[a-LeXx]

It seems you have the audiophile syndrome - Nothing's ever good enough for you

Why that, I even have shown my setup here - it‘s just a DFR for 170 Euro and a Fiio A5 for 120 Euro - and this combo, still under 300 Euro, sounds perfect to my ears. Why do you invent a ‚syndrom‘ if I neither prefer your low-cost, nore an unnecessary expensive overhyped solution?

 

[niron]

In a good way. We're always looking for the ultimate sound

 

[a-LeXx]

Yapp, sorry for our wallets But I seem to have it well under control in the recent years. The reason for my new search was unfortunatelly purelly sw-related. Spotify discontinued search function on older versions, and turned my galaxy s1 with a nice wolfson dac into a paperweight. So I had to start a new quest for an audiophile-quality transport/dac.... I'm done now so I think...

 

[MisterMudd]

Once again, I just wanted to express my absolute love for this device. A true Game Changer in my book!

 

[Chessblitzer2017]

Once again, I just wanted to express my absolute love for this device. A true Game Changer in my book!

What else do you have experience with for reference

 

[monsieurfromag3]

Nothing really special there. There is even no amp there, the AK chip used is a combination of a DAC with a standard around 30mW headphone amp that delivers around 1Vrms. Any iDevice has a similar one, many Android phones also do. The only difference is - ES100 uses 2 of them, and can drive many cans balanced. This gives it enough headroom to drive HD6xx. DFR can do the same job single ended, means it will not require a ballanced cable. HD6xx are very efficient, they don‘t really need power, but because of their 300Ohm they need a bit more voltage than a usual mobile device. 2Vrms are giving them enough headroom, and both ES100 and DFR can deliver those - one in a balanced mode, another single ended.

On an android phone ES100 cannot be better than DFR by definition when paired over BT. It‘s not because of BT, it‘s because when using BT, there is no way to bypass 48kHz upsampling and not that good audio subsystem of android. Even if in the BT developer settings you change the BT sampling rate to 44.1 from 48 kHz, an android phone would first upconvert everything to 48kHz, process it, and then downconvert to 44.1kHz.

This upconversion alone reduces the quality a bit, smearing the 3d imaging.

This issue is not present when an iDevice is used as a source.

On the other hand, ES100 doesn‘t reach the resolution of DFR, but still sounds very pleasing, as I said. My hope was to get a best semi-mobile SQ with it, I couldn‘t get that, that‘s why I returned my ES100. For a different purpose (like yours) it would be clearly better.

As I said, I was not looking for absolute mobility, but wanted to get a best semi-mobile sound out of the combo that can fit into my pocket when I‘m indoors in my house.

So, for now I found this to sound best to my ears after many a/b tests with a switch box (transport is ipod touch, it‘s permanently attached to this stack):

A dedicated amp is not necessarily better than one integrated with the DAC. My LG V30 and more and more high-quality mobile devices use Sabre’s new DAC/amp chips to great results, in the case of the V30 rivalling the Mojo technically. These amps are less powerful than what’s inside a Mojo of course, but with even high-end iems, or easier-to-drive but high-end full-size cans, the results are brilliant. My Final Audio PHVI sound better out of the V30 than out of the Mojo for me, and with not a hint of a hit in detail retrieval, tonal balance, or most of the other great strengths of the Mojo.

Are you sure about that BT up/downsample business? Even using UAPP to emit, does Android get its mittens on the sample rate? True question, I have no idea. I know UAPP gives me more volume over BT, but as to quality I haven’t tested thoroughly, and never with the ES100.

I must admit I don’t find combo bricks like the one you show very elegant solutions, even for semi-mobile use, and also a bit outdated in the days of the ES100, Shanling M0 and LG phone-DAPs, but that’s just me, if you like the sound better that’s cool. I don’t like the DFR anymore, I find it stressful, the ES100 loses to it on pure resolution and retrieval but wins on musical enjoyment hands down as far as I’m concerned. And practicality of course.

I’m circumspect about your claims on the Mojo. I fully agree it’s not the be-all, end-all device it’s made out to be, I returned my own unit after a week of auditions as I found it dull. That said, if there’s one thing I don’t associate with the stuff Rob Watts designs, it’s “dirty tricks”. That intentional treble roll-off you suspect flies in the face of their entire ethos as liberally professed on these parts, and sure it’s part of their marketing effort but transparency is their exact point of differentiation on the market. A lot of music is mastered with treble roll-off though, because as you well say it’s more pleasant that way. If anything, to me the Mojo is a bit schoolboyish in its faithfulness to the signal. But then I’m a musicality over fidelity guy, which may explain why I like the ES100 more than you do.

 

[Rowethren]

Received my ES100 and my custom cable last week and am pretty happy with it! The buttons are a bit fiddly but it works very well, no problems syncing and sounds great with LDAC. No added hiss that I can hear. Overall very happy with the forza cable K10 and Es100 combination!

 

[Alphasoixante]

Received my ES100 and my custom cable last week and am pretty happy with it!

That looks great. I'm loving the sound of my es100 with my Final Audio E5000s + balanced cable.

May I ask where you got the custom cable made? I'm getting very tired of catching my cable on almost everything. Would love a short cable.

 

[Rowethren]

That looks great. I'm loving the sound of my es100 with my Final Audio E5000s + balanced cable.

May I ask where you got the custom cable made? I'm getting very tired of catching my cable on almost everything. Would love a short cable.

From a company called Forza Audio Works. I have used them before and they make some very nice cables. They are based in Poland and have pretty decent prices, communication can be a bit slow at times though.

 

[a-LeXx]

A dedicated amp is not necessarily better than one integrated with the DAC. My LG V30 and more and more high-quality mobile devices use Sabre’s new DAC/amp chips to great results, in the case of the V30 rivalling the Mojo technically. These amps are less powerful than what’s inside a Mojo of course, but with even high-end iems, or easier-to-drive but high-end full-size cans, the results are brilliant. My Final Audio PHVI sound better out of the V30 than out of the Mojo for me, and with not a hint of a hit in detail retrieval, tonal balance, or most of the other great strengths of the Mojo.

Are you sure about that BT up/downsample business? Even using UAPP to emit, does Android get its mittens on the sample rate? True question, I have no idea. I know UAPP gives me more volume over BT, but as to quality I haven’t tested thoroughly, and never with the ES100.

I must admit I don’t find combo bricks like the one you show very elegant solutions, even for semi-mobile use, and also a bit outdated in the days of the ES100, Shanling M0 and LG phone-DAPs, but that’s just me, if you like the sound better that’s cool. I don’t like the DFR anymore, I find it stressful, the ES100 loses to it on pure resolution and retrieval but wins on musical enjoyment hands down as far as I’m concerned. And practicality of course.

I’m circumspect about your claims on the Mojo. I fully agree it’s not the be-all, end-all device it’s made out to be, I returned my own unit after a week of auditions as I found it dull. That said, if there’s one thing I don’t associate with the stuff Rob Watts designs, it’s “dirty tricks”. That intentional treble roll-off you suspect flies in the face of their entire ethos as liberally professed on these parts, and sure it’s part of their marketing effort but transparency is their exact point of differentiation on the market. A lot of music is mastered with treble roll-off though, because as you well say it’s more pleasant that way. If anything, to me the Mojo is a bit schoolboyish in its faithfulness to the signal. But then I’m a musicality over fidelity guy, which may explain why I like the ES100 more than you do.

I agree with you, as actually I never said an integrated solution cannot sound as good as a descrete one. I only said, that most of those, including the AK chip in the ES100, are limited in power domain, mostly simply due to tiny size and very limited possible heat dissipation, that‘s all.

I actually like Sabre in the DFR a lot. AK in the ES100 is more close to the Wolfson DAC in it‘s relaxed presentation, and I actually loved the Wolfson DAC. Sabre is much closer to Cirrus Logic in the iDevices. But surprisingly, although being highly resolving, it is never annoying to me, I never hear sibilance from it. It is resolling and soft and warm sounding at the same time to my ears, with much better 3d-imaging than Cirrus DAC.

I was surprized by what I‘m hearing, so I asked my wife who has perfect hearing but no interest in the audiophile stuff (she is happy with average ear buds) to listen to my set up, while I‘ve been switching the sources for her. She picked the DFR as being best sounding every time, blindly, she found it even less sibilant than Wolfson DAC, although that one is much warmer sounding...

As to the size of the rig - I said earlier that I hate volume controls through buttons, I love my volume knobs. Apart from that, even for the ES100 I‘d need an amp, it wouldn‘t drive HD600 loud enough single-ended, and I‘m not going to spend a fortune on replacement balanced cables, they are rare and expensive in Germany

Regarding Android‘s upsampling - as I also said previously, I‘m doing most of my listening over Spotify premium nowadays. And there is no way, unless you root your phone, to force Spotify to output at native 44.1kHz instead of upconverting. The difference is very pronounced, that‘s a reason I had to get an ipod touch as transport. My Galaxy S didn‘t do that, it was one of those rare android devices operating at 44.1kHz...

And I must say, I do like the look and feel of my ‚brick‘. It feels competently and solid, and I don‘t care whether the thing in my pocket is 50g or 300g (that‘s my brick including transport/dac/amp) when I‘m doing household or am just relaxing in a chair, the cable of the hp is actually more annoying...

 

[monsieurfromag3]

I agree with you, as actually I never said an integrated solution cannot sound as good as a descrete one. I only said, that most of those, including the AK chip in the ES100, are limited in power domain, mostly simply due to tiny size and very limited possible heat dissipation, that‘s all.

I actually like Sabre in the DFR a lot. AK in the ES100 is more close to the Wolfson DAC in it‘s relaxed presentation, and I actually loved the Wolfson DAC. Sabre is much closer to Cirrus Logic in the iDevices. But surprisingly, although being highly resolving, it is never annoying to me, I never hear sibilance from it. It is resolling and soft and warm sounding at the same time to my ears, with much better 3d-imaging than Cirrus DAC.

I was surprized by what I‘m hearing, so I asked my wife who has perfect hearing but no interest in the audiophile stuff (she is happy with average ear buds) to listen to my set up, while I‘ve been switching the sources for her. She picked the DFR as being best sounding every time, blindly, she found it even less sibilant than Wolfson DAC, although that one is much warmer sounding...

As to the size of the rig - I said earlier that I hate volume controls through buttons, I love my volume knobs. Apart from that, even for the ES100 I‘d need an amp, it wouldn‘t drive HD600 loud enough single-ended, and I‘m not going to spend a fortune on replacement balanced cables, they are rare and expensive in Germany

Regarding Android‘s upsampling - as I also said previously, I‘m doing most of my listening over Spotify premium nowadays. And there is no way, unless you root your phone, to force Spotify to output at native 44.1kHz instead of upconverting. The difference is very pronounced, that‘s a reason I had to get an ipod touch as transport. My Galaxy S didn‘t do that, it was one of those rare android devices operating at 44.1kHz...

And I must say, I do like the look and feel of my ‚brick‘. It feels competently and solid, and I don‘t care whether the thing in my pocket is 50g or 300g (that‘s my brick including transport/dac/amp) when I‘m doing household or am just relaxing in a chair, the cable of the hp is actually more annoying...

In turn I actually agree with all of your points On the analysis of the DAC and amp sections and surprising lack of sibilance in the DFR, the importance of the physical interaction with volume control (I don't mind buttons but I too prefer a knob), also on the inherent limitations of the ES100's amplification power.

I hadn't noticed you listen through Spotify, so indeed UAPP is no help there sadly.

Lastly, I totally get how in certain situations the brick can feel nice and satisfying, many high-end DAPs are designed in such a way you wouldn't worry if your house was built out of them actually (most expensive construction material ever) and it can add to their appeal.
PS: I also love to run my audio gear by my wife, she certainly sets things straight sometimes - a few manufacturers could use her in their QA team, her views would blow their mind in ways they could definitely use to expand beyond the "wealthy rich male audiophile hobbyist" mindset they're stuck in sometimes

 

[a-LeXx]

After the blind tests with DFR, my wife told me, you are keeping this little thing I was very interested in her opinion, as she really has ‚golden‘ ears and can always explain what she is hearing in simple words and to the point.

 

[woye263s]

Do this company even offer warranty? My unit is now constantly dropping BT connection and when I looked up online, I couldn't find much about their warranty policy. Really sad because I only used this good sounding device only for 3 months..

 

[waynes world]

After the blind tests with DFR, my wife told me, you are keeping this little thing I was very interested in her opinion, as she really has ‚golden‘ ears and can always explain what she is hearing in simple words and to the point.

Just to be clear, by "this little thing", do you mean the ES100?

 

[FinnXIII]

Do this company even offer warranty? My unit is now constantly dropping BT connection and when I looked up online, I couldn't find much about their warranty policy. Really sad because I only used this good sounding device only for 3 months..

Hey, seems like I'm having the same problem with you. Does the device automatically turns off and requires you to press play/pause once button to turn it on again?