I just received my D90SE. Bought on Amazon from Aoshida Hi-Fi. Delivered in 4 days to US.
Replacing an old Mytek Brooklyn DAC+.
A bit of background. I had bought a Matrix Audio X-Pro year and a half ago. Subjectively, I felt the Mytek was better, but when I did a blind test, I could not tell a difference. So Matrix was returned.
Now, first impressions on the D90SE. It could be in my head, but it sounds way better than Mytek, feeling cleaner low and high end, and I can play louder without any subjective feeling of “compression.” I have the D90SE in 5volt preamp mode, mode 5 filter FR linear, driving a McIntosh MC462, which powers KEF R11s from 4 Ohm output taps.
Could this be a output impedance issue? Topping specifies 100ohm output impedance. My McIntosh has a 22kohm input impedance and 4.2 volt input sensitivity. Stereophile measured 20dB gain using the 4ohm output taps, which I’m using. Mytek supposed to have 50ohm output impedance and 6volt output at 0db. On paper, this should not be an issue.
Either way, D90SE sounds better in current setup. Or maybe it’s in my head and matter of expectations. I expected Matrix to sound better, but it didn’t; I expected Topping to sound the same, but it sounds better. Thinking of doing a blind test again.
Also, recently got a Schiit Modius, which subjectively is worse the both of these. But again, this could be in my head or an issue with the ability to drive the McIntosh.
View attachment 138980