The "Too good for the price" list

[Blu]

Maybe add Topping E30 under DACs?
$130, measures well, and sounds great. Even comes with a remote and has some filters to boot.

[Andrew_Davis]

For sure!!

[Mufflertape]

Thanks for the e30 suggestion, now I know what I’m getting for my living room to complete it, using an d30 atm so not too bad, but then I wont have to adjust anything by hand if I can remote control volume and switch sources

[Blu]

No prob! I really like it a lot and definitely think it is a great value for what you get with it.

[LeDechaine]

Yup. Added a few things.

@LeDechaine

• Topping D10, SMSL M100, SMSL Sanskrit 10th and the JDS Atom DAC are all good desktop DACs, all for 100$ .
• Topping E30 is a new and great DAC for 130$ . Even if the name starts with E. (…Stand-alone Topping dacs before the E 30: D 10, D 30, D 50, D 90…).

@LeDechaine

• Topping A90: Excellent for some, “endgame” for others. A 500$ headphone amp even rivaling the 3000$ Benchmark HPA4 according to Soundnews.

[Antpage2]

Maybe you should add the Emotiva A100 to the list

[LeDechaine]

Added this too.

@LeDechaine

• Triangle Borea BR02/BR03: More or less 500$. The least expensive speakers Triangle makes. These wowed a few reviewers who said the Boreas sound better than a lot of stuff under 1000$ .

@LeDechaine

• Pro-ject Pre-Box S2: A dual mono DAC (two ESS9038 chipsets in two completely separate channels ) for 400$.

@LeDechaine

• Emotiva BasX A-100: A really special one. Not quite an AVR (but probably better than most AVRs). A 50W RMSx2 @ 8 ohms speaker amp, and a headphone amp with a special “jumper” allowing you to push really, really power-hungry headphones. 12 f—ing watts at 33 ohms into your headphones . Webpage says “USE WITH CAUTION” … Indeed. All for 230$.

[Antpage2]

@LeDechaine

AVR

whats a AVR?

[Kron]

@Antpage2

whats a AVR?

Audio Video Reciever for surround sound stuff usually

I wish that the basx was that price over here, it’s £350 here

[LeDechaine]

Added some stuff again.

@LeDechaine

Moondrop Starfield: All-around great neutral-sounding IEMs for 110$ (and they’re beautiful!).

@LeDechaine

Geshelli Erish Balanced: Simply great. A balanced only headphone amplifier for 200$.

[LeDechaine]

My 50th edit!

-Divided speakers into active and passive speakers.
-Divided headphone amps and balanced headphone amps.
-Added a few comments:

@LeDechaine

Topping D10, SMSL M100, SMSL Sanskrit 10th and the JDS Atom DAC are all good desktop DACs, all 100$ . Considering you can’t hear the difference between DACs at this price unless (maybe) you have “golden ears”, choose the one which looks the best for you and enjoy.

@LeDechaine

Topping E30 is a new and great DAC for 130$ . Even if the name starts with E. (…Stand-alone Topping dacs before the E 30: D 10, D 30, D 50, D 90…). Will play all your files up to 32bit/768khz/DSD512 for all the bats around you.

Added these:

@LeDechaine

Topping D50S: I believe this is the cheapest that does “everything”. Another “32/768/512”, with a screen showing the file format (Khz), with Bluetooth AptX-HD/LDAC, with volume and a remote.

@LeDechaine

Topping DX7s: This “everythingizer” (sorry again) is now 400$. 2 x ES9038Q2M DAC + Full balanced headphone out + Balanced XLR out. For 600$, there’s also the DX7 Pro, adding Bluetooth AptX-HD/LDAC (among other things).

[LeDechaine]

I also added a ton of power measurements @ 32 ohms for the headphone amps.
Yes, we need more active speakers.
This list also needs tubes.

[duke86fan]

question… would you consider this list good for finding good starter headphones… like great entry levels for beginners

[BoxingRobes]

Schiit Modius as a balanced DAC for $200 with its measurements is tough to keep off this list.

SMSL SU8 for about $200 offering balanced + remote + those filters + measurements is also tough to beat at that price point.

[LeDechaine]

Definitely. These aren’t “too good for the price” according to only me or only Zeos, these are “too good for the price” according to many.

I personally only own the HD58Xs, but also the 4 first IEMs in this list and the Fluance SX6 speakers. Also the Behringer UCA-202 and the JDS Labs Atom.

…for now

[Cycie]

Anyone’s heard of the $40 TempoTec Sonata HD Pro? An OEM of Hidizs S8 for half the cost.

Seems too good for the price as written reviews would compare it to more expensive dongle DACs. Maybe that should be another category in this thread?

[voja]

I would add the EarMen TR-Amp to the list. Works wonders with Sennheiser cans… the difference it made to my HD 598 was significant, yet subtle. It definitely brought the life out of those cans, felt like a completely new headphone.

For 250 bucks, you are getting a portable amp that is built like a tank, built and manufactured in Europe, and also has a ton of options - you can drive two headphones simultaneously, you can charge and use the amp simultaneously (as long as you have and extra USB C to USB A cable).

I love this little guy too much. Can drive planars too - it drove the Hifiman Deva without any sound compromises or distortions. However, I was pushing it to it’s limit. It had a harder time driving the Kbear TRI i3 IEM (planar magnetic). As far as dynamic headphones go, this is my go-to.

Kind of bummed to not see them getting enough attention. So here I am sharing my experience =)

[nhatlam96]

Can anyone try ollo s4x? this guy prefers them over the hifiman ananda!

[olinko]

wow, never heard of Ollo but damn that looks interesting. Especially the trial thing

[11_Clouds]

Ordering these next paycheck actually, that trial is legit, these will be In my studio rotation, casual listening will be secondary but this review is promising