XLR with volume control

[TerryTown]

Thanks for all the replies everyone.

A manual UAC1 toggle is required to make the DAC compatible with the PS5 and Nintendo Switch.

Ok, that sounds like the answer! So that sounds like if I just plugged everything in and turned everything on the ZH3 would start up in UAC 2.0 because it's plugged into a Mac. From what said it sounds like it defaults to UAC 2.0 and it has to be switched manually into UAC 1.0. If that's how it works then we're golden, I just don't want to open the box before knowing in case it needs to be returned. Thanks for that answer.

A good choice would be the MOTU M4. I have used one extensively and it has good quality conversion, USB input up to 24 bit 192khz and a good digital volume control that has hard stops (ie: it doesn't just spin) that controls the XLR outputs. There is a review on this site. Good luck with your search!
Edit: If there is a need for UAC 1 for the usb (if you are using game machines etc) then I would recommend the Topping DX-1 ii, which adds full PEQ capabity to it.

Thanks Jeff. Coincidence that you mention an audio interface because this is part of a music room/studio. The gear is for my son actually and I believe he's already got an interface along with all the other gear he uses for recording. No one intends to use it for playing games as far as I know I've never seen him doing that in there.

From what I can read from the Fosi manual, you should be able to (with USB input and AUX output) switch UAC mode and have volume control, but not EQ (bass and treble tone control), for the XLR and RCA outputs.

Here is from the manual ...
(Note: PO mode means headphone output mode; LO mode means pure DAC mode with XLR/RCA line output; AUX mode means pre-amp mode with XLR/RCA line output).

Thank you for all that work NTK! I did see that in the manual and Fosi support said the same thing, what they didn't say though is what UAC mode will be if it's switched to AUX. Just not having access to the software toggle doesn't let me know what UAC mode it will be in when it goes to AUX. Does it stay in UAC 2.0 if I already set it there before switching to AUX?

You should plug in headphones to confirm UAC2 mode.

Then AUX mode will be at full resolution, as sent from source.

That really is all there is to it.

And note that in objective reality, going higher than 44.1/48kHz delivers n o audible benefit for playback anyway.

Good idea to check on it, but then I'd have to open it up and test it and if for some reason it didn't work as expected I'd have to return an open box and be less likely to get an RMA and shipping tag. Understood about the sampling rate john, it's more about bit depth in this case and playing back files as they were created rather than possibly losing some dynamics etc.

Not sure if it's because of this forum posting or no but I did get a reply from Fosi this morning around 6:00 am my time and they're looking into it. It'll take a couple days to get back on it but since they're ahead a day it's possible I could hear from them by the time it arrives anyway so all this hand wringing may be for naught.

This is a time crunch thing for me and if I need to go in another direction I need to do it soon. This is a half for me half for you thing I'm doing with my son. For me it's for leisure, for my son he needs the high bit rates and sampling for his studio. And this is something of a gift for both of us, one that I can afford if you know what I mean.

 

[john61ct]

> You should plug in headphones to confirm UAC2 mode

It lets you switch between UAC1 vs UAC2, you just can't be in those other modes even to just view the current setting.

It does not matter what the default is.

If you understand this, then what further Q do you have? AFAICT you are just wasting a lot of time overthinking, going round and round?

You should not need to return it unless it is actually broken!

 

[TerryTown]

And as it turns out it's actually broken. While I can confirm it functions as you would expect when inputting USB from a computer.... bit rates change according to the file and the app functions, and you can get volume control on XLR in AUX mode and full available bit range which was my main concern at the time.

So what's broken? Something in the DAC at the 6.3mm headphone output. Plugged in a pair of HD 600 phones. Worked fine at first. At one point while listening the audio suddenly started changing. Never heard this before but listening to a song I know well and for some reason there was no singing although you could hear the rest of the music albeit slightly changed. The longer I let it play the more the sound just collapsed into the center. Never heard this on any analog gear I've ever owned. To put it differently, at times the sound was EXTREMELY center focused, loss of some lower frequencies and for some reason the audible range where the voice is goes missing. Tried shutting down, pulling the phones and plugging back in thinking this may be due to improper insertion. Sometimes this approach worked other times not. Sometimes it would correct itself if I just powered down the device and powered back up without touching the HP plug, other times it doesn't fix it. So the ZH3 has a recommended impedance range including 300 ohms, which covers the HD 600s. I'm not familiar with how the unit is constructed but this isn't something on the analog side but rather something in the DAC that starts faltering in an odd way.