Topping D90SE Review (Balanced DAC)

[Eddy H.]

I've a/b the 2 dacs over a few days and the d90se sounds better. You can take my word for it or you can stop by and hear for yourself. I always buy 2 dacs and return the one that doesn't sound as good. The only thing I don't like about the d90se or for that matter all of the Topping dacs is there remotes. The pre90 and d90se look almost identical.

 

[HDavidson]

The latest driver 5.20 does not install on win 8.1

 

[JohnYang1997]

The latest driver 5.20 does not install on win 8.1

Chg: Operating systems Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 are not longer supported
(Microsoft discontinued vendor signing)

 

[respice finem]

...People that think all dacs sound the same need to get there ears checked.

Well, there we are again at the point where no consensus is possible - because no one can say what the other one hears = what his brain "tells" him. That said, when two DACs sound far apart, are AFAIK a) one of them is seriously broken (technically or by design), b) one is louder than the other (the louder one wins).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bias
Ceterum censeo: your bias is as good as mine, and vice versa. Everybody is biased all the time.
That's why measurements beat subjective impressions.

BTW: Getting the ears checked (not just by otoscopy but by audiometry) woud give many "i-hear-it-all" people a depression.

 

[Enkay25]

Chg: Operating systems Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 are not longer supported
(Microsoft discontinued vendor signing)

Any changelog for the new driver? @JohnYang1997

 

[aandres_gm]

The latest driver 5.20 does not install on win 8.1

Why are you still on 8.1?

 

[hexxpunk]

@JohnYang1997 Can you tell us a little about how upsampling interacts with the internal filters? For instance, if I feed the DAC upsampled audio at 768kHz, does it still go through the user selectable 8x FIR Filter? Or does it bypass that stage, meaning that it wouldn't matter which of the 7 FIR filters I chose since it would get fed directly into the IIR filter?

 

[OB Ron]

I sent a message to Topping ([email protected] & [email protected]) more than a week ago regarding the D90SE, and have not received a reply. I'm hoping some members here can chime in to support my questions and request, and encourage a constructive reply. I hope a firmware upgrade can provide the important feature I request.
Here's the message I sent:
"Dear Topping,

I'm considering purchasing a Topping D90SE DAC, however, it appears to not meet one of my minimum requirements -- which is a major disappointment since it seems to have everything else I want. So, I want to check with you, Topping, to see if I'm wrong, or perhaps it might be possible for Topping to improve the design to meet my requirements.

I see in the D90SE User Manual in Settings, item 11 Polarity Setting, however, I don't see any way to access this from the remote control, and the Settings Menu appears to only be accessible through a power cycle boot sequence. So it seems polarity is only a configuration setting, not available for change during play. Having polarity switching available from remote control during playback, along with an indicator on the display to show Normal or Inverted mode, is a MUST HAVE feature for me, and it should be for all audiophiles. There are lots of digital recordings, even MQA and TV/movies, that are in inverted polarity, and sound like poor recordings when played in normal polarity, but sound wonderful when inverted to play correctly.

Am I wrong about polarity switching not being available during play for testing polarity, correcting inverted polarity recordings and streams, and switching back to normal when that's needed?
If I am wrong, how can it be switched, and how is the mode shown on the display?
If I'm correct that it's not available now, can Topping add this highly important capability to the D90SE? Please, please, PLEASE!

Thanks for considering my questions and plea,
OB Ron"

 

[enricoclaudio]

Hi @JohnYang1997 . Got today my D90ES and I really love it. Makes my Bluesound NODE sound like a $5000 DAC However, I'm having an issue. I'm feeding the D90ES from the Coax out of the NODE. Sometimes, I get jumps with MQA tracks. I can see the D90ES screens flickering and losing sync. I'm controlling my music over Roon and I have no issues with other streamers or DACs. This kind of reminds me the Pro-Ject Pre Box S2 Digital which had issues playing MQA tracks which I returned. If there something I need to try or change on the settings? Looks like it's also happening with Optical input.

 

[JohnYang1997]

Hi @JohnYang1997 . Got today my D90ES and I really love it. Makes my Bluesound NODE sound like a $5000 DAC However, I'm having an issue. I'm feeding the D90ES from the Coax out of the NODE. Sometimes, I get jumps with MQA tracks. I can see the D90ES screens flickering and losing sync. I'm controlling my music over Roon and I have no issues with other streamers or DACs. This kind of reminds me the Pro-Ject Pre Box S2 Digital which had issues playing MQA tracks which I returned. If there something I need to try or change on the settings? Looks like it's also happening with Optical input.

Hi. May I have the exact model name for the"Bluesound NODE" you are using? I saw some 2i, some 2021 etc. This will help us reproduce then identify then fix the issue for later products. Also the model that you have that work with it is also very welcome and appreciated.

However this doesn't look like an issue that we can fix. Previously there are a few reports of incompatibility. However recently one reported with incompatibility with PS4. We only managed to get a PS4 pro as all other models we could get our hands on don't have spdif output. But the one we got works with D90se nicely. So we have not yet reproduced the issue. A couple of others are either solved by changing settings, or the machine is too difficult to find here.

Solution to you is going to be disappointing. But.... There doesn't seem to any way to solve it. So you may want to contact the seller and issue a refund. Thanks.

 

[enricoclaudio]

Hi. May I have the exact model name for the"Bluesound NODE" you are using? I saw some 2i, some 2021 etc. This will help us reproduce then identify then fix the issue for later products. Also the model that you have that work with it is also very welcome and appreciated.

However this doesn't look like an issue that we can fix. Previously there are a few reports of incompatibility. However recently one reported with incompatibility with PS4. We only managed to get a PS4 pro as all other models we could get our hands on don't have spdif output. But the one we got works with D90se nicely. So we have not yet reproduced the issue. A couple of others are either solved by changing settings, or the machine is too difficult to find here.

Solution to you is going to be disappointing. But.... There doesn't seem to any way to solve it. So you may want to contact the seller and issue a refund. Thanks.

John, mine is the newest Bluesound NODE (N130) 2021 model. Very disappointing to read about incompatibilities issues. I already contacted APOS Audio and asked for a RMA/Refund

 

[JohnYang1997]

John, mine is the newest Bluesound NODE (N130) 2021 model. Very disappointing to read about incompatibilities issues. I already contacted APOS Audio and asked for a RMA/Refund

By any chance, you have this in your setting?
I thought it was NAD only thing.
https://www.peachtreeaudio.com/pages/disabling-bluos-audio-clock-trim

 

[Eddy H.]

By any chance, you have this in your setting?
I thought it was NAD only thing.
https://www.peachtreeaudio.com/pages/disabling-bluos-audio-clock-trim

 

[Eddy H.]

I had to turn the option for the Node 2i to adjust the play back/jitter off because it was causing the DAC to studder during streaming. Also I noticed that during MQA tracks I can't change the filters. Anyone else notice this?

 

[Eddy H.]

Well, there we are again at the point where no consensus is possible - because no one can say what the other one hears = what his brain "tells" him. That said, when two DACs sound far apart, are AFAIK a) one of them is seriously broken (technically or by design), b) one is louder than the other (the louder one wins).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bias
Ceterum censeo: your bias is as good as mine, and vice versa. Everybody is biased all the time.
That's why measurements beat subjective impressions.

BTW: Getting the ears checked (not just by otoscopy but by audiometry) woud give many "i-hear-it-all" people a depression.

How many dacs do you have on hand may I ask?

 

[Marc v E]

By any chance, you have this in your setting?
I thought it was NAD only thing.
https://www.peachtreeaudio.com/pages/disabling-bluos-audio-clock-trim

It is NAD only. Bluesound node is from NAD.

 

[JohnYang1997]

It is NAD only. Bluesound node is from NAD.

Oh ok. Thanks for the information.

 

[enricoclaudio]

Mine doesn’t have that option:

 

[JohnYang1997]

Mine doesn’t have that option:

View attachment 147434

Sorry can't make it work.

 

[JohnYang1997]

It is really confusing situation as this one works with D30pro which uses CS8416 which was tested by us to be confirmed having worse compatibility than LC89091 used in D90se. https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/bluesound-node-review-streamer.25578/
Maybe I'll let Amir know and ask him to test it with D90se. If this one works then maybe it's the other model's issue(this one is cheaper I afaik). It's still a bit early. I'll report back if we find anything.