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Topping A50s Headphone Amplifier Review
- Thread starter amirm
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i forgot to mention that i am using Equalizer APO to tame highs of those Beyers a bit and there i have set preamp -2db to avoid clipping
when i turn it off it is louder so i understand that it is enough for you, if i was not using this that would be enough for me too and in most cases it is still enough (but i encountered a case when it was not enough but i have to say its rare), but it was the first thing i noticed when i switched from A50 to A50s that it is less powerful and then i started finding answer for that and i stumbled upon that signal strength and found out what it is and that standard is 2 Vrms and that specs i looked at from that comparison table on Topping website, those results they have there, they tested with 4 Vrms or what
i dont know if it is because of that you get 160 mW x2@300Ω with 2 Vrms on A50 and on A50s you get 52 mW x2@300 Ohm with 2 Vrms, or it is because A50 has +9db high gain and A50s has +6db high gain
when i turn it off it is louder so i understand that it is enough for you, if i was not using this that would be enough for me too and in most cases it is still enough (but i encountered a case when it was not enough but i have to say its rare), but it was the first thing i noticed when i switched from A50 to A50s that it is less powerful and then i started finding answer for that and i stumbled upon that signal strength and found out what it is and that standard is 2 Vrms and that specs i looked at from that comparison table on Topping website, those results they have there, they tested with 4 Vrms or what
i dont know if it is because of that you get 160 mW x2@300Ω with 2 Vrms on A50 and on A50s you get 52 mW x2@300 Ohm with 2 Vrms, or it is because A50 has +9db high gain and A50s has +6db high gain
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btw i did not received answer for my original question, if its a good DAC and if it will work and if this is the problem that with 2Vrms on A50s i get only 52mW @300ohms and not 192mW@300ohms that his amp should be capable off on SE
The SMSL will also give you 2Vrms output SE. Converting balanced to SE will halve the voltage. So you will get the same output voltage as when using the SE outputs the DAC comes with.
I still don't understand how the A50s is not powerful enough to drive some 250Ohm Beyerdynamic headphones to insanely loud levels (providing it gets a decent input signal). Any SE DAC with 2Vrms caple output should be able to do that.
I still don't understand how the A50s is not powerful enough to drive some 250Ohm Beyerdynamic headphones to insanely loud levels (providing it gets a decent input signal). Any SE DAC with 2Vrms caple output should be able to do that.
it can get it to insanely loud but not in every case, those are rare but i experienced it... if what you are saying is true then how can someone feed that amp with 4 Vrms? i think only very expensive DACs give you that much power on SE, but in that case you probably would get more expensive amp too... to me, this amp is strange then and its downgrade from A50 (sure, A50s has better measurements but can human really tell the difference?), because you never get the full power from it when you need some 800 or 1000€ + DAC to achieve that
i dont know, maybe i try Topping E30, its 150€ with free shipping for me and guy that is doing reviews on this forum says its good and he recommends it
i dont know, maybe i try Topping E30, its 150€ with free shipping for me and guy that is doing reviews on this forum says its good and he recommends it
If you can get an FX Audio Dac X6 used, for cheap, at least you could try that before splurging on a brand new DAC. The E30 is one of the DAC that i considered when getting my stack.
If you don't mind spending a little more - Khadas Tone 2 Pro is a wonderful unit (can serve as a more portable DAC/AMP with balanced out and can be powered solely by USB) - unanimously considered a better DAC than the E30 but it's $50 more. It's the combo I'm running and am totally pleased with it (flatter and punchier sound than the Yulong D100 I had)
i dont want DAC/AMP cuz i feel i am paying more for something that i will not use and that DAC/AMP would be 220€ + 20€ shipping for me, so E30 for 150€ free shipping wins, and in test it performed worse than E30
i googled a bit and i did not found anything about that XLR to RCA cables lowers the voltage, in fact i found that people should be careful when using this because the device they connect the RCA end to, may not be designed to receive more than 2 Vrms and it can overdrive it and you can lose volume control and you can get distortions
so how is it then?
SE is just the one half of the balanced signal. You use the hot (OR the cold) and the gnd from the source. Balanced you use hot and cold and the gnd can be used as a shield and is not used for signal transport. Cold is the inverse signal of the hot signal. At the amplifier side they get substracted. This eliminates any disturbance introduced during signal transport. Hot - cold = Hot - (-hot) = hot + hot = 2*hot. So double the voltage compared to just hot (vs gnd) when connecting SE.
im lost in this, it depends on cable or what? that for example some XLR to RCA cables halving the voltage and others not? because i found that warning i mentioned before that you can overdrive the device that is not designed to receive more than 2 Vrms with XLR to RCA
i dont know thats why i asked in my very first post... i would like to hear what amirm would say, hes the expert
and if you cannot get 4 Vrms with XLR to RCA then Topping is baiting people without knowledge about signal input strength because you never get 192mW x2 @300 ohms on SE on that AMP because you would not use this amp when you would buy 1000€+ DAC that is capable of more Vrms than 2 on RCA and their table on their website that is comparing A50, L30 and A50s is misleading, and thats mildly said, in that table it looks like A50s is stronger than A50 but in real conditions A50 has more than triple the power that A50s has @300ohms
When they know the best that 2 Vrms is basically the standard for SE
i dont know thats why i asked in my very first post... i would like to hear what amirm would say, hes the expert
and if you cannot get 4 Vrms with XLR to RCA then Topping is baiting people without knowledge about signal input strength because you never get 192mW x2 @300 ohms on SE on that AMP because you would not use this amp when you would buy 1000€+ DAC that is capable of more Vrms than 2 on RCA and their table on their website that is comparing A50, L30 and A50s is misleading, and thats mildly said, in that table it looks like A50s is stronger than A50 but in real conditions A50 has more than triple the power that A50s has @300ohms
When they know the best that 2 Vrms is basically the standard for SE
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Well, since you clearly found the specs for the amp, why are you then claiming that they are lying about them?
Thier claims are quite in line with what @amirm has measured: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...opping-a50s-headphone-amplifier-review.16290/
Maybe this can help:
Thier claims are quite in line with what @amirm has measured: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...opping-a50s-headphone-amplifier-review.16290/
Maybe this can help:
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Veri
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Amir recommends to use a "balanced DAC" with this amp which really should have been removed by now. You cannot connect a balanced DAC over XLR to RCA cables, you lose half the voltage. As has already been explained. You can't connect both hot and cold over a single RCA pin, so you lose half the voltage using such a cable. It doesn't matter which cable.
yeah after research and finding the answer for why A50s is weaker than A50 when it should be stronger, i didnt even know there is some input signal voltage before and they show in their table power of different amps but it was tested differently, on one amp they are showing power at 2 Vrms (which is not mentioned that it is at 2 Vrms) and other amp they are showing power i dont know at what Vrms, i dont think they even stated at what Vrms you get full power
its like i would test how fast two cars are and one car would go up the hill and other would go downhill and i would said "see this car is faster" without mentioning how i tested
but it is what it is so what can i do, i learned a lot by trying to find the answer
yeah it helped
anyway, is there a benefit of getting a DAC? for example Topping E30, currently this is my DAC Realtek ALC1200 / ALC1220P Codec
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Veri
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Umm yeah, it is quite likely whatever output you are using there is low voltage and is (severely) limiting your amp output. This one was only 1.1 Vrms! https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...te-z390-aorus-motherboard-audio-review.13083/
E30 is 2.15 volt. I recommend getting it if you need more power.
well if mobo for Intel (they only recently started making better mobos for AMD) had that low output and Aorus Master (i think only Aorus Elite is above that) which should be almost the top mobo then i get that DAC just to be sure, and its not that expensive and from the test that Topping E30 is really good for that price
Thanks
Human Bass
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I still believe that a balanced A50S using khadas rca connectors would be an ultra compact end game
Veri
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Mm would be a nice concept. But, Topping is not going to license those connectors
very pricy right now, not really useable.Human Bass
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According to John it is 7 dollars. But considering they replace both rca and xlr and also save space and reduce the size of the amp, it can make economical sense. They could try with the L30 also. The potential is there.Mm would be a nice concept. But, Topping is not going to license those connectors
https://www.l7audiolab.com/f/khadas-tone2-pro/
https://forum.khadas.com/t/tone2-pro-firmware-v1-2-mcu-update/11944/42
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/khadas-tone2-pro-review-dac-amp.20684/ (Amir's review was before the MCU update that solved some jitter/distortion issues)
Some subjective reviews with direct comparisons:
https://headfonics.com/khadas-tone2-pro-review/
https://soundnews.net/sources/dacs/khadas-tone-2-pro-review-khadas-1-hi-end-dac-market-0/
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