long answer is also no, but you may lose some placebo effect from the technically better (but inaudible) measurements.