Man I am also working on my review for the M7, and my thoughts are exactly matching with yours. I am trying to give the DAP about 100-150 hours before I actually judge its sound performance.
Great Write-up mate!!

Thanks for the review.

Can you clarify on why you put M7 ahead of M17 in amplification they put
amplification as a con in your synthesis?

Idem for resolution.

I read that the cons of the M7 are still better than the M17 ???

Also you state 'It performs way beyond it's price range' but it did not perform much better than IBasso DX240 which is MUCH cheaper.

@BlueA ...
There are 2 aspects of amplification... Quantity... Which is power in mW or Watts... And... Quality... Such as: class A or AB or otherwise.
My comparison of M7 with M17 amplification is mainly on the quality part.

However, I put that as a con since present players are trending towards class A or class AB, a class AB grade amplification for $1249 can be expected. The Cayin N6ii E02 comes with class AB by default.

Finally, I havent tried DX240 hence cannot comment.

Also, would request tgat you go through the Facebook post, link of which I had shared in the review. That would give you clarity on why a con of M7 can be better than M17.

Just think about a common scenario where in a Mathis exam the average score is 80... Person A scored 75 and person B scored 68. Though person A score is below average... It is better than person B

Nice Review

Great review. Any specific thoughts on the EXT pairing ?

@gops2116 EXT pairs well with the M7. The way EXT can scale up with amplification... It can almost take the M7 to its limits.