RME ADI-2 fs against Topping D90SE

To be honest, once you get to fiddle a bit with the RME unit's DSP, it became quite manageable - still complicated though but in many of the different formats on offer, the sound, to my ears, did not change significantly. What I did like was the ability to better integrate the sound with the room you were listening in. Great value

The Topping D90SE or LE is now $719. I got mine today and my previous comment holds on the complexity of the RME. I have 3 DACs and there is no chance I will remember the nuances of each DAC. I setup the Topping D90LE just now to the default filter #3 and VALVE mode. I am not looking at these settings again.

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i had them both in early/mid 2020, sold both within a month - was the d90 mqa model and the akm-chipped rme 

they sound similar, extended top, leanish mids, decent but somewhat nondescript bass, not much harmonic richness, i preferred a chord 2qute and then an ayre codex, then a schiit gumby to either, all more musical less overtly digital sounding

neither the topping nor the rme could image properly, narrow and shallow

rme is a good headphone amp though, and that manual gave no quarter to the old bellsouth yellow pages ...😂

Mine has the AKM chip (2 yrs old) and is much more 3Dish than the Topping. I believe AKM are back in business and have developed a new chip even better than the previous but again the technology is moving fast and I find differences in units very hard to distinguish until you get up the 'ladder' (with ladder technology). The way we hear these things has a lot to do with what we integrate them with.