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Review and Measurements of Topping D50 DAC

KaJ

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Been following this forum for a while and have been waiting for this review. While this looks like something I could pair with my Burson Soloist, it's unfortunate that it doesn't come with a quality power supply. I'd prefer not to plug it into my noisy USB ports of my PC either.
 

astr0b0y

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Been following this forum for a while and have been waiting for this review. I have been looking for a quality DAC to pair with my Burson Soloist and this looks great. It's unfortunate that it doesn't come with a quality power supply.
From my interpretation of Amir's data, power supplied via USB appears to be only marginally worse than his lab supply so no need to worry about spending money on a PSU if you have a spare USB port.
 

RayDunzl

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Say hello to my new little friend!

Hello.

Why is your volume knob rotated fully counter-clockwise?

---

Ok, new functionality.

"Volume-Control Bypass – places one or both analog output buses in a calibrated fixed-gain mode"
 

L0rdGwyn

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Been following this forum for a while and have been waiting for this review. While this looks like something I could pair with my Burson Soloist, it's unfortunate that it doesn't come with a quality power supply. I'd prefer not to plug it into my noisy USB ports of my PC either.

Seconded. If anyone is able to recommend a quality switching (or linear) power supply at a reasonable price it would be appreciated :)
 

rebbiputzmaker

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Very entertaining review and comments. Good specifications. One issue though, shouldn't you test it via USB not just spdif as that is how most, if not all, will be using it. USB also will allow all resolutions to be available. The USB section may also give different test results.
 

dat yeti

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fitero

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Interesting. Thanks for the link. Do you have recommendations for the cables to attach to this, and an enclosure for it?

Athough I've "planned" to place them all in a single enclosure and make nice connection terminals I've been lazy and just plop them on the shelf, hiding most of their ugliness behind other gear. They all have a flat bottom, so with the addition of some stick on rubber feet, they are quite stable on the shelves.
I either cut off the lead from the tiny SMPS that comes with the unit that I want to power and use that, or I buy new leads from a local surplus electronics shop. For AC power, I again just select a suitable cord, cut the female end off, trim the wires and connect to the LPS.
 

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amirm

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ne issue though, shouldn't you test it via USB not just spdif as that is how most, if not all, will be using it. USB also will allow all resolutions to be available. The USB section may also give different test results.
Absolutely correct. I originally intended to measure both interfaces and then post but there is so much interest in this DAC that I decided to release the S/PDIF data since it is much faster to run and some of the tests only run in that domain.

To expand, my analyzer has built-in digital (S/PDIF and AES) generator. So if the device supports that input, the analyzer can be in control of generating the signal quickly and gathering the results.

With USB, the process is "asynchronous" and I have to fire off the player with the right signal and trigger the analyzer to run. Not all tests can be run this way and the process is much more tedious when they do.

The newer version of the analyzer can use USB sound card on the PC as the source but unfortunately requires ASIO interface which in turn requires new drivers to be installed. I do all of my testing with Windows built-in WASAPI interface so I don't have to install drivers.

Anyway, USB measurements to come. :)
 

Timbo2

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So looks like external power is mandatory. The unit will NOT power on with just the USB data cable. It comes with a USB to 5 volt barrel cable that you need to use to power it in addition to USB cable. When I use that with my laptop port, I get this:

Is that on USB 3.X or USB 2 USB port? USB 3.0 provides 0.9A - of course the device would have to identify itself as USB3.0 aware and operate with that amount of power...
 

DonH56

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Note charging ports are usually 1.5 A up to 5 A max though I do not think I have seen one over 3 A. I am tempted to buy a cell-phone charger and add an inline output filter.
 
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amirm

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Is that on USB 3.X or USB 2 USB port? USB 3.0 provides 0.9A - of course the device would have to identify itself as USB3.0 aware and operate with that amount of power...
My laptop has USB 3.0 but I am pretty sure the Topping does not.

I just measured the in-use current and it is 0.2 amps with the display shut off (which it does on its own) and 0.21 amps with the display on. So well below the asking spec for the power supply.

Idle power with nothing playing and display off drops to 0.17 amps or 170 milliamps.

So overall power consumption is pretty reasonable for a desktop DAC.
 

Timbo2

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My laptop has USB 3.0 but I am pretty sure the Topping does not.

I just measured the in-use current and it is 0.2 amps with the display shut off (which it does on its own) and 0.21 amps with the display on. So well below the asking spec for the power supply.

Idle power with nothing playing and display off drops to 0.17 amps or 170 milliamps.

So overall power consumption is pretty reasonable for a desktop DAC.

Thanks! That's odd - USB2.0 provides 0.5A so it would seem to have ample ability to power the device itself. I suppose you could plug the included USB power cord into a different USB port on the PC. I wonder if they wanted to force power and data to come from two different sources.
 
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amirm

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Thanks! That's odd - USB2.0 provides 0.5A so it would seem to have ample ability to power the device itself. I suppose you could plug the included USB power cord into a different USB port on the PC. I wonder if they wanted to force power and data to come from two different sources.
I think that is it. They are allowing people to use different power supplies without having to resort to making or buying special cables.
 
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amirm

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I am running USB tests as we speak. I thought I post them one at a time as I get them done.

I already post the jitter over USB. See: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...nts-of-topping-d50-dac.2403/page-2#post-68200

Here is the preliminary USB linearity performance:

Topping D50 DAC USB Linearity Measurement.png


Remarkably perfect! This is the deviation at every level that I tested in table form:

upload_2018-3-2_11-35-21.png


First column is the amplitude of the signal created in digital domain (in dBFS) and the second, is the measured value. The third is the computed difference.

As you see, it never drops below my threshold of 0.1 dB of error! Worst case is 0.039 dB of error and that is the combined value between my analyzer and the Topping D50!
 
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