USB DAC/AMP Combo - ifi Zen DAC or Topping dx3 pro

Equipment / Electronics / Gear / Accessories Headphone Amps
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I will add the Sennheiser HD660S (refurbished for 300€) to the current stack:

  • Bose QC35
  • Beyerdynamic Tyger
  • Koss KPH30i
  • Sennheiser GSP 300

Because of the addition of HD660S, I would need to add a headphone DAC/AMP combo. The combo would need to have a USB connection (using a KVM).

As mentioned in the title, I’m looking at the ifi Zen DAC or Topping dx3 pro. Both are below 250€ (my limit) here in Europe.

Is there any other option that I can get on German Amazon/EU? Or any of these two options a clear favorite?

I looked at the Fiio K5 pro, but I can’t stand the design, and it’s not on the contender list.

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hey Aa, the Zen DAC would be a very good choice. it’s my daily driver and I use balanced for my Nighthawk Carbon;'s and SE for my Senn HD599se. I want to get a balanced cable for my HD599se at some point too.

only your HD560s could be made to go balanced, the rest all have an integrated SE cable. of course, if you’re comfortable modding stuff, there are lots of YouTube guides on how to convert headphones.

actually, the QC35 have a removable cable…but most wireless headphones tend to sound bad when using the wired connection…but you may be able to use a balanced one on it to see what happens/

also, the Zen DAC has just been replaced by a v2. it’s a bit more than the original, but comes with a better XMOS USB processor. it also now supports full MQA decoding, but if you’ve been reading audio news, MQA is getting a log of flack for not being what it’s been marketed to be. it’s worse than lossless.

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I second the zen DAC.

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Thank you for the responses.

I had some time (not always a good thing) and was looking to maybe just bit the bullet and step up a tier above. I was looking at the Topping A50s and maybe pairing it with the E30 or D10s.

But here I have a question. Could I use the Topping A50s and use the Apple (or similar) USB dongle to act as a DAC, or will it produce too little power?