[DJJEZ]

Has anyone got a fairly accurate sizing measurement for the D90? Mine is stuck at Heathrow so won't be here for several days at least. I'm thinking of putting my Arcam rHead headphone amp on top of it to minimise the overall footprint. Also, is the D90 made well enough to have an item stacked on it?

My Arcam rHead is 19cm (W) x 12cm (L) x 4.5cm (H) so I'm hoping the D90 is a tiny bit bigger.

Yes you can stack things on it. Its not gonna break

 

[GeorgeA]

I’ve stacked an SMSL SP200 on top of my Topping D90.

 

[DJJEZ]

Got mine on top of my 887 currently but i had it other way around before. Just prefer the headphone cable on the bottom

 

[klyrish]

I ordered this last Thursday through Apos and it arrived about 2 hours ago. I cannot believe how fast it got here. It's hooked up and I've been feeding it both coaxial to start and now AES through my Matrix X-SPDIF 2 and am A/Bing it with my Onyx (originally fed AES, now coaxial) via my Gilmore Lite MK II, using Ether 2 headphones.

The DACs sound nearly identical. Even after switching the input on both. The D90 has a little more of a edge in the treble and slight increase to punchiness in bass, but otherwise they sound exactly the same. I can A/B very easily with the Gilmore's front source switch and since both DACs are using RCA outputs there's no worry about XLR on one or the other.

To say I'm disappointed would be an epic understatement. I know this DAC is still new and not "burned in" yet, nor is it likely fully warm since it was on an ice-cold delivery truck but still...I thought there would be SOME difference between these two, especially considering one is a NOS multibit DAC and the other is an OS D/S DAC.

Guess I can sell my Onyx, though...

 

[Quinto]

give it some time..

 

[Viper Necklampy]

It's been a little over a month since I got my Topping D90, which has exclusively fed my iFi Pro iCAN. I'm satisfied with it, other than:

• USB signal implementation is trash. The connection goes to sleep after a few seconds of no signal, causing an audible pop. (See page 2)
• USB power filtering is poor. I can hear noise with the USB cable plugged in. I don't care what any silly graphs state otherwise. It's audible to the point where I had to switch to optical.
• The display can't be turned off. I've had to put electrical tape over the display because I find it distracting when watching movies.

Considering this is one of the only DACs with the AK4499 chip, I'm willing to forgive its flaws. But it's a $700 DAC, and at that price point, I expected zero issues. Oh well.

Turns out you're one of my man, because i would use it only optical! What optical cable you use on it?
What do you think about sound then, It's great with Optical? (Until you'll try also with Usb maybe one day?) Thanks

 

[Taz777]

A slightly disappointing start to my Topping D90 journey. Ordered through Amazon UK and sold and shipped by Shenzhen Audio in China, one of the pins on the 3-pin mains power lead was broken! I couldn't find the broken pin in the box so it must have been packed like that. However, fortunately, I have a spare IEC 'kettle' style 3-pin UK mains cable that fits fine. I'm letting the unit get up to room temperature for a few hours before powering it up as it was ice cold when it was delivered to me this morning.

 

[Taz777]

So after a wobbly start with my new D90 due to a damaged power cord, I have it configured in DAC Only mode and have got it working on the I2S (IIS) interface with my Cayin N6ii DAP. I had to adjust a couple of the IIS settings:

Which resulted in this playback configuration:

I'm using the XLR outputs to my headphone amp.

A very quick test of the sound and I'm extremely happy with it, and also relieved that the IIS interface paired up correctly. I will also test out the USB interface to see if I can notice any difference in sound quality. However, as I understand things, the IIS interface should, in theory, provide the better quality digital stream.

 

[AudioQuality777]

just got my D90 in.

im running THX887 > D90 > Hifiman Arya

does anyone know which is the default filter?

By default, filter 3 is included in the D90.
I personally liked filter 1 more, which shows a more natural scene with an arrangement of musical instruments and also more density in the sound and more dynamics in the sound.

 

[Viper Necklampy]

By default, filter 3 is included in the D90.
I personally liked filter 1 more, which shows a more natural scene with an arrangement of musical instruments and also more density in the sound and more dynamics in the sound.

So, Filter 1 is sharp roll-off filter, which i guess is same or similiar as on D50 Ess, aka Linear phase fast roll-off; I find it the better sounding in D50 i have, much more precise, sound-stage coherent, clean, dynamic range, extended high-frequency..

 

[Taz777]

Topping D90 IIS-LVDS vs USB Interface Sound Quality

I've been doing a bit of testing of the sound quality on the I2S (IIS-LVDS) interface and the USB interface. I used exactly the same music app source (UAPP running on my Cayin N6ii DAP) and I played a set of three songs alternately using each interface a total of four times (= 12 songs per interface). I know the songs well so was looking out for presentation and detail.

The bottom line, to my ears, is this: the I2S interface on the Topping D90 sounds a little better than the USB interface. However, there is a difference in soundstage. The I2S interface sounded more 'in my head' than the USB interface. The USB interface was a little more laid back and further away in its presentation of the soundstage (which is something I do prefer generally).

However, in terms of resolution, clarity and detail of vocals and instruments, the I2S interface was slightly better. The downside of the I2S interface is that you may have to do a bit of menu configuration on the D90 to get it to work with your source. The USB interface was plug and play - I used an Android OTG dongle and a short printer-style USB cable and that combo worked perfectly. In terms of cabling for the I2S interface, I used a standard mini HDMI (DAP end) to HDMI cable (D90 end).

So, in summary, if you want a more laid back presentation with a soundstage that's in front of you then the USB interface may be to your liking. If you want a more 'in your head' presentation that is more vibrant, more forward, with a little more clarity and detail, then the I2S interface may be your preferred option.

 

[klyrish]

I've been doing a bit of testing of the sound quality on the I2S (IIS-LVDS) interface

You have to do anything special to get IIS working? I got an unused HDMI cable out and connected my D90 to my X-SPDIF 2 and the DAC screen shows 44.1KHz audio coming in but I hear nothing. I was previously using AES with no problem.

EDIT: I've changed the phase between the default standard and reverse and that made no difference. I also changed IIS DSDR to DATA (with both the phase regular and reversed) and it made no difference. The DAC is receiving a signal but not outputting anything.

It's also running in DAC mode (no preamp).

 

[Taz777]

You have to do anything special to get IIS working? I got an unused HDMI cable out and connected my D90 to my X-SPDIF 2 and the DAC screen shows 44.1KHz audio coming in but I hear nothing. I was previously using AES with no problem.

EDIT: I've changed the phase between the default standard and reverse and that made no difference. I also changed IIS DSDR to DATA (with both the phase regular and reversed) and it made no difference. The DAC is receiving a signal but not outputting anything.

It's also running in DAC mode (no preamp).

It's all a matter of luck! I am directly connecting my DAP to my D90 and the one setting that made a difference for me was the DSD flag setting (changed from 15 to 14, menu number 10). See my post #98 further up for a photo of what my settings look like - it may not work for you at all as your X-SPDIF 2 IIS pinout may be different to that on my Cayin N6ii. Also, I don't know whether you can damage your equipment by changing these settings so it's at your risk - my D90 display was going crazy when I had the wrong IIS settings! But it's working fine now. I think my HDMI cable is not a good quality one so I have another one on order (latest HDMI version and supports 4K TV signals which should mean it complies with the latest HDMI spec, so it should be fairly good quality).

Good luck if you get it working!

 

[klyrish]

It's all a matter of luck! I am directly connecting my DAP to my D90 and the one setting that made a difference for me was the DSD flag setting (changed from 15 to 14, menu number 10). See my post #98 further up for a photo of what my settings look like - it may not work for you at all as your X-SPDIF 2 IIS pinout may be different to that on my Cayin N6ii. Also, I don't know whether you can damage your equipment by changing these settings so it's at your risk - my D90 display was going crazy when I had the wrong IIS settings! But it's working fine now. I think my HDMI cable is not a good quality one so I have another one on order (latest HDMI version and supports 4K TV signals which should mean it complies with the latest HDMI spec, so it should be fairly good quality).

Good luck if you get it working!

Thanks. I don't have any DSD files at all so I'm not sure how that could affect anything but I guess I'll try it since I've got nothing to lose. But out of curiosity have you tried it outputting to RCA? That's what I'm currently using while I await my GS-X mini to return from the shop.

EDIT: I changed the DSD flag to 14 and tried again but no luck. I just don't get it. I tried two cables but maybe they're both too old. This is definitely annoying.

 

[Taz777]

Thanks. I don't have any DSD files at all so I'm not sure how that could affect anything but I guess I'll try it since I've got nothing to lose. But out of curiosity have you tried it outputting to RCA? That's what I'm currently using while I await my GS-X mini to return from the shop.

EDIT: I changed the DSD flag to 14 and tried again but no luck. I just don't get it. I tried two cables but maybe they're both too old. This is definitely annoying.

It may be the cables.

I am only using the XLR outputs. What is your output setting? You could try BOTH XLR and RCA to see what happens.

Also, I agree with you about menu number 10 (DSD flag), but that is definitely related to the IIS interface and things go crazy on my D90 if I leave it at the default setting of 14.

I'll try RCA tomorrow as I need to find my RCA cables, and I'll let you know how it goes. In your case it sounds like something is muted. I was getting horrible static noises when I had the wrong IIS settings.