Dac: Old vs New

@tonyjack I was in the same boat. I own an old but very respected dac and was curious as to how dac has progressed over the years. I bought the Topping d90se to try. Well received and measured really well. Well getting right to the point, it sucked. It has high details but low transparency. in a sense that it allows you to hear almost everything. But it doesn’t differentiate pitch and loudness very well. So even though you can hear more instruments, those instruments sounded similar to each other and one song sound similar to the next. A monotone presentation that got boring very quickly. Soundstage was meh. Air was meh. 

So yea the Topping was a disappointment. But I did like how vocals sounded on it though.

@tonyjack I’m actually selling my dac (Anedio D2) for a very good price. PM me if you want more details. Be warned that it makes a pop when turning off or turning on, you can avoid this by turning dac on before amp, and turning amp off before turning dac off. Or you can leave dac on 24/7

It’s a fantastic dac (also a pre-amp and headphone amp combo) and normally I wouldn’t sell but I bought a BMC amp and its potential is not fully realized unless I also buy a BMC dac to connect both product through the "Current-Injection" method.

If the Topping comparison was anything to go by, I don’t think there’s a new dac out there that can touch my Anedio D2 for under $500.

This dac was very special at the time it was released. John grandberg (project86) said it rival some Invictus dac at $8,000 or something. My memory is a little hazy but you can find more details when you search up d1/d2 reviews.