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How do you like your Topping D30 DAC?

I had only used my Macbook inbuilt DAC for music before and as soon as th D30 was connected - massive difference - the music sounded fatter and more organic, less less "digital" than I ever remember digitally-sourced music sounding!

Get or build a better powersupply tho - the supplied ones fall apart or die.
 
I like it. I ordered and sent back a Cambridge Audio DACmagic because I preferred the D30. But then I got a Parasound DAC-1100HD and prefer the Para; it's just slightly warmer than the D30. The D30 is really a great little DAC and it will stay in my secondary system.
 
Overall, I'm pleased with how the D30 sounds. I'm certain there are better DACs out there, but not for this price.

I am not pleased with the power supply that ships with it. As mentioned by slimecity, it's not quality at all.

One more test tonight, I'm hooking up an Emotiva XDA-2 to compare the D30 to but can't A/B so unless the emotiva is just that much better I won't notice. :-)
 
OK, amateur testing complete. Short version:

Emotiva XDA-2 > Topping D30 > Hifiberry DAC+ Pro

Long version: I was able to A/B these on different inputs to my integrated amp. I realized the Hifiberry DIGI+ Pro is outputting a signal on both the COAX and Optical outs simultaneously.

Here's a shot of the setup:

0213191631_2.jpg

After an initial impression, I swapped the COAX and Optical inputs between the two DACs to make sure one cable was not better than the other and re-tested.

The Emotiva XDA-2 sounds better. Noticeable difference in soundstage width and slightly better bass impact.

Like the D30, the XDA-2 has no tone controls. The XDA-2 does have a volume control as it is a preamp as well. Following Emotiva's recommendation, I set the volume on the XDA-2 to 0.0db when using it as a DAC and plugged into the AUX input on the amp.

Combined with the power plug problems of the D30, I'm going to be sending it back.

* Flight of the cosmic hippo, The Nightfly and Tin Pan Alley were the test tracks.
 
Decided to give the D30 one last try, comparing USB vs Toslink inputs from two different RPIs and inadvertently ran into an issue that is just the nail in the coffin for this DAC at my house.

EDIT: did this same test with the Emotiva XDA-2 and that never made this sound.

This D30 makes a scratching pop whenever I switch between files with different sample rates. It does fine when all the source files are the same sample rate. In this video, I'm switching between two tracks of the same song, one at 44.1/16 and the other at 192/24. Gonna take a tweeter fuse out or worse someday. :)

 
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RobertCO said:
Decided to give the D30 one last try, comparing USB vs Toslink inputs from two different RPIs and inadvertently ran into an issue that is just the nail in the coffin for this DAC at my house.

EDIT: did this same test with the Emotiva XDA-2 and that never made this sound.

This D30 makes a scratching pop whenever I switch between sample rates. I does fine when all the source files are the same sample rate. In this video, I'm switching between two tracks of the same song, one at 44.1/16 and the other at 192/24. Gonna take a tweeter fuse out or worse someday. :)

Click to expand...
Believe it or not, I am experiencing a similar issue. Same pop/scratch when I turn my equipment on. Funny is that the $10 ELAC DAC never had this problem. I may also be looking into replacing the D30 with another DAC.
 
drabina said:
Believe it or not, I am experiencing a similar issue. Same pop/scratch when I turn my equipment on. Funny is that the $10 ELAC DAC never had this problem. I may also be looking into replacing the D30 with another DAC.
Click to expand...

I've experienced no issues when switching between sampling rate, or bit depths. My signal path: Logitech Media Server - Allo Digione Player (BNC SPDIF output) - Topping D30.

I like my D30. As always YMMV.

-Dave
 
Well the mailman delivered a D30 DAC I had ordered from Amazon Australia today. It's for the bedroom where I have an old desktop that I put Win XP and a load of MP3 and Flac files on, with a Yamaha stereo receiver and a pair of Magnavox 6" twin cone speakers that I found in the hard rubbish. Not having ever set up a DAC before I watched the video file over and over and eventually it sunk in. So now I think I have it set up properly, not sure I understand why it shows you must have the volume settings on max, does it affect the sound quality?

Thankfully it worked first time after I ditched the poor quality power plug converter for a decent one I had here. I got Foobar2000 setup and its basic but works fine for what I want.

Now down to the listening, everything it much clearer, smoother and cleaner than with the computer output, not sure I can tell much difference between MP3's with 192+ bitrates and FLAC files though but considering my speakers originally came with a cheap stereo it's no wonder. I just realized I should take my AD700 headphones in there for a proper listen.

Overall though out of the box and besides it coming with a cheap adapter plug it works and sounds great, huge step up from the onboard sound card, having loads of music on the old desktop is a boon.
 
I just got a D30 of Amazon yesterday as well (funny a lot of new D30 owners here). I'm mainly streaming Spotify premium through USB, going to a Sony GX40ES amp to Acoustic Research TSW-210 speakers. It's not a huge difference from the DAC built into my PC's motherboard. Granted, I have a gaming PC, so the sound card is likely better than your average integrated PC sound. It's some Realtek HD audio something-or-other. I did extensive comparing and found that the D30 certainly has more output (louder signal), is slightly brighter sounding, and maybe crisper / better defined instruments. It was not a revelation, as I was expecting, and I'm a bit on the fence as to whether it's worth $130. I read an analogy in a Crutchfield catalog that said adding a DAC is like cleaning a window with Windex: you could still see through the window before, but the Windex sharpened the image. I feel that's a good analogy.

I have a Sony C85ES cd changer (1990) with a optical digital-out. I'll do a comparison between the internal DAC and the D30 and report back.
 
JumboMumbo said:
I read an analogy in a Crutchfield catalog that said adding a DAC is like cleaning a window with Windex: you could still see through the window before, but the Windex sharpened the image. I feel that's a good analogy.
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I have the same Crutchfield catalog :-) Unfortunately, my D30 did not do the Windex miracle in my system. The biggest difference in sound was when I have upgraded speakers. Since then, nothing really changed the sound as much (amps, sources, cables, etc).
 
JumboMumbo said:
I have a gaming PC, so the sound card is likely better than your average integrated PC sound. It's some Realtek HD audio something-or-other.
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Exactly what I have Realtek HD, what are you using as a playback program? I'm using Foobar2000, and it took me a while to set all the correct drivers in it, this is apparently the key to getting all the benefits on the DAC, there's another one called JRiver which I've never seen as well.

Others may correct me if I'm wrong but after reading up on other sites if you simply install your DAC and use Windows Media Player or even Foobar2000 without installing the proper drivers for your DAC in the playback program there will be next to no difference as Windows down samples the sound.

The drivers should be in a separate folder mine were in "FB2K DSD Components".
 
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HypnoToad said:
Exactly what I have Realtek HD, what are you using as a playback program? I'm using Foobar2000, and it took me a while to set all the correct drivers in it, this is apparently the key to getting all the benefits on the DAC, there's another one called JRiver which I've never seen as well.

Others may correct me if I'm wrong but after reading up on other sites if you simply install your DAC and use Windows Media Player or even Foobar2000 without installing the proper drivers for your DAC in the playback program there will be next to no difference as Windows down samples the sound.

The drivers should be in a separate folder mine were in "FB2K DSD Components".
Click to expand...

I'm using Spotify since I don't have a lot of music files on my hard drive, also I like the convenience of streaming. I installed the drivers from the manufacturers website to Windows 10, which was a bit of a pain since the drivers were made for Windows 7 and didn't have a proper security signature for Windows 10. So, I had to disable driver security signatures in Windows. I tried using the driver that Windows automatically installs for the unit when you plug it in, but the official drivers sounded noticeably better.

I tried out the D30 hooked up to my Sony C85ES via optical cable. The difference was barely noticeable. Maybe a testament to the quality of the Sony DAC. The D30 sounded slightly brighter, like somebody turned up the treble knob, and slightly louder.
 
Just wanted to update on my thoughts on the D30 since I have decided to return it. The major factor was that the company doesn't have Windows 10 approved drivers for the product. Previously I disabled driver security to be able to install the older drivers (not an ideal solution to begin with). It worked, great! However, last night Windows updated. This caused the driver to be unrecognized again, meaning I would have to disable driver security again and re-install it. I'm not going to go through this rigamarole every time Windows updates. This company obviously doesn't care about keeping their products/drivers up to date. Would rather get a DAC from a more reputable company. Furthermore, the sound quality increase was not worth $130 in my eyes, it was marginal at best.
 
JumboMumbo said:
Just wanted to update on my thoughts on the D30 since I have decided to return it. The major factor was that the company doesn't have Windows 10 approved drivers for the product. Previously I disabled driver security to be able to install the older drivers (not an ideal solution to begin with). It worked, great! However, last night Windows updated. This caused the driver to be unrecognized again, meaning I would have to disable driver security again and re-install it. I'm not going to go through this rigamarole every time Windows updates. This company obviously doesn't care about keeping their products/drivers up to date. Would rather get a DAC from a more reputable company. Furthermore, the sound quality increase was not worth $130 in my eyes, it was marginal at best.
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You should not need any drivers if your W10 has all updates. Microsoft rolled out UAC2 support some time ago and the majority of modern DACs are now plug and play.

Second Spotify app on Windowd sucks for quality playback. Get a Chromecast Audio device off Ebay and a Toslink cable with mini tip for the Chromecast side and connect the DAC directly to the Chromecast. You will need to use a phone or a tablet to start Spotify playback on Chromecast, then you can control it from the Windows app if that is what you normally use .
 
gvl said:
You should not need any drivers if your W10 has all updates. Microsoft rolled out UAC2 support some time ago and the majority of modern DACs are now plug and play.

Second Spotify app on Windowd sucks for quality playback. Get a Chromecast Audio device off Ebay and a Toslink cable with mini tip for the Chromecast side and connect the DAC directly to the Chromecast. You will need to use a phone or a tablet to start Spotify playback on Chromecast, then you can control it from the Windows app if that is what you normally use .
Click to expand...


I tried the plug n' play Windows drivers that automatically install. They had noticeably worse sound quality.
 
JumboMumbo said:
I tried the plug n' play Windows drivers that automatically install. They had noticeably worse sound quality.
Click to expand...

Sounds dubious. You should check how the sound device is configured in Windows, for Spotify use it needs to be set to 44.1kHz, max volume in both system and Spotify app. Disable volume normalization in Spotify settings and make sure Spotify is set to stream in the highest quality.
 
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