Topping A90 or Topping Part Deux

And this was your feedback:

So your "feedback" was a statement of preference? Can't these people stay in Head fi?

 

how to make successful consumer goods business in China

step 1. make very cookie cutter product (Topping D30) which has zero innovation in design, utilizing economies of scale only available in Guangzhou province
step 2. promote cookie cutter product using any metrics possible, however irrelevant they may be to the actual real-world performance of your product, as you need to stand out among a sea of other cookie cutter products being produced next door to you. make sure you specify all of the brands of components or their knock-offs you are using in your product.
step 3. realizing that the perceived value of your cookie cutter product will skyrocket with the endorsement or consumption of your product by foreigners (non-Chinese), use marketing agents to successfully infiltrate Western communities and market your product via astroturfing
step 4. find a 'white monkey' to endorse your product on nonsensical merits ("audio science") that no one can disprove on a surface level. this actor needs no knowledge of how the product actually works or what they are talking about.
step 5. begin producing more expensive cookie cutter products that, while slightly more expensive for you to manufacture due to your economies of scale, provide massive net profit returns as you begin to target more upscale Western consumers with deeper pockets
step 6. have your 'white monkey' and other Western agents promote your more expensive products, despite the merits being even more nonsensical than the entry level product
step 7. congratulations, you are now very profitable. many returns for you and your investors.

Amir/ASR is just a 'white monkey' for Topping. this is not a racist term, it is a real method of market differentiation that exists in China's free market. his promotion of Topping products using nonsensical metrics like SINAD and 0.00000000001% THD are no different than Nicholas Cage appearing in this Beijing Auto ad. the uneducated Western consumer will believe they are receiving never before seen levels of performance and value as your DAC climbs to the top of the SINAD comparison chart. I don't think they even listen to the crap they make.

 

There are also some speaker tubeamp designs being pimped around called Wellsington or something. Regardless of another "well" thought out name it might be interesting because toobz. Then again it might set your house on fire. Welldonesington?

 

@purr1n Paul Wolff, former owner of API and designer of numerous cool things, thinks all the cloners should burned alive. They steal more deserving and talented people’s livelihoods and butcher their designs. Changes and improvements are not clones through; they’re progress. Chifi muntzed evaluation boards are cheaped out clones.

 

I assume you are talking about the likes of these guys as well, who are selling tube preamps for $320, EL34 tube integrateds for ~$500 in fancy chassis, as well as JBL horn speaker and LS3/5A ripoffs?

https://www.china-hifi-audio.com/en/soundartist-amplifier-speaker-c-78

I wouldn’t trust these products as far as I can throw them.

 

Yeah those guys. Ah well not in the market anyway.

 

Seems Topping nailed step 6 or almost.. Not sure if they're in step 7.
Not only ASR but also HF/Headphones.com started to serve as such white agents a while ago. They're at least very re-sellable elsewhere now -- just don't post any fs ad in sbaf.

I honestly recommend any hidden? topping facboys/girls to move to more favorable sites to them. Rather than spending their time in conscious or unconscious trolling.

 

As it ever has been.

 

Yeah I think Yang should have some kind of label marking him as part of Topping as it is misleading for him not to have one.

As a fun fact he also shit on the Geshelli Erish in a incredibly petty and whiney manner to the point that Shelli from Geshelli came into the thread and took him to task for it. Basically he was real salty that the Erish outperformed the A90 and was 300 dollars cheaper in spite of being made in the USA. Now Schiit has done the same thing by releasing a product exciting to the ASR crowd at the same time as his super duper Topping L30 so I am not suprised he is throwing a fit again.

Really poor behavior on the part of a company representative.

 

Yeah he deleted it and some other things after Shelli came in and told him to STFU. Someone saved most of his comments so he couldn't make it disappear. Very jealous and petty fellow imo. Clearly wasn't a isolated occurrence given that he is doing it again.

On a related note I am also quite irritated that the L30 is extremely misleading in the way its specs are given. It claims 2.3w into 32ohms but it only achieves that if fed 3vrms through its rca input. How many dacs actually do that via rca? At 2vrms it only does around 1w. Really shady move.

To Amir's credit he did expose this in his measurements but to his detriment he did not call them out for it. Most of the people in the thread were just handwaving that away as fine. Quite infuriating for me as the most positive aspect to me of the objective camp has always been exposing misleading or outright bullshit specs.

Yang for his part just keeps insisting that 1w is enough for most headphones which while that is true it completely sidesteps the actual issue which is misleading specs.

I find it hard to deny that there is a bias towards topping at ASR, if any other brand had done this they would undoubtedly been taken to task.

 

The more people go there, the more bother to give them clicks, the more traction they get. Everyone should just pretend they don't exist IMO. It's not going to change people's minds that love topping measurements and buy according to that only.

 

I suppose it is too late unfortunately. They are spreading everywhere I see people on other forums repeating and spewing the things they read there. It's quite infuriating actually.