Z Review - Mini Tube Amps and an Un-Costly Balanced DAC

I also put in the CE JAN 5670W and it sounds a lot better.

I received mine today. It is just pretty. Now have to get balanced cables and new dac and some tubes.

I am feeding the p20 from my O2+SDAC through RCA to balanced cables, Sounds great, I also changed tubes to GE JAN 5670W, available on amazon.

Thank you

Sean Driscoll

Feed the DAC a digital signal and you should be good. Fiber/Coax or USB should make no difference

ZeosPantera

Yes on Focusrite, Meh on Nobsound which isn't a balanced dac its just a volume control.

ZeosPantera

Id say both offer quite a bit of quality for the price. Which isn't REALLY cheap. But the SMSL is a bit more robust in build also.

ZeosPantera

and to be slightly more ridiculous what about the Nobsound Mini Fully-Balanced/Single-Ended Passive Preamp?

Could you use the balanced outs from a focusrite scarlett 2i2?

Of course... this would just be 2 unbalanced DACs with no noise advantage. Thing is, there are not a lot of Balanced DACs because there is no reason they should sound different than unbalanced. No measurable noise in the 4 inch cord that connects the DAC to the amp. If you are using much longer cables...like to a pair of balanced powered monitors that might be different. The Loxjie amp (like a lot of balanced HP amps) puts out a lot more power in balanced mode...double the circuitry...so its Balanced OUTPUT should sound different. but that's not an issue with DACs. SO...I do have an old but great Yulong DAC with balanced and will try it myself...but I cannot see how there would be a difference in the unbalanced/ balanced output of the same DAC... unless the manufacturer of the Balanced DAC purposely put some pixie dust in there to make them sound different.

George Roch

I bought the p20 and now there is only one left. Now need to find the right dac damnit. Need to buy balanced cables for my sens and the verum ones. Going to need a video on how to hook all these up to the 12 volt plug cause I will be living in my car soon at the rate I am buying things.

I ordered the Periapt. Do you feel the source into the SMSL SU-8 will make any noticeable difference (Fiber Optic or RCA) ? into the DAC, XLR from the DAC to the LoXjie Amp, and XLR to the headphone)

Sean Driscoll

Thank you.

Sean Driscoll

I might steal this. Gotta get two identical dacs first.

ZeosPantera

Periapt or Ursine.audio . Can also look on Ebay for generic brands

ZeosPantera

I have the TA-10 from Xduoo and I think it would be good for you to look into the higher end offerings from them Zeos. I think they compete slightly with Audio-GD, but they are a hybrid so its not exactly the same.

I have the amp now, and just ordered the DAC, all I need is a good cable to work with my Sennheiser (580, 58X, 600) . Who can point me in the Zeos approved direction for Balanced use?

Sean Driscoll

THAT...... isnt' the craziest thing I have ever heard...... FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF

ZeosPantera

Fiber optic splitter -> 2 dacs -> balanced :D Of course don't listen to my ridiculous ideas.

There is the Massdrop SDAC Balanced for $150. Ships like next year though so as good a guess as mine as to how it sounds.

Edrei Z.

ZMF Auteur

ZeosPantera

what were the headphones you switched too?

Wow, I didn't even notice that. Thanks!

Well ofc they own the trademark S.M.S.L.: Shuang Mu San Lin. :)

BeyondWakanda

Not sure if youve done it or not, but maybe do some kind of dac/amp sound demo. Or something to "show" the difference between balance and not.

Bad3gg

Thank you.. Google needs to update their shizz too.

ZeosPantera

Changing to Un-Costly. BRB

ZeosPantera

I mean, you say that the dac is expensive, but as close as I can tell, the only cheaper balanced dac out there is the SMSL-SU8, which requires wall power. From my admittedly brief scan of the amazon/ebay/google, literally no other usb powered balanced dacs exist. Not counting the Fostex HPA4, but then that's also a headphone amp, and $400 something dollars depending on where you get it. $330 doesn't seem too unreasonable to me compared to the SU8 at $250, if only just for the fact I dont have to spend another power port on it. Good shit tho, def getting that Loxjie at some time in the near future. My SAP-9 stopped working balanced(like doesn't output through the right channel) so that seems like the perfect replacement.

Jacob Ward

"Jie" is Chinese for "connect." "Lo" is "single." Nothing for "x," but "xi" is "small." So, perhaps an abbreviated form of "Single Small Connect," or just "Single X Connect." It's a registered (pending) trademark of Shenzhen Shuangmusanlin Electronics Co., Ltd. at 8th Floor, B6 Building, Jun Feng Industrial Park, Shenzhen, China. They also own the trademarks Sabaj and S.M.S.L. The "Lin" in "Shuangmusanlin" appears to refer to someone named Lin Malian (or Ma-Lian?), the owner of the company. No data on him/her.

Also I think you're using an old link to Stoner Acoustics. I found the direct one on their Facebook page. <a href="https://stoneracoustics.com/udx/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://stoneracoustics.com/udx/</a>

Edrei Z.

How does the UDX compare to your other balanced DAC, the SMSL SU-8?(currently $250 on Amazon) Would be interesting when the time comes, someone also sends you the Massdrop SDAC Balanced, then you can do a balance DAC-off.

Edrei Z.

i dont need any more DACs, AMPs, HP, Speakers. why i keep watching and wanting theeeeezzzeeeee.