Topping D50 D/A Converter. Worthwhile?

I love vinyl andveas happy with CDs, and figured I would never want to bother with ripping CDs playing files, having a computer deal with any of my audio programming. Then something happened. My CD collection including CD-Rs of boots and rare music hit way out of hand. Like you could not imagine. I had to get organized and get it in computer server so I could enjoy it and bring up things quickly. I was dragged into it kicking and screaming.

 

Listening to more titles in all formats, thus DAC appears to me to be musical with nice detail. Does not seem analytical or bright in a bad way.

Listened to Neil Young - “On The Beach” Pono download the other night with the D50. Beautiful thick and rich sound.

An old Jerry Butler Vee-Jay album “Need To Belong” on Collectables CD sounded smooth and nice to. Old recording, but pretty fabulous stereo sound here.

I’m so happy to get my digital playback to this level in all sample rates and DSD sounding really nice finally.

 

I'm glad you like it, I personally love mine. I had never had such a sound quality increase for so little money.

 

I’ve not tested the various filter settings yet. So dialed in to perfection I may get yet more out of this DAC than current settings show.

It’s a great looking box that stays out of the way, great sound, small footprint, sharp look, easy to read display.

Topping has served notice to other makers of finer DACs. The days of over-charging for a fancy exotic name are about over. And to not include DSD or dsf decoding on a DAC for personal “Audiophile” use is now considered unacceptable.

 

@quicksrt
I agree that Topping and other Chi-Fi options (SMSL, Gustard etc) have really done a great job of providing great sounding devices at a low price point. The term "giant slayer" is one that comes to mind.
However, I don't think there is a necessity to provide DSD support. The debates over PCM vs. DSD sound quality can go on and on, but as long as thing sounds good, a lot of folks will be happy playing PCM sources.

What surprises me most about these units is that there just isn't much in them. As technology moves forwards, fewer components are required as they tend to do more things. I am still a little in shock over the point that a XMOS USB receiver chip, low voltage ESS DAC chip and a couple of Op-Amps can sound so good.

If only these folks can get their acts together and make high quality active speakers at budget prices.

 

To me it is not PCM vs DSD at all. I just happen to have both formats on files and I want to be able to play them, and I really like bit transparent or bit perfect playing of the files, no conversions going on at all. That is just me I know, (some) others are fine with a lot of manipulation going on before the digital stream hits the speakers - I prefer to hear what it sounds like exactly as recorded bit for bit, for better or even worse.

Active speakers are great and have a place and purpose of course. A system of high-end separates does not seem the place for them imo. It’s for the sake reason an outboard DAC is most appealing.

 

Count me in, if a file is on PCM regardless of its resolution, or DSD I want the PCM file to be natively played as PCM by the D/A IC and the same for DSD, I want native DSD playing DSD. I've done plenty of DSD to 176.4/24 PCM with Weiss Saracon and even the outstanding job that Saracon does at converting DSD to PCM nothing beats native DSD. DSD files are not the most sold format I think what most of us play are DSD files coming from our SACD rips.
The Topping D50 is not only a low powered D/A converter as its rated power consumption is rated at 5 Volts and 1 Amp., it's super low powered. I recently got a USB multimeter that measures voltage, current and others and checking the Topping D50 playing a PCM file connected to an E C Technology 22400 mAh poweramp and the USB multimeter in the middle it actually draws around 450 mAh, curiously a bit less while playing DSD files around 460/465 mAh if memory serves me well.

 

So I just got the Topping D50s. (Perhaps this needs its own thread as it's a different product from the D50, but pretty close, I suspect.) Fairly easy setup with connections and driver download and configuring the audio device. But there must be another step I have to take as I am playing 24/96 files (through MediaMonkey) but the Topping LED shows 44.1kHz, not 96. Anything else I need to do in Windows, or the software to get to 24/96? Note: I am using, on this desktop computer, the dreaded Windows 8.

 

Follow-up to above: I changed the device's properties in the control panel so that in shared mode it is at 24/96. And the display on the Topping now says 96kHz. But then I played a track at 16/44.1, and it still said 96. Does that mean the computer is resampling to 96kHz? Ugh . . . How do I get it so that the computer plays the file in its original format and the device will indicate that? Thanks for any help!

 

What happens when DSD material is played I wonder? Does it at least display that format correctly?

I have the D50 btw.

 

It looks to me that you need to switch the audio output to exclusive instead of shared and this is something that needs to be configured in your player software. On Windows PC (assuming you are using a Windows OS) audio will always be directed to the system mixer and re-sampled unless you use the WASAPI or ASIO audio output options and exclusive mode.

 

This. ^^
Exclusive mode. Otherwise Windows is still mucking up your music.

 

Thanks lads and that was exactly right. I selected WASAPI audio output option in MediaMonkey, checked exclusive mode, and now have output at the file resolution.

Now here comes the hard part -- finding out if I can hear a difference . . .

 

I went through a similar trial and error process to SBurke when getting my D50 set up in foobar2000 a few weeks ago. No matter what I did it was converting DSD to PCM. After some trial and error I got it configured correctly and I have to say that DSD files sounded very different when being sent to the DAC at 24/176.4 PCM versus native DSD. In PCM the files sounded good but seemed to have an overemphasis on bass to the point of sounding boomy and even a bit muffled. Native DSD brought an immediate change to a crisp, well-balanced sound that I found to be much more pleasing overall. I didn't check to see if the DAC itself was applying any of its built in filters to PCM signals, but DSD native was a night and day difference from DSD converted to PCM. Another possibility is that foobar2000's DSD to PCM conversion implementation caused the difference.

 

The problems you hear are due to the DSD to PCM conversion that Foobar does using the SoX resampler. The SoX resampler sounds like that. It sounds like you how you described. The SoX resampler also sounds a like what you described when higher sampling rate PCM to lower sampling rate PCM, but to a lesser degree. The DSD to PCM conversion just makes it more obvious since SoX has to convert from a very high DSD rate down to PCM.

If you want to compare, try comparing a DSD to PCM conversion done using Weiss Saracon DSD to do the conversion and compare that to SoX doing the same conversion. I have compared a couple SACD DSD conversion using Weiss Saracon and SoX. The Weiss Saracon versions sound much better and sound like high res PCM. The SoX versions sound like mush in comparison with the bass problems and other problems you described.

Unfortunately, Weiss Saracon DSD is $2000. While SoX is free. It's difficult to justify a $2000 cost for a software based resampler unless you're a professional mastering engineer or professional studio.

 

This is very helpful information! I'm all set with my current hardware, but this helps me know what to expect (and why) in the future when using non-DSD DACs.

 

I'm not happy with the sound of the SoX DSD to PCM conversion. My current considerations are either Weiss Saracon DSD at $2000 (ouch!) or a Mutec MC-3+ USB Master Clock at $1200 that has a feature to convert from DSD to PCM. Unless I can find something else that can do a good conversion that I'm happy with. I haven't heard the Mutec MC-3+ yet. I'd have to demo and listen to its DSD to PCM conversion and decide if it's good enough for me (it could sound worse than SoX).

 

And that is why the DAC in the topic of this thread is such a winner for many of us, that native DSD decoding to analogue outs, we’re amazed! I mean most of us are.

 

You can put me firmly in the "D50 is a winner" column. I think it sounds great, enough so that it's encouraged me to finally go through the effort of ripping my SACDs. (Prepped a PS3 for this back in '12 or so, did some test discs, and never ripped the other 200+ I've accumulated over the years.) Next step is getting a MiniDSP UDIO-8 and two more D50s so I can play 5.1 SACD ISOs in native DSD.

 

See but that’s so cool, the timing of this DACs arrival, your setup prepped, and then now you move to that step in the process to enjoy the efforts of your work and efforts. It all pays off and it’s not too late at all.

 

If you're going that route you may want to buy the three D50s from the same manufacturing run. I don't know if Topping does secret running changes during a manufacturing run or makes secret changes between manufacturing runs. With the UDIO-8 style setup you want all three DACs to be the same. Same firmware in all internal components, same components inside. If your current D50 somehow ends up being somehow different from the two new D50s then you could end up with a system that drifts out of sync or even starts off out of sync.

 

What’s everyone think of the D70 though compared to the D50 while assuming we are NOT using XLR’s. Is the AKM4497 noticeably superior?

I’ve only heard the akm 4458 and 4490 and the 4490 seemed noticeably better than the 4458. How do these stack/rank against the ESS and cirius DACs that are in the topping D30/D50/D50s?

 

I'd really like someone to answer this too

 

I have exactly the same questions. Interested in the sound differences between D70 and the others!

 

And you know that how? How do you compare the orginal DSD vs the PCM produced by WS? WS is nothing more than an algorithm. There are software DSD to PCM and SRC solutions that can replicate the WS DSD to PCM algorithm and give you a choice of different algorithms as well and that do a considerably better job at SR conversion.

What does "better" mean? Does it mean the same to you as it does to me? This type of qualifications are meaningless and that is why measurements make much more sense.

Sure, as long as it's about you and your system. But then what's the point of discussion audio if there is no common denominator?

I hate to break it to you but there is no single DAC chip that can do both PCM and DSD without conversion.