They ran out of money?
Similar trend can be found with rims and tires.
Some buy very expensive and flashy rims and what they wrap around them?
The cheapest china rubber there is.
It really is a thing.
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That and you can actually buy several 99 dollars amps that wont explode your headphones and will sound great with your 2k headphones. The Schiit Magnis offer great non flammable performance that might not give you the max potential of a 2k headphone but it certainly wont sound bad off it, nor you know EXPLODE.
Never heard of any JDS Labs ATOMs going nuclear either, nor any of Geshellis stuff which is all super affordable. Sure some of them break but a catastrophic failure that burns the gear connected to it…is not common.
Its really not the fault of the consumer here at all. Particularly when this particular brand is pushed as being OBJECTIVELY BEST EVER PERFORMANCE for the best price. This is an example of my biggest issue with the current obsession with measurements, people will ignore actual practical things that matter like reliability, safety, sane amounts of gain, solid volume pots, quality components just to chase 2% better measurements that according to their own beliefs dont actually mean anything.
Hope anyone burned by this episode gets some kind of compensation. If Topping doesnt do anything to make this right, consumers need to be warned that they dont stand behind their products and to buy at their own risk.
Thankfully no one so far has been injured, the scary thing here would have been if the headphones exploded on someones head. They could have suffered permanent hearing damage, burns or any number of other serious injuries. This is really not something that can be hand waved away.
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I’m going to use that line when writing my experiences of gear from now on.
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Don’t get me wrong when I you ask the question why put an $800-3000 in a $99 headphone amp.
Your arguments are great without question.
Sure, everyone sees it differently, but whane.
The question is more about when you make these in the future because you want to appeal to the masses and the slogan is we want to enable small people to sell good audio.
Then something like this must not happen and sufficient security must ensure that something like this does not happen.
With the question I could read out if I were a manufacturer okay this is important to people.
These are arguments with which I could carry out my work.
Should not be discriminatory as with the example of buying rims that are expensive and barely field for a decent tyre. But rather that in the hope the manufacturer aka Mr.Yang/Kevin reads this in silence and is sensitised to it, as well as other manufacturers.
I don’t care if it sounds great to you and you are happy with it, it’s all good.
Live and let live.
Subjectively, everyone hears differently.
Apart from that, it was also mentioned that you can hurt yourself, which is also not the point.
We have certain standards in America and Europe that have to be met by the manufacturer, regardless of which country you come from.
As I said, it would be great if something positive could be reported, even if it was just a simple exchange.
The internet never forgets anything.
Most manufacturers forget that.
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Amen to that!
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Noob here. Your question temp me to post 
Sure you can ask yourself why would you plug a $1000-3000 headphone into a $99 amplifier?
I am new in the hobby. Well kind off… I had a UE Triple-fi 10 in the past but that was more than 5 years ago.
I never have an amp or a dac until 2 months ago. So I finally bought a Topping E30 + L30. The plan was try to get some cheap amp + dac and see if it’s even worth the $ compare to my PC. Because you know posts in any forum could be complete BS. Sales hyping shit up, they are everywhere.
I bought the stack. Yeah they sounds a bit better and decided to keep it.
I ended up exchanging the L30 to A50s because I ordered Tin P1. Earlier this month I got myself a UM Mest.
So yeah new people in the hobby will ends up buying the cheap one first before going to a higher tier.
Why someone will use 100-200 amp to a 1000$ headphone/iem? New to the hobby, can’t be helped. Even if you got the money no one is stupid enough to jump to a niche hobby with both of their legs.
im sorry but i have absolutely no idea what you are trying to say.
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Many Chinese companies don’t stand behind their products, not like western companies.
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Idk how safe the new units are but someone has to take the plunge… I had ordered one from AMZ but it came 2010xxxxxx so I immediately returned hopefully seller doesn’t resell it…
That said I talked to the folks at Apos audio and got 2 L30’s direct from SHENZHEN LONGRUIXIANG TRADE CO.,LTD coming . I was assured they will be current production.
May bench test em with some old pc37x’s my brother gave me before I plug anything I use in or wear them for that matter…
Waste of time? Seems like a huge liability to not deal with any safety issues immediately but I can’t help but want to see em working continuously for a couple days
If you don’t mind, would you take one apart and post some photo of the internals? No need to remove parts from the board, just slide it out the case.
Areas of interest are these 3:
- A circuit marked “DC_Det”, if it does what the marking implies, this may be what changed.
- The uController the L30 has for some reason and some transistors to control the relays.
- The Op-Amp that (used to) blow up
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gladly, expecting early next week
Here’s a pic (taken from another site) of the “fix”. A super shitty soldering job of a metal piece that sits against the chassis to ground it. Quality is job none at Topping lol.
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Wow.
A freaking 5ct pogo pin to fix a grounding issue…
I’m particularly impressed with the soldering job. I hope it actually makes good contact or it’s going to be kablammo all over again.
It would be so funny to get reports of sudden “pling” noises in a few days/weeks when the bodge-joint fails and the pogo-pin pings about in the case
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I’m sure they needed to fix it without revving the board or the manufacturing process, an that was probably the easiest way to do that.
But that’s some pretty terrible soldering, so likely hand applied.
The more interesting thing is now they are saying the 2012 serials have the DC protection fix but not the static fix, and you need a 2102 serial for both.
Tough shit, honestly.
Respin the boards with a properly engineered fix. Bodging your way to success is… shit tier honestly.
Nothing wrong with a nicely layed out bodgewire. But that there? Come on!
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Apparently it was done by one of the bean counters. Or perhaps HR. Because whoever did it has no business around a soldering iron. I bet 30% of those fail.
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lol ChiFi provides quality RMA repair
Im really hoping we will have even more great news in coming weeks.
Here is an excerpt from an alleged exchange of the L30 after the revision by a user.
Anyone who works in a trade knows that this can definitely be done better.
I’m not an electrician myself, but in principle, when I read the post and see the pictures, it looks like this is a very functional revision that may work.
However, I have my doubts that it will last longer.
What is the use of a functional revision if in 2-3 years I possibly shoot up the next pair of headphones again?
You can do this for experimentation, but you can’t sell it as a manufacturer.
My conclusion is definitely and remains hands off the L30.
Apart from that, those who have damaged the headphones have been left with the costs.
Before there is no L30 2.0 I would definitely stay with Schiit Magni 3+ ,Herasyun Jds Labs.even a little Dot Mk 1+ looks better even if it may look slightly spartan the Sicherer or Geshelli as an alternative.