I bought this DAC/AMP to replace my Asus Xonar Essence ST because I needed the PCI slot that the sound card was taking up so I was looking to switch to an external solution. I was mainly looking around the 200-399$ range and considered stuff like O2 and even the Asus Xonar STU because I quite liked the sound of my Asus Xonar ST. Unfortunately, the STU was just a little out of my price range so I opted for the much cheaper Topping D3 since I had read good reviews of the Topping D2, its predecessor. The Topping D3 is not a terrible DAC/AMP, that's...

extremely clear and quite airy. does everything well with exception to bass. bass is very accurate, just isn't very impactful. that isn't to say it has no bass, it definitely has bass, just not suitable for bassheads.