[DjBobby]

Thread to discuss all things about the SMSL M9 - Asynchronous DAC & Balanced Headphone Amplifier, made by ShuangMuSanLin Electronics Company based in Shenzhen, China.

Specs

• Manufactured by S.M.S.L.
• Chassis: CNC-machined aluminum
• Display: 1.44” color TFT LCD screen
• DAC chip: 2 x AKM AK4490EQ
• Digital receiving chip: CS8422
• Opamp: 2 x TI TPA6120A2
• Volume control: 2 x PGA2311
• USB audio interface: XMOS xCORE-200 with 3 low-noise oscillators
• PCM support up to 32 bit/768 kHz
• DSD support up to 22.5792 MHz (DSD512)
• Native DSD
• Fully balanced design
• Built-in ASRC (Asynchronous Sample Rate Convert)
• Outputs: 6.35mm headphone out, 2.5mm balanced out
• THD+N, DAC: 0.0004%
• THD+N, headphone amplifier: 0.001%
• Dynamic range (24 bit): 115 dB
• Compatibility: Windows 7/8/8.1/10, Mac OS X 10.6 and above

Official Website:
http://www.smsl-audio.com/productshow.asp?id=108

Massdrop:
https://www.massdrop.com/buy/76653

Unboxing:

 

[DjBobby]

SMSL M9 trades for typically US $445.99, with occasional drops down to $369.98. The latest Massdrop offer for unbeatable price of only $139.99, made many people ordering the M9 out of curiosity, myself included. Alone for the sake of having a dual AK4490EQ DAC for less than a third of the original price(!), is interesting in itself. The folks who are up to the balanced iems, may find this drop interesting as well.
Therefore I wanted to open the topic to exchange impressions, experiences and reviews of the M9.

 

[BrotherKathos]

SMSL M9 trades for typically US $445.99, with occasional drops down to $369.98. The latest Massdrop offer for unbeatable price of only $139.99, made many people ordering the M9 out of curiosity, myself included. Alone for the sake of having a dual AK4490EQ DAC for less than a third of the original price(!), is interesting in itself. The folks who are up to the balanced iems, may find this drop interesting as well.
Therefore I wanted to open the topic to exchange impressions, experiences and reviews of the M9.

Have you gotten your unit yet and had time to listen to it much?

 

[BrotherKathos]

I've been listening to the M9 for the last couple of days and I have a few initial impressions of it.

I like it, but it took a bit of tuning to get it where I wanted it. For reference I will disclose my entire setup so people will have a better idea. I'm getting usb from my pc that is first treated by an ifi idenfender 3 power/ground noise eliminator without external 5v ifi ipower(this is used on the M9 for ac/dc power) since I don't need the usb to power the dac. Then the signal is going through a 1.5 meter Pangea usb cable that is their lower tier cable ($25) on amazon. Then the signal goes to a Schiit EITR Usb to spdif converter and comes out of a 6 inch mogami 2964 75ohm cable to the M9. THen the audio is sent via mogami 2549 rca to the THX 789 amp. Headphones are brand new Sennheiser HD6XX using Fanmusic balanced cable.

When i first hooked it up I was initially underwhelmed. I had all the equipment above hooked up minus the ifi ipower on the M9 and the sound I was getting, while 'detailed' came off as too sharp and certain dynamic sections of song were a bit piercing and grating on my ears. I fiddled around with the internal oversampling features and the digital filters and still did not get much of an improvement. The internal up-sampling(ASRC) feature seemed to give the biggest improvement to smoothness. I fiddled around with the usb and even tried the ifi ipower on the usb line to see if there was any reason the eitr might improve the signal if there was a 'better powered' usb signal getting to it. This still did not take away the edge unfortunately.

I broke down last night and ordered another Schiit loki thinking I was just going to have to use it to tame the glaring highs with no other option. Then today I finally decided to just test the IFI ipower with the M9 instead of using its supplied power brick. I was aprehensive because the supplied power brick is a 5v 4amp unit and the ifi brick is only 5v/2a. I thougt there might have been an issue there so was reluctant. Then I was just like oh well just try it. I'm not using the M9 as a head amp anyway and never plan on it either. Just the dac portion can't use that much energy. Long story short, the ifi ipower fixed it. I've used them on other dacs like the D50 and modi 3 and did not really find it to make much of a difference in those specific applications.

This time however I have been very pleasantly surprised. The glare is as far as i can tell gone now. I can listen to the headphones at the same volumes as on my other setups with the D50 and modi multibit, and the sq might actually be a tick better as far as micro details go. Very hard to say for certain because I can't a/b them, but I'm very satisfied with this dac now. I'm now only looking forward to the loki for when I just want to play around a bit, instead of as a way to fix the system's sound. Who knows why the ipower smoothed things out so much, but I'm glad I got one to use with this system. Hopefully this helps others if they find their units a bit too 'bright' or 'glaring' at first listen. Maybe an LPS would work even better? The good thing is this unit when tamed by the right accompanying gear is an extremely well performing dac. Its by far the best price/performance dac I own at the $140 I paid for it on massdrop.

 

[DjBobby]

Have you gotten your unit yet and had time to listen to it much?

Not yet, DHL tracking says I will have it until end of the this week.

 

[newtophones07]

That is a pretty amazing price@$139.00, I wonder when 4499 devices will start showing up on the market

 

[BrotherKathos]

That is a pretty amazing price@$139.00, I wonder when 4499 devices will start showing up on the market

There are already a few out there, but I just don't remember which ones from memory. Its really hard to beat the performance perdollar spent of the massdrop M9 offer. Even with the $50 ipower you are still under total price you would pay for the Topping D50 on massdrop, and with the M9 you get a balanced hp amp included.

 

[DjBobby]

I've been listening to the M9 for the last couple of days and I have a few initial impressions of it.

I like it, but it took a bit of tuning to get it where I wanted it. For reference I will disclose my entire setup so people will have a better idea. I'm getting usb from my pc that is first treated by an ifi idenfender 3 power/ground noise eliminator without external 5v ifi ipower(this is used on the M9 for ac/dc power) since I don't need the usb to power the dac. Then the signal is going through a 1.5 meter Pangea usb cable that is their lower tier cable ($25) on amazon. Then the signal goes to a Schiit EITR Usb to spdif converter and comes out of a 6 inch mogami 2964 75ohm cable to the M9. THen the audio is sent via mogami 2549 rca to the THX 789 amp. Headphones are brand new Sennheiser HD6XX using Fanmusic balanced cable.

When i first hooked it up I was initially underwhelmed. I had all the equipment above hooked up minus the ifi ipower on the M9 and the sound I was getting, while 'detailed' came off as too sharp and certain dynamic sections of song were a bit piercing and grating on my ears. I fiddled around with the internal oversampling features and the digital filters and still did not get much of an improvement. The internal up-sampling(ASRC) feature seemed to give the biggest improvement to smoothness. I fiddled around with the usb and even tried the ifi ipower on the usb line to see if there was any reason the eitr might improve the signal if there was a 'better powered' usb signal getting to it. This still did not take away the edge unfortunately.

I broke down last night and ordered another Schiit loki thinking I was just going to have to use it to tame the glaring highs with no other option. Then today I finally decided to just test the IFI ipower with the M9 instead of using its supplied power brick. I was aprehensive because the supplied power brick is a 5v 4amp unit and the ifi brick is only 5v/2a. I thougt there might have been an issue there so was reluctant. Then I was just like oh well just try it. I'm not using the M9 as a head amp anyway and never plan on it either. Just the dac portion can't use that much energy. Long story short, the ifi ipower fixed it. I've used them on other dacs like the D50 and modi 3 and did not really find it to make much of a difference in those specific applications.

This time however I have been very pleasantly surprised. The glare is as far as i can tell gone now. I can listen to the headphones at the same volumes as on my other setups with the D50 and modi multibit, and the sq might actually be a tick better as far as micro details go. Very hard to say for certain because I can't a/b them, but I'm very satisfied with this dac now. I'm now only looking forward to the loki for when I just want to play around a bit, instead of as a way to fix the system's sound. Who knows why the ipower smoothed things out so much, but I'm glad I got one to use with this system. Hopefully this helps others if they find their units a bit too 'bright' or 'glaring' at first listen. Maybe an LPS would work even better? The good thing is this unit when tamed by the right accompanying gear is an extremely well performing dac. Its by far the best price/performance dac I own at the $140 I paid for it on massdrop.

How is the soundstage? How does it compare to the D50?

 

[BrotherKathos]

How is the soundstage? How does it compare to the D50?

The two are nearly identical in sound stage as far as I can tell without being able to directly a/b test. The D50 is warmer than the M9 to me. The M9 has a little too much zing to it in the upper mid-range and treble so it becomes shouty to me on some songs. This is especially apparent with bad recordings. After all the usb and power treatment however, the two dacs then become nearly identical as far as I remember with the M9 possibly taking a slight edge in overall quality? Maybe its just new toy syndrome? In any case I'm really liking it an am fully satisfied with the dac now. I hope you enjoy yours as well

 

[lacknothing]

Then the signal goes to a Schiit EITR Usb to spdif converter and comes out of a 6 inch mogami 2964 75ohm cable to the M9.

I for one would never ever consider to go the detour through SPDIF.

SPDIF is no bidirectional connection, thus no asynchrounus mode possible, thus the clock at the DA conversion - the one and only point in audio chain where it really counts - must be extracted from the digital signal and somehow "purified", witch in fact is the worst concept one can follow if there are other choices.
On top of that, the EITR punches its own jitter probems right into the audio signal, as one can see over there:
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...nts-of-schiit-eitr-usb-to-s-pdif-bridge.3753/

But on the other hand, if it works for you and within your specific setup, enjoy and forget what I've said.
Thanks for your nice and detailed review!

 

[lacknothing]

By the way, what is the sonic difference if you take out the EITR and go by USB into the M9 powered by the external 5V ifi ipower, compared to your current setup?

 

[BrotherKathos]

By the way, what is the sonic difference if you take out the EITR and go by USB into the M9 powered by the external 5V ifi ipower, compared to your current setup?

I've found that usb interfaces all sound worse than spdif and even toslink through testing on all my devices. Even using an emotiva big ego dac as a usb to toslink converter improved the sound of the Topping D50 which is one of the best measuring dacs on that audio-science site you linked. Measurements are a poor instrument to judge sound quality, as ears work much better. The M9 without EITR loses a slight definition in bass and the sound stage is compressed a bit as well. The glare is actually not much worse with or without EITR surprisingly, but still has the tiniest bit of an edge via straight usb. I would recommend the ipower as the first mod for the M9 over the EITR based on this.

 

[lacknothing]

I've found that usb interfaces all sound worse than spdif and even toslink through testing on all my devices.

Gave the detour over SPDIF a quick try, as I have a long time used and well known nuforce uDAC available that offers asynchronous USB mode as well as having SPDIF out.
https://www.optoma.com/ap-nuforce/product/μdac3/

So my setup was:

Laptop (powered from battery) > Intona USB isolator > nuforce uDAC USB to SPDIF conversion > Topping D50 SPDIF in (powered from battery followed by super regulator) > headphone amp

Though I did not totally fall in love with this setup compared to going straight into the D50 USB via the Intona USB isolator, I found that it has some merits in coherence and homogeneity of presentation, for me well worth to further investigate.

Thanks for kinda pushing me there!

 

[BrotherKathos]

Gave the detour over SPDIF a quick try, as I have a long time used and well known nuforce uDAC available that offers asynchronous USB mode as well as having SPDIF out.
https://www.optoma.com/ap-nuforce/product/μdac3/

So my setup was:

Laptop (powered from battery) > Intona USB isolator > nuforce uDAC USB to SPDIF conversion > Topping D50 SPDIF in (powered from battery followed by super regulator) > headphone amp

Though I did not totally fall in love with this setup compared to going straight into the D50 USB via the Intona USB isolator, I found that it has some merits in coherence and homogeneity of presentation, for me well worth to further investigate.

Thanks for kinda pushing me there!

I'm glad to see you found some improvements! I just got my loki eq today and well I'm glad I did. I listen to alot of Electronic music and the very slightest of sub bass bump is required imo to make the Senn HD6XX complete. I mean only a very very slight turn on the knob though. Around 12.30 on the bass and if I ever run into some super shrill recordings I can turn the treble knob a bit to tame them. Great little box the loki is!

 

[DjBobby]

New toy in da house.
My M9 just arrived, ice cold with condensation. I have to wait few hours until it settles to the room temperature before powering it up.