Which DAC measurements do you like to see next?

[duo8]

I measured one of the lower end ones and indeed, it did not do too well: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...of-shozy-alien-digital-audio-player-dap.2058/

That said, love to measure some of the other ones.

You could try some of the other, more popular lower end ones, would be nice if they turned out to be decent. The Benjie T6 is worth testing, $60 and uses a CS codec chip (no fancy discreet dac+amp).
Or you could be the first to ever measure a Sony DAP.

EDIT: WM1Z was measured at least: https://www.0db.co.kr/xe/index.php?mid=REVIEW_0DB&category=183&document_srl=91538
And the AK240: https://www.0db.co.kr/xe/index.php?mid=REVIEW_0DB&category=183&document_srl=1270

 

[ManglerFi]

Any plans at looking at the panda stack gear from SMSL? Any plans to measure any of the Fiio stuff? Or did I miss this stuff being in the pipeline/measured already? I think it would be nice to see how some of the other cheaper Chinese brands stack up against what has been measured so far. Thanks for all your work.

 

[amirm]

I have some Fiio products in the pipeline (click on the link in my signature).

On the Panda stack, is it worth $600? I tend to get cagey with Chinese stuff when they get up in price.

 

[ManglerFi]

Yeah, the whole stack is a bit much. Not sure if you would be able to just get the DAC and/or the amp unit, not worrying about the LPS, would be an option? Last I looked, which was a while ago, I thought the DAC was around $125 or so on amazon, not sure if I remember that correctly though. Just a suggestion, if it's not in the cards so be it.

Edit:
Had forgot where that TODO list was. I do see some SMSL stuff on there, that would placate me on their stuff for now. I was just wondering how some different companies stuff was performing.

Thanks

 

[amirm]

Good deal.

 

[ManglerFi]

Just checked amazon and yeah that sanskrit pro DAC is $168, so a bit more then I was thinking.

 

[Leit]

Marantz HD-DAC1 would be interesting to see. Has nice "living room audio" feel to it by the looks. Would this be any possible for you @amirm ? It is a combined DAC & pre-amp unit.

 

[amirm]

I have gotten requests for it before. Alas, at $800, it is pretty expensive given my meager budget at the moment. It is also an older product.

Is there much buzz about it these days?

 

[Leit]

I have gotten requests for it before. Alas, at $800, it is pretty expensive given my meager budget at the moment. It is also an older product.

Is there much buzz about it these days?

Not that I know of. I do understand that reviewing products from 3-5 years of now is not too relevant any more as buying a newer, well performing product is better thing to do. And yes, $800 is quite a lot of money.

I found one review article by "audiovideohd" from France. http://www.audiovideohd.fr/tests/381-Marantz-HD-DAC1-2.html Their measurements are done with Rightmark Audio Analyzer. Can you see anything good/decent? Are these even any comparable to yours with Audio Precision?

 

[Dro]

RMAA depends a lot of the quality of the recording device. Assuming the recording device is any good, then the Marantz does not measure that well.

 

[amirm]

RMAA depends a lot of the quality of the recording device. Assuming the recording device is any good, then the Marantz does not measure that well.

Yeh, it is definitely not competitive. There is so much noise/idle tones in there:

None of those before the 1 kHz tone should be there. A blip or two around power supply frequency at lower levels would have been OK but not so many spikes.

 

[hvbias]

Berkeley Alpha DAC2

@Rene ?

 

[garbulky]

@amirm I've heard anecdotal reports of how impulse, timing, phase response differ between multibit and delta sigma. Do you have a way of measurably testing if this is true or not in these aspects? I'm wondering what tests can be run regarding these aspects of the signal?

 

[amirm]

@amirm I've heard anecdotal reports of how impulse, timing, phase response differ between multibit and delta sigma. Do you have a way of measurably testing if this is true or not in these aspects? I'm wondering what tests can be run regarding these aspects of the signal?

Sure. I can do some testing when I go after Schiit Modi 2 three-way battle.

 

[gvl]

I would think that the difference in impulse/timing/phase would be a function of the used filters and not much dependent on the actual DAC chip architecture.

 

[Dro]

Yes, impulse response is a result of frequency and phase response, which is defined by the filter. Assuming the DAC part itself generates correct output.

 

[duo8]

Would you consider measuring some USB-C to 3.5 adapters?
With the recent trend of headphone-jack-less, people have been looking for good adapters. It seems the pixel 2 adapter does quite well (for its $9 price).
These devices are small and usually use a one chip solution for the dac+headphone anp. So this might be one of those times when you can judge a device based on its components.
AFAIK there are 5 popular ones out there: Pixel 2 adapter (alc4021), generic realtek (alc4040), essential adapter (a conexant chip), HTC adapter (cs42l42) and razer adapter ("thx certified dac").
There are 2 "audiophile" adapters too: Musiland mu1 and hidizs sonata HD.

 

[DataX]

Would you consider measuring some USB-C to 3.5 adapters?
With the recent trend of headphone-jack-less, people have been looking for good adapters. It seems the pixel 2 adapter does quite well (for its $9 price).
These devices are small and usually use a one chip solution for the dac+headphone anp. So this might be one of those times when you can judge a device based on its components.
AFAIK there are 5 popular ones out there: Pixel 2 adapter (alc4021), generic realtek (alc4040), essential adapter (a conexant chip), HTC adapter (cs42l42) and razer adapter ("thx certified dac").
There are 2 "audiophile" adapters too: Musiland mu1 and hidizs sonata HD.

On a similar note (of headphone-jack-less phones), bluetooth headphone DAC/Amps such as the FiiO BTR1 are quite interesting. Not sure how those could be tested though, maybe with a 3.5mm to bluetooth transmitter (EarStudio ES100, Mpow), but then you're also testing the ADC of the transmitter. There's one SPDIF to bluetooth adapter that I'm aware of from TaoTronics: https://www.amazon.com/TaoTronics-Bluetooth-Transmitter-Receiver-Wireless/dp/B01KO1JNCA

Now that I'm thinking about it, how about testing digital-to-digital performance of that TaoTronics adapter @amirm? You could get a pair and do both SPDIF in and out.

 

[duo8]

On a similar note (of headphone-jack-less phones), bluetooth headphone DAC/Amps such as the FiiO BTR1 are quite interesting. Not sure how those could be tested though, maybe with a 3.5mm to bluetooth transmitter (EarStudio ES100, Mpow), but then you're also testing the ADC of the transmitter. There's one SPDIF to bluetooth adapter that I'm aware of from TaoTronics: https://www.amazon.com/TaoTronics-Bluetooth-Transmitter-Receiver-Wireless/dp/B01KO1JNCA

Now that I'm thinking about it, how about testing digital-to-digital performance of that TaoTronics adapter @amirm? You could get a pair and do both SPDIF in and out.

AFAIK bluetooth can't do lossless transmission yet.

 

[amirm]

Would you consider measuring some USB-C to 3.5 adapters?
With the recent trend of headphone-jack-less, people have been looking for good adapters. It seems the pixel 2 adapter does quite well (for its $9 price).
These devices are small and usually use a one chip solution for the dac+headphone anp. So this might be one of those times when you can judge a device based on its components.
AFAIK there are 5 popular ones out there: Pixel 2 adapter (alc4021), generic realtek (alc4040), essential adapter (a conexant chip), HTC adapter (cs42l42) and razer adapter ("thx certified dac").
There are 2 "audiophile" adapters too: Musiland mu1 and hidizs sonata HD.

Yes, I am interested in this category. I have been loaned the pixel 2 adapter cable so plan to test it.

I takes me longer to get motivated to do tests of this types since I have to use my phone, different audio playback, etc. which makes it hard to run tests.