Topping A90 or Topping Part Deux

Discussion in 'Headphone Amplifiers and Combo (DAC/Amp) Units' started by Scubadude, Jul 15, 2020.

  1. dufourism

    dufourism New

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    This may sound unbelievable, but I actually bought an A90 to replace my EC Black Widow. The A90 offered a SQ that is so darn close to that of the BW, while offering a significantly smaller footprint (yes, desk space is a premium to me and the chief reason why I sold off the BW). To my ears, the A90 sounds clean and authoritative with a slight tinge of warmth, probably just a hair less meaty sounding than the BW.
     
  2. Baten

    Baten Friend

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    How long do you own A90? New toy syndrome??
     
  3. dufourism

    dufourism New

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    Couple of months. Yeah.. I guess new toy syndrome could have played a part too..
     
  4. John Massaria

    John Massaria New

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    So I wound up returning the A90 back to Apos and they were great. I made up my mind when I brought both my PASS WHAMMY w/OPA627 and Topping A90 to my buddy's house who has the Stax Lambdas- we used his NOS db audio labs tranquility dac and my Topping D90. We used the STAX SRD1Mk2 with his Stax. Then we tried my Kennerton Dynamic HPs the GH50 and the Planar Wodans w/ToppingA90 etc- in every way possible the WHAMMY beat the A90 - stage width musicality- my buddy who uses Perfect 8 speakers in one system at his home- said the WHAMMY sounds like a $3K amp and is much better than the A90. When he found out it was a kit- he said well, after marketing and manufacturing, assembling it and using a $75 matched opa627 amp set - it would cost around $2500-3000 in retail. He explained the A90 being $499 assembled is a crazy deal - but the parts can not be close at that price. He also mentioned the engineering of the WHAMMY is extremely well designed- but has nearly zero features like the A90. He confirmed what I heard from first week with A90- its just not as good. I have tried many cables, RCA and XLR and did find the GRIMM TPR worked best for money and an all copper custom XLR was best with A90. (my review here of XLR shootout WITH A90) Now I am looking for a better amp maybe the Headamp GSXMini or similar... but for now I love my set up and have zero regrets in trying the A90- it is an amazing amp for $500. No doubt... man I squeezed a ton in there sorry for my blabbermouthing! cheers!
     
  5. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    It will be difficult the beat the WHAMMY. Another consideration would be the AMB M3. Very similar in many respects to WHAMMY, but Ti Kan doesn't have the name recognition of PASS. The M3 remains one of my favorite DIY solid-state amps.

    I wouldn't consider GSXMini better than WHAMMY. Maybe different, very different. Since you are using OPA627, the GSXMini's highs may not be to your taste. Everything from WHAMMY on up is pretty much different, not better when it comes to solid-state. Notable exceptions are OOP or expensive, and can be counted on the fingers on one hand: McIntosh MHA150, EC BW, Luxman P750u, Schiit Rag 1.5, ECP 3F, etc.

    Topping A90 is like any other 0.000x% THD design. It won't do much wrong, but generally it will sound flat and boring. Once you get better sounding DACs with better recordings, stuff like the A90 (or anything with a TPA6120 like Sennheiser HDVD800 amp or Magnius) starts to show its limitations. Personally, I think there are better choices for $300 less than the A90 from the likes of SMSL or Geshelli if you want one of those 0.000x% THD amps. A $300 premium is a lot of money for measurement e-peening.

    If you listen to today's pop music, anime soundtracks, or K-pop, with a few exceptions, none of this matters.
     
    Last edited: Sep 30, 2020
  6. SSL

    SSL Friend

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    @purr1n You've heard the gsx mini?
     
  7. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    Nope.

    But talking with some trusted ears, it's more along the lines of GS Lite in tonality with GSX2 dynamics and detail. Basically add warmth to GSX2 so it's more V-shaped instead of bright, the brightness never did GSX2's edgy transients and graininess any favors. Stuff will likely depend on the gain switch too. However adding warmth to a bright amp is never the answer for me.

    The basic circuit and lineage are the same. I don't expect any HeadAmp Dyna-mid build to sound like any of the aforementioned SS amps.
     
    Last edited: Sep 30, 2020
  8. santoshmanivannan

    santoshmanivannan New

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    I've been looking into getting a new amp and I see the WHAMMY is a clear choice forward compared to the A90.. Another name that I've read a lot is the RJM Sapphire. Just curious, @purr1n have you heard the Sapphire by any chance? I want to start a DIY project at some point in the next month so wanted to know from more experienced members about the two choices I'm set on
     
  9. Marvey

    Marvey Super Friend

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    Which Sapphire? There appear to be two versions:

    http://phonoclone.com/diy-sapp.html
    http://phonoclone.com/diy-sap4.html

    I haven't heard either WHAMMY for Sapphire. The Sapphire uses diamond buffers which I'm not a big fan of their sound. Kind of tizzy with tubby lows. Diamonds have a certain kind of distortion characteristic that I'm not always a fan of. WHAMMY's got a very simple Class A Mosfet pair output stage - reminiscent of classic Nelson Pass and looks better to me on paper. Again, I haven't heard, so just guessing since you asked.
     
  10. santoshmanivannan

    santoshmanivannan New

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    I was looking at the Sapphire 4 which is the most recent version of the board, the second link you posted. I'll definitely dig deeper into the diamond buffer stage and do some reading. I see AGD also uses diamond buffers in some of their products (Master series amps, NFB/D 28, etc) but I don't have a reference of how their products sound so definitely need to read more.

    I've also heard that Pass Labs gear has excellent timbre but still no first-hand experience and don't know if the WHAMMY follows that too.. I have to make more audio friends so I can leech some gear to audition I guess lol
     
  11. Beefy

    Beefy Friend

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    How experienced are you? I think the WHAMMY or the Saph1 are better beginner projects, and between those two the WHAMMY looks the most interesting. I'd wager the WHAMMY is also the best documented, with the largest community to help out.

    As another first-project option, the AMB CKKIII is a much older design but would be a great choice. Really nice single board integrated build.
     
  12. santoshmanivannan

    santoshmanivannan New

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    I have experience with soldering SMD components as well as regular components but outside of Audio. Yeah the WHAMMY does seem to be a better option to begin with given the super detailed build guides and debug threads. This way I can get my feet wet, start with a hard-to-fail audio project, learn in the process and then go further later. I Will definitley look into AMB CKKIII as well, thank you!
     
  13. Beefy

    Beefy Friend

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    If you already have some electronics experience, then the world opens up a lots more. Just be warned that the price/performance of DIY can be a hard sell versus commercial gear these days.

    The AMB M3 is in many ways the predecessor to the WHAMMY, and is a more difficult build (separate power supply, needs larger case or two cases) and has some interesting but unusual design choices (single rail supply, active ground channel). But it is much more comprehensively tweaked than the WHAMMY, and has a cleaner signal path without coupling caps. I proudly use my M3 daily.

    The Neurochrome HP-2 seems like a nice modern take on the classic OPAMP with chip output buffer design. Not my cup of tea, but the fact that you can buy a fully machined/finished case means you can get a beautiful end product. If a friend asked me to build them a no-nonsense amp today, I'd seriously consider this.

    Kevin Gilmore designs are great (anything with the words Dynalo, Dynamid, Dynahi), but the documentation is a bit more difficult to piece together, and chances are you'll be ordering your own PCBs, or maybe sourcing obsolete JFETs.

    I've seen lots of Chi-Fi chipamp boards out there. I'm sure they are wonderful, but I can't see how there is any 'joy' to be had there.

    Plenty of tube amp schematics out there if you want to P2P something together.

    How these actually sound versus the A90? I've no idea. But if you are the sort of person who feels intangible pride in your own creations, they will smack the A90 into oblivion.
     
  14. Marvey

    Marvey Super Friend

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    AGD uses a different kind of buffer, but with the name "diamond" in it.

    Another good build is the AMB M3. I love that amp.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jul 6, 2021
  15. uniqusrname

    uniqusrname Acquaintance

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    Both whammy and sapphire v4 are excellent amps, I can tell from my experience in building those..
    Whammy: Simple build based on single PCB, opamp based gain stage means one can tune the sound with opamp rolling.
    Sapphire: Not a beginner project for sure, its a dual mono design with PSU/Amp section on PCB, and unless you are buying kit from RJMaudio, you will need to match BC327/337 closely to get low DC offset.
    Between the 2 in terms of SQ I would definitely recommend Sapphire, its more resolving amp than Whammy and has better bass and treble extension (one of the few SS amps which can slam well but do not sound sterile). Works equally well with planars and dynamics.
     
  16. Beefy

    Beefy Friend

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    What sort of DC offset do you see on the Sapphire v4 in real world use? The idea of a CFA without a DC servo makes me nervous, and the instructions say you should expect DC offset to drift by 50 mV, which is absurdly bad IMHO.
     
    Last edited: Jul 6, 2021
  17. santoshmanivannan

    santoshmanivannan New

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    Hello fellow countryman! can I DM you to become your friend and maybe try to leech some gear to audition if we're from the same city?
     
  18. uniqusrname

    uniqusrname Acquaintance

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    For my builds I was matching transistors within 10-20 in terms of hfe values. With that and some bias adjustment I used to get around 0 with 5-10mV drift.
     
  19. sp33ls

    sp33ls Friend

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    Digging up an old thread to comment on the amps mentioned above.

    The WHAMMY sounds way better than it has any right to for the money one would spend on it. I've got one with discrete regs, Cree Schottky, and Burson V6 opamps. It's a very engaging listen. Not the last word in resolution, but no slouch either. The highs are not as forward but I kind of prefer that. In some ways it reminds me of my Bottlehead Crackatwoa. Just makes me want to enjoy the music and not f**k with picking things apart.

    The Neurochrome stuff is very well designed. I built the (rare) HP-1 and it's my daily desktop amp with my BF2. It's the closest thing to a wire with gain I've heard, but still somehow maintains some musicality. I wouldn't classify it as flat or boring, just honest. HD650's have serious bass and clarity with this amp. The BF2 is the buddy that gives him a joint to loosen up a bit.

    I built an HP-2 for a buddy who likes to produce his own music. Originally, my WHAMMY was meant for him. ;) But figured a less colored amp with XLR inputs would be more beneficial for his use case and his equipment. It sounded like the HP-1's little brother. Same character, just slightly scaled down and with less output power.

    You can't go wrong with either of them (HP-1 no longer available). Both hold their own against much higher priced amps. I think the WHAMMY is the more fun one, and allows for more easy upgrades.

    I need to look into the Sapphire.
     

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