[Lifter59]

All my dongles are under 1ohm oi. But unfortunately I don't know much about it, but I have a 6-armature per side custom earphone the resistance of which I don't know, I'm looking for my first dap for this iem . i hope that the m23 will good for me

Who makes your IEM's?

 

[laleeee]

Who makes your IEM's?

A local guy in our local hifi forum who makes ciems for musicians and hearing aids.

 

[rlw6534]

Imagination is a very good choice of words if discussing sound differences between very similar modern audio devices.

I base my opinion on having the M11 Plus LTD and ESS, a Shanling DAP plus a bunch of other gear that all sound as great deal more the same than different and make nowhere near the difference that IEM or headphones make, not even the difference different IEM tips make. I wasted thousands of dollars chasing the differences that people talk about and eventually concluded that the vast majority of it is just that, talk.

If you think you can tell a bunch of different DACs/amps apart please test yourself and set up a proper blind A/B comparison with careful volume matching not have a listen then swap gear and have a listen to something else 10, 20, 30 seconds later probably at a slightly different volume. I suspect you might just be less dogmatic in your assessment of sound differences and assertion that I need a different hobby.

I am pretty certain that when people review gear like this and compare to other gear they don't blind test and probably don't even really accurately volume control which in itself makes a huge difference to perceived sound. They have to have something to talk about and careful testing to actually confirm just how different something is not doesn't make for good reading.

Or just go merrily on and believe the marketing and 'reviews' and hear differences with very casual comparisons.

+1

 

[laleeee]

+1

you don't hear any difference between iems and sources either ?

 

[seanwee]

There is the argument I mentioned

Why would I need a different hobby, music is still music, I get different versions of the music with different IEM and headphones.

you don't hear any difference between iems and sources either ?

Nothing like a bit of miscommunication with @laleeee from the start lol.

People say a lot of things that are not accurate in this hobby.

I am pretty certain that when people review gear like this and compare to other gear they don't blind test and probably don't even really accurately volume control which in itself makes a huge difference to perceived sound. They have to have something to talk about and careful testing to actually confirm just how different something is not doesn't make for good reading.

Or just go merrily on and believe the marketing and 'reviews' and hear differences with very casual comparisons.

That is true, no doubt. But whether it's due to lack of/emphasized difference from their listening library or due to imagination is impossible to discern without doing the comparison yourself.

That said, I find dap reviews to generally be less of a minefield than iem reviews.

The only things anyone should take away from the marketing are the actual features, ie android version, soc, power output.

Imagination is a very good choice of words if discussing sound differences between very similar modern audio devices.

That's why I review independently myself, to find the reviewers that I can trust. Double blind verification if you will.

I've ping ponged between reviewers and whether to trust or completely brush off their opinions.

I base my opinion on having the M11 Plus LTD and ESS, a Shanling DAP plus a bunch of other gear that all sound as great deal more the same than different and make nowhere near the difference that IEM or headphones make, not even the difference different IEM tips make. I wasted thousands of dollars chasing the differences that people talk about and eventually concluded that the vast majority of it is just that, talk.

Yes, iems and headphones make the biggest difference no doubt. But you have cases like mine where I've already found the pinnacle of my preference tuning but are interested in hearing improvements where they present themselves.

If you haven't settled on a preference tuning then I do implore you, don't upgrade your source if you don't need it yet, save it for when you can no longer find any improvement from iems/headphones.

A properly designed modern DAC and amplifier will not change the sound relative to the digital input unless there is some sound processing implemented.

Someone is going to argue the point for sure but the M23 will sound like any other DAP and your existing dongles.

Yeah unfortunately the SP3000 of all things closed that chapter for me.

Tldr: Didn't enjoy the SP3000 though the SP series was my baseline for comparing TOTL daps, turns out AK "tuned" their sound to be more reminiscent of the AK380 sound, removing the holographic quality they had since the SP1000.

In fact their lowly HB1 dongle with a single ESS 9281AC has a hint of that holographic sound, making it more holographic that the SP3000, despite having much worse sound quality overall.

So to answer your question, no, dap makers still very much "tune" their daps to have a signature. Whether it be via software, amp selection, or dac implementation.

If you think you can tell a bunch of different DACs/amps apart please test yourself and set up a proper blind A/B comparison with careful volume matching not have a listen then swap gear and have a listen to something else 10, 20, 30 seconds later probably at a slightly different volume. I suspect you might just be less dogmatic in your assessment of sound differences and assertion that I need a different hobby.

I have and still do that for my dap comparisons. Volume match at a louder and softer level, match to 0.5db and only switch between the two for louder/softer albums.

There are definitely differences to be heard, but the question is are you or your gear discerning enough to hear it?

Many people just enjoy the music just fine on regular airpods and don't find the need to get anything better.

Myself, well, I'm a chronic music analyser. It's just how I enjoy my music. I love being able to hear every single note, instrument, background motif and cue.

I'm mostly content with my gear already. But I will still look for potential upgrades for when my existing gear stops functioning well. In my case last year my DX160 started causing buzzing in the left ear when I charge it while listening so I looked for a replacement, eventually landing on the FiiO M15S.

I didn't want to get something the size of the M15S. The DX240 was a far more appealing choice size wise.

But even after volume matched A/B testing it was conclusive that the M15S was just better outright.

 

[BS5711]

Yes it seems laleeee may have been asking about something different, IEM versus DAC/amp, I am not sure.

I still hold that any differences are very subtle and frankly fall within the limits of being potential perception only rather then definitive differences in actual sound created. If one is listening for differences one will generally hear them when they are not there. We can hear differences even with the exact same gear if we are told we are listening to something different. Even with a somewhat controlled test it is very hard to escape the effects of expectation bias and other effects that lead us to perceive something that isn't there.

Also you make a good point, and in a very polite manner thank you, about a person and gear being discerning enough. Most people say use the old classic "your hearing isn't good enough and/or your gear isn't resolving enough", I like the use of the term 'discerning'

IEM and headphones aside, ones level of discernment is a critical consideration and not often discussed. I am not interested in listening for the tiniest of tiny nuances between the tiny hint of sibilance on the leading edge of the female vocal at 1.32 in a specific song for example because it make no practical difference even if it is of technical interest to some. The problem comes when extremely discerning people start talking about sound differences between DACs and amps like they are genuinely really significant and use terms like "night and day". What they actually mean is they are subtle at best but to them they are really important. Others read the term "night and day" or a description of greater bass impact or whatever it might be and assume that the apparently really significant difference will be obvious to them as well when it probably isn't even audible to them unless they also listen for that exact tiny nuance at that time point stamp on that song.

In real world terms just listening to music to enjoy it not to listen to it and dissect it and use it to dissect the gear to the nth degree the differences are immaterial and nothing like the typical reviews make out.

 

[seanwee]

Yes it seems laleeee may have been asking about something different, IEM versus DAC/amp, I am not sure.

I still hold that any differences are very subtle and frankly fall within the limits of being potential perception only rather then definitive differences in actual sound created. If one is listening for differences one will generally hear them when they are not there. We can hear differences even with the exact same gear if we are told we are listening to something different. Even with a somewhat controlled test it is very hard to escape the effects of expectation bias and other effects that lead us to perceive something that isn't there.

Also you make a good point, and in a very polite manner thank you, about a person and gear being discerning enough. Most people say use the old classic "your hearing isn't good enough and/or your gear isn't resolving enough", I like the use of the term 'discerning'

IEM and headphones aside, ones level of discernment is a critical consideration and not often discussed. I am not interested in listening for the tiniest of tiny nuances between the tiny hint of sibilance on the leading edge of the female vocal at 1.32 in a specific song for example because it make no practical difference even if it is of technical interest to some. The problem comes when extremely discerning people start talking about sound differences between DACs and amps like they are genuinely really significant and use terms like "night and day". What they actually mean is they are subtle at best but to them they are really important. Others read the term "night and day" or a description of greater bass impact or whatever it might be and assume that the apparently really significant difference will be obvious to them as well when it probably isn't even audible to them unless they also listen for that exact tiny nuance at that time point stamp on that song.

In real world terms just listening to music to enjoy it not to listen to it and dissect it and use it to dissect the gear to the nth degree the differences are immaterial and nothing like the typical reviews make out.

Yeah well I guess I'm one of the people who has gear and hearing that will definitely emphasize the differences.

But stating that I compare with a $3500 TOTL iem should be disclaimer enough for most people hahaha.

Though I think it's definitely worth noting that people who are even consider getting DAPs over $500 should already be well aware that the potential differences from dap to dap won't be as pronounced as the potential differences from changing iems.

On the topic of similar dacs sounding similar, I suggest you have a listen to the Hiby R6 Pro II. It sounds nothing like the SP3000 or the FiiO K9 AKM. Heck, I would say it has a cirrus logic dac if I were asked to guess the dac from its sound.

 

[jsmiller58]

All DACs and Amps sound identical - if they are implemented identically (components, filters). But they're not implemented identically, so they don't always sound the same.

My subjective opinion only...

I cannot comment about DAPs as I have limited experience listening to DAPs (having only owned 2 HiBy DAPs), but I do have a number DACs and Amps. In one case I have a couple of DACs (Topping and SMSL) feeding a couple of Amps (Topping and Monoprice) through switch boxes and definitely I can hear differences in this setup just by changing the DAC or the amp.

I also have multiple dongles and the sound is very different from many. First example the iFi Kensei versus the FiiO KA17 aren't close at all...

 

[BS5711]

Perhaps all the gear I have bought has been to similar or I expect to hear genuinely ‘significant’ differences that are not as significant to me as they are to others.

I really don’t know ?

I know what I (don’t) hear and I know what I think I hear until I test further and find the difference was imagined or due to a volume mismatch or a subtlety in a song that fooled me.

Additionally, I know that technically well designed DACs and amplifiers should be ‘audibly transparent’ so I don’t expect to hear differences. As such my observations of not hearing differences don’t surprise me and yet it seems like a massive swathe of people have a different experience to mine.

I know I far from alone in my experience but of course I can’t have anyone else’s listening experience so I can’t know where the different perception comes from.

 

[laleeee]

All my five dongles sounds totally different ,even though there are some with the same chipset

 

[rlw6534]

you don't hear any difference between iems and sources either ?

My experience is similar to @BS5711 with respect to DAC/Amps which he has explained well, especially the wasted money part...

I'm not sure where the reference to IEMs came from as they are quite obviously where major differences exist.

 

[BS5711]

All my five dongles sounds totally different ,even though there are some with the same chipset

Please define “totally”.

What is different and how different is it ?

Different like a bit of EQ to change a part if the frequency range by a couple of db or something else.

I was listening today after the above conversation and compared my little Shanling M3 Ultra to an iFi Go Bar running off an iPhone 15 Pro both running from Apple Music downloads and volume matched as close as I could there was no immediately discernible difference listening to the same 30 seconds of music one after the other.

I was using Campfire Audio Solaris 2020 which are pretty decent IEM so it isn’t like the IEM were so poor that the source made no difference.

 

[laleeee]

My experience is similar to @BS5711 with respect to DAC/Amps which he has explained well, especially the wasted money part...

I'm not sure where the reference to IEMs came from as they are quite obviously where major differences exist.

The daps has higher end sound like the dongles ?

 

[BS5711]

I also have multiple dongles and the sound is very different from many. First example the iFi Kensei versus the FiiO KA17 aren't close at all...

Can you define”very different” and “not close at all”.

Genuine question I would like to understand what others hear/perceive.

In my mind “not close at all” simply makes no sense, to me that is describing a bigger difference than swapping out IEM or headphones not just the DAC/amp and I very much can tell even similar IEM apart.

 

[rlw6534]

The daps has higher end sound like the dongles ?

??? Not sure what you are asking. I have both DAPs and dongles and I don't think that one form factor is superior over the other with respect to sound quality.