My "subjective" experience with AKM vs ESS DAC chip "sound signature".

[hbcke]

I really do not understand peoples obsession about more khz than sound perspective. More khz doesnt mean you are getting a better sound. How many recordings at 1536khz? How many songs in captured in that way. Why are bits are so important?

 

[Mon44]

I think implementation is the most important thing. For example, the new DAC from Aune - S9c on ESS does not sound at all like Sabre.

 

[Brain Damage]

I think implementation is the most important thing. For example, the new DAC from Aune - S9c on ESS does not sound at all like Sabre.

I agree. I returned to my dragonfly black after about a year and a half. In that time I have listened to a couple of other ESS implementations, but predominantly moved away from Delta Signal chip based DACs favouring the R2R (RU6, EF400) and 1-Bit (RU7) sound. On returning to the dragonfly, it doesn't sound as bright and sharp on the highs as some other ESS implementations, yet still includes good details and timbre. Implementation is definitely more important IMHO.

 

[123peter]

In my opinion, it is difficult to compare ESS and AKM chips if we mean DAC/AMP combo devices.
How much of the sound difference is due to the DAC itself and how much is changed by the headphone AMP itself.
Any DAC comparisons make sense when they are only DACs or streamers and connected to our favorite one headphone amplifier with our favorite one headphones.

 

[jjazzy]

In my opinion, it is difficult to compare ESS and AKM chips if we mean DAC/AMP combo devices.
How much of the sound difference is due to the DAC itself and how much is changed by the headphone AMP itself.
Any DAC comparisons make sense when they are only DACs or streamers and connected to our favorite one headphone amplifier with our favorite one headphones.

In a situation where both are done very well, I most times always prefer the AKM version, there is some smoothness , musicallity in it, I mis in ESS.
And yes I have heared some very very expensive well done ess dacs, but most of the time it was smooth but the price for it costing details.

The akm well done is many times smooth, and still include the details.

I have a very well ess dac at home as well, some moments I like it with electronic music.

If it was only one time, but every tome ess implementations are less musical than akm versions. Does not mean a well done ess dacs are bad, it is a matter of taste. They are still very good.

 

[123peter]

There is an audio saying - "Only the chip itself does not sound good, even the more expensive ones - only its correct, well-thought-out implementation."

The latest models AKM 4499EX and the ESS9039 series, their decoding capabilities are far ahead of the currently available lossless music file formats, which cannot even be purchased at such high samples, not to mention streaming services. They must accelerate and at least equalize the capabilities of the latest chips.
This may not necessarily be a good comparison, but now, when 8K TVs are slowly becoming more affordable, and 4K TV has been a standard for many years - where are the TV programs broadcast by satellite in 4K?
I have a device ready to receive high-quality images, but the signal is mostly in FHD.

 

[Ghoostknight]

did someone tried DSD (upsampling or native files) with AKM vs ESS ? i read somewhere that AKM can basicly run in NOS mode with DSD where ESS still applies some filters

 

[SWIN]

Following an absolutely outstanding review on the ASR site, just out of curiosity I bought an ESS DAC equipped with ES9038 PRO chip.

I have since tried that DAC on many different types of amplification, headphone and loudspeaker combinations.
Headphones - the old AKG 340, the nice and mellow Sennheiser HD 600, the open and clear Beyerdynamic DT 990 pro just to name a few.
Amplification - tubed, AV recivers, dedicated amps and so on.
Loudspeakers- from smaller B&W, to big old JBL L7.

But I have yet to find one that you can listen to it for any length of time, say over a minute.

And I have tried to disconnect the tweeters, used different types of equalizers both software and digital hardware, cables and what not.

Still to bright an abrasive.

All the measurements on the DAC is superb, no distortion at all, everything is fantastic, but I can not listen to it or even stay in the same room.
I have read that most people can not hear any difference in different DACs, let alone different DAC chips, but to me the differences are very glaringly obvious.

My conclusion is that modern DACs, and especially from ESS are not made for humans.
But to measure perfectly.

And that most if not all reviews are fake or made by nearly deaf people.

So the next step forward is to make DACs that users can listen to, and where they can really enjoy their favorite music.

 

[KSB1978]

I feel this is an overstatement, but I kind of get what you mean.
In a true essence of the word, if the music was completely reproduced in a way that is totally distortionless, it shouldn't be this way... But something in these ESS DACs make them somehow very treble forward and fatiguing. I find them unbearable unless on some of the very limited implementations around... Like the original dragonfly and a couple of others.

 

[jjazzy]

Following an absolutely outstanding review on the ASR site, just out of curiosity I bought an ESS DAC equipped with ES9038 PRO chip.

I have since tried that DAC on many different types of amplification, headphone and loudspeaker combinations.
Headphones - the old AKG 340, the nice and mellow Sennheiser HD 600, the open and clear Beyerdynamic DT 990 pro just to name a few.
Amplification - tubed, AV recivers, dedicated amps and so on.
Loudspeakers- from smaller B&W, to big old JBL L7.

But I have yet to find one that you can listen to it for any length of time, say over a minute.

And I have tried to disconnect the tweeters, used different types of equalizers both software and digital hardware, cables and what not.

Still to bright an abrasive.

All the measurements on the DAC is superb, no distortion at all, everything is fantastic, but I can not listen to it or even stay in the same room.
I have read that most people can not hear any difference in different DACs, let alone different DAC chips, but to me the differences are very glaringly obvious.

My conclusion is that modern DACs, and especially from ESS are not made for humans.
But to measure perfectly.

And that most if not all reviews are fake or made by nearly deaf people.

So the next step forward is to make DACs that users can listen to, and where they can really enjoy their favorite music.

I understand completely what you are saying... first I thought I was crazy, because you read and hear so many times that it is the dac chip itself and everything around it matters. But everytime I went auditing dacs or dac-amps, that sounded harsh and irritating to me, everytime it was a ESS dac chips.

I have no idea how the ESS dac works, but I never have those issues with any dac that contain AKM dac chips, a little bit with Cirrus Logic, and never with Chord dacs or r2r dacs. People can say whatever they want, but I hear it right away if it is a ESS dac, either right away or because I get annoyed by the sound very fast while listening.

Some brands are good at trying to squeeze the best out of the ESS, but now you see more and more brand returning back to AKM, ESS was more of a necessity, because of the burned down factory. I am not saying ESS is awfull or crap, but they are no AKM an certainly a decent FPGA dac

with ESS, 10, maybe 15 minutes fatique kickes in... and I stop the music.

With a decent AKM dac or a very good FPGA Dac like chord's (mojo2, tt2+mscaler) I can listen to it for hours

 

[123peter]

For many years I was a big fan of AKM chips.
And since my last sound sources in recent years have been DAPs
I can say one thing - DAC chips themselves "don't play music". The chip is just one element of the path and what matters is how they were implemented in a given device/equipment.
Remember that Astell&Kern presented the SE200 model with AKM and ESS chips some time ago - 1x AK4499EQ + 2x ES9068AS.
Switching between chips was very easy and the comparison concerned one device.
Yes, I heard these subtle differences in warmth and velvetiness in AKM and analyticality and detail in ESS - but it's an old model and a lot has changed.
Currently, in my opinion, it is difficult to compare, for example, a DAP with ESS to a stationary device with AKM and vice versa.
If the sound is different, is it the merit or fault of the Chips themselves or the power supply amplification path... other elements of the device itself.
I do not deny that someone has a sensitive ear and that the differences can be heard by them, but for comparison in tests with colleagues to demonstrate this, there would have to be similar models with only a difference in the chips inside.

I recently managed to join the Qobuz family (it is not available in my country) and I will say one thing that it was an impressive change compared to Tidal, Apple Music or even my own dense files.
So my previous assessments of which chip AKM or ESS were unreliable? because now I hear my playlists in a different sound dimension with Qobuz.

It is difficult to be a fan of good playing, how much more is ahead of us to compare and discover.

 

[Loftprojection]

XD05 owners that have bought the three chips (ESS, AKM and ROHM) can certainly provide quite good feedback because they are using the exact same amp and components when they switch between DAC chips. Hopefully soon XDuoo will release an R2R DAC to fit their device and we'll have almost the whole range. From what I've read in the owner thread there are quite a few differences between the 3 chips. I myself am a R2R NOS DAC lover, don't love the sound of oversampling DACs very much, some sound good at first but they all have some kind of digitally processed twist to the sound that I don't like very much, at least compared to my NOS DAC.

 

[jjazzy]

For many years I was a big fan of AKM chips.
And since my last sound sources in recent years have been DAPs
I can say one thing - DAC chips themselves "don't play music". The chip is just one element of the path and what matters is how they were implemented in a given device/equipment.
Remember that Astell&Kern presented the SE200 model with AKM and ESS chips some time ago - 1x AK4499EQ + 2x ES9068AS.
Switching between chips was very easy and the comparison concerned one device.
Yes, I heard these subtle differences in warmth and velvetiness in AKM and analyticality and detail in ESS - but it's an old model and a lot has changed.
Currently, in my opinion, it is difficult to compare, for example, a DAP with ESS to a stationary device with AKM and vice versa.
If the sound is different, is it the merit or fault of the Chips themselves or the power supply amplification path... other elements of the device itself.
I do not deny that someone has a sensitive ear and that the differences can be heard by them, but for comparison in tests with colleagues to demonstrate this, there would have to be similar models with only a difference in the chips inside.

I recently managed to join the Qobuz family (it is not available in my country) and I will say one thing that it was an impressive change compared to Tidal, Apple Music or even my own dense files.
So my previous assessments of which chip AKM or ESS were unreliable? because now I hear my playlists in a different sound dimension with Qobuz.

It is difficult to be a fan of good playing, how much more is ahead of us to compare and discover.

Even the newer ess9038 en 39 have that too clinical sound, and some brands are good at taking away that fatiqueing effect. But it you compare it to a wel done akm4499, the akm still sound beter.

But at the end of the day I still prefer my mojo2+poly or my tt2+mscaler or my fpga psaudio fpga dac.

Maybe will pick up a astell sp3000 with akm4499, which sounds amazing.

 

[Brain Damage]

With a decent AKM dac or a very good FPGA Dac like chord's (mojo2, tt2+mscaler) I can listen to it for hours

Ditto with a decent R2R DAC (Cayin RU6 & HiFiMAN EF400) and 1-Bit DAC (Cayin RU7). All of the ESS DACs I have experienced do not come close IMHO. They are too clean with treble glare and artificial sounding hence the listening fatigue. This is why I treat Audioscience reviews of DACs & amps with a pinch of salt. It's certainly been proven that it's not ALL about numbers & statistics.

 

[harry501501]

Following an absolutely outstanding review on the ASR site, just out of curiosity I bought an ESS DAC equipped with ES9038 PRO chip.

I have since tried that DAC on many different types of amplification, headphone and loudspeaker combinations.
Headphones - the old AKG 340, the nice and mellow Sennheiser HD 600, the open and clear Beyerdynamic DT 990 pro just to name a few.
Amplification - tubed, AV recivers, dedicated amps and so on.
Loudspeakers- from smaller B&W, to big old JBL L7.

But I have yet to find one that you can listen to it for any length of time, say over a minute.

And I have tried to disconnect the tweeters, used different types of equalizers both software and digital hardware, cables and what not.

Still to bright an abrasive.

All the measurements on the DAC is superb, no distortion at all, everything is fantastic, but I can not listen to it or even stay in the same room.
I have read that most people can not hear any difference in different DACs, let alone different DAC chips, but to me the differences are very glaringly obvious.

My conclusion is that modern DACs, and especially from ESS are not made for humans.
But to measure perfectly.

And that most if not all reviews are fake or made by nearly deaf people.

So the next step forward is to make DACs that users can listen to, and where they can really enjoy their favorite music.

Bit of an exaggeration lol. By your logic all of those positive reviews, of all the different DAPs and standalone DACs from multiple brands that use ESS chips in specific models.. are all from "nearly deaf people" or a grand conspiracy of reviewers giving fake reviews? C'mon, that's ridiculous... and you're basing that on a single model you've tried?

From my experience there's a different 'flavour' of sound from the AKM and ESS chips I've used in many different models over the years, but I've liked both and it's allowed me to enjoy many different headphones and IEMs, depending on how they match. Thicker sounding headphones I've enjoyed pairing with ESS chips as they've helped to open up the sound, bright sounding headphones I've enjoyed pairing with AKM as they smoothen it out. I've also had a DAP with an ESS chip that's beautifully balanced, no sharpness, buttery smooth.

My preference is AKM, but that's just me. I like that velvety sound, suits my sound preference. I can understand though why people might dislike these chips too... they may sound overly coloured to those individuals. It all depends on the model, pairings and most importantly... sound preferences of the listener.