GUSTARD DAC-X16 MQA USB DAC DSD512 PCM768kHz ES9068AS DAC Bluetooth 5.0 Full Balanced Desktop Decoder With I2S/AES/COAX/OPT Input (Black)

£9.9
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GUSTARD DAC-X16 MQA USB DAC DSD512 PCM768kHz ES9068AS DAC Bluetooth 5.0 Full Balanced Desktop Decoder With I2S/AES/COAX/OPT Input (Black)

GUSTARD DAC-X16 MQA USB DAC DSD512 PCM768kHz ES9068AS DAC Bluetooth 5.0 Full Balanced Desktop Decoder With I2S/AES/COAX/OPT Input (Black)

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Description

The trebles on the EM6L are really well extended. They are very airy and detailed. However, the detailed trebles come with their cons too. As such, the EM6L is a bit sibilant. It also doesn't compare to the Xenns Top, which has very well extended, extremely detailed, and quality trebles but presents them in a controlled and smooth manner. Hence, it is not fatiguing or overwhelming during long sessions. The Top also has better technicality and separations than the EM6L or the Khan by a huge margin (understandably as they belong in different price ratios). So the trebles sound better on the Xenns Top. The EM6L sometimes sounds fatiguing and piercing with treble-heavy songs.

Listening to the chilled jazz of Paolo Fresu and Lars Danielsonn’s Summerwind record it’s very easy to fall into the music and be seduced by the chilled nature of the presentation. And I think this gets to the crux of what the character of this DAC is all about – on tunes where I’m looking for energy, vitality and pace I was left wanting, on more chilled music I found myself drifting into the tunes and getting right into it. The question then would be “Is the X16 a bit boring?” and I suppose it sort of is if I’m honest. That’s a bit unfair, actually, and as opposed to boring I think a better way to describe its character is chilled and undemanding. At about 2.5 kilos or ~5.5 pounds, it’s considerably heavier than its competitors like Topping D90SE and SMSL M400. A heavier unit suggests that a linear power supply and a bigger capacitance are sitting inside, building confidence that I’m dealing with a serious unit. What was quite amazing is that several amplifiers that aren’t known to be impressive when it comes to bass delivery and speed, X26 PRO awoke them from their deep sleep, giving a huge helping hand and the same can be said about mellow sounding headphones and loudspeakers. The best of Gustard with its overkill capacitance would infuse more positive vibes, more uplifting beats, that would cure even slow and boring setups. If you really need more slam, more body and a faster pace…I think I found a cure for the boringness of your setup.

Sending music from a smartphone via streaming services as Qobuz and Tidal worked as a charm and LDAC codec sounded almost indistinguishable to its wired connection. Bottom line is that X16 performed very good in here, exactly as good as their top of the line X26 PRO. In my home system, most of my listening is done with my Magneplanar LRS quasi-ribbon loudspeakers, which can tend to sound, perhaps, a bit bright with certain material. My other go-to loudspeakers, the Zu Audio Omens, use compression drivers in what is essentially a treble horn arrangement, and they also tend to sound a bit bright. So, there’s that dynamic I must deal with in trying to make an objective decision on how oversampling might be affecting what I’m hearing through the Gustard X16. That tendency towards brightness of both of my loudspeaker choices might be impacting what I’m hearing with oversampling engaged in Roon when played through the X16. I might feel (or hear) differently if the oversampling was done by HQ Player rather than Roon, but I don’t currently have full access, so for now, it’s a moot point. I plan on doing more serious listening in the near future, and try to reach some sort of consensus on how I feel about using oversampling with Roon and the X16. My system is both audiophile and home theatre and i often switch between optical and usb. Both are consecutive on the input list so it is not difficult to switch even if i cannot read the display. Bluetooth is easy to set up. Go into the menu, turn on the Bluetooth power and the computer or phone sees the DAC immediately. Select BT input with the remote and you are away. We often have issues with Bluetooth in the house but the Gustard performed flawlessly. Bluetooth streaming is what it is to my mind and I rarely use it – it worked fine! CONCLUSION I did hesitate a long time to switch the X16 with X18. I did not test the X18 but i would bet that X16 is better.

The biggest novelty is that Gustard ditched two ESS-Sabre ES9068AS silicon in favor of a single, but higher performing ES 9038 PRO DAC chip. As I have explained multiple times, ES 9038 PRO is a very interesting silicon, as it can work in mono, stereo or 8-channel mode with either current-mode or voltage-mode operation. Most ES9038 PRO designs that are I know of are using it in stereo configuration with a voltage mode operation due to a much lower cost and R&D. However, if you want to squeeze maximum performance out of it, this particular chip gives a lower total-harmonic-distortion, bypassing the IMD hump if current mode is being used. This configuration adds a lot to the cost, as a powerful I/V (current to voltage) conversion stage needs to be built around the ES9038PRO. The better the I/V conversion stage is = the higher precision can be squeezed from the DAC chip and the same can be said about its operation mode, as in mono mode it will output a higher dynamic range. Another striking difference is that I could easier follow the trail of a musical note in busy passages with X26 PRO. There was simply more air around, the whole place felt decompressed and the musical notes had clearer leading edges. Not only the soundstage was bigger, wider and taller, but I could easier focus on anything I wanted, without stressing myself too much. X16 wasn’t that impressive with HPA4, it wasn’t that holographic and it wasn’t that deep and open wide by comparison. X16 has a clean front panel with just a simple monochrome OLED screen in the middle and a nice volume wheel on the far right. If you want to use it in the DAC mode, select maximum volume of 0 dB and if you will be using it as a DAC and Preamp, you can choose the desired volume level via that remote control or via its volume wheel. In the middle of the volume wheel a button is located, a short press on it will select your desired digital input and a long press will engage its user menu, where additional setting can be found. Gustard is not forcing you to use the remote control in case you’ll want to change setting like digital filters, you can do that single-handedly, unlike Topping that is forcing to use its remote for advanced settings. If what I’m searching for can’t be found on Qobuz, then I will be continuing my search on Tidal and after that on Spotify. When it comes to high-resolution MQA content, for now there are three services that will be offering such content: Tidal, Nugs.net and Xiami Music in China. Once you have a subscription to any of these, you’ll have access to a wide variety of MQA files that are released on a weekly basis. These files can go up to 24-bit and 96 kHz in resolution with the last bits of information stored in a lossy format.However, they are still great when it comes to digital audio, their X16 DAC that I’ll be testing today is a road opener in many ways, it’s the first converter to use the newest ESS 9068AS DAC chips that have a full MQA decoder built-in. On paper, X16 seems like a high-performance modern DAC, wrapped in a fairly small aluminum enclosure with just a mid-fi price tag attached to it. Could this be the Holy Grail of digital audio, or this is this another flavor of the month? Let’s find out together. I personally don’t hold a lot of respect for forgiving sounding DACs, I personally value non-forgiving sources, that are giving me everything on a plate, it should be my only decision to look and hear all those micro-details, and mastering errors or not. I can count on X16 because it always appeared as detailed and transparent sounding no matter the song. It was so obvious hearing people inhaling and exhaling air in their lungs, fingers touching musical instruments, low-level notes and air casually passing around in well-mastered music. This DAC is a killer. Detailled, dynamic, wide and deep soundstage, neutral but not cold and not so much analytical. It grooves. It outperforms my AudioGD NFB29 9038 except if i am below -30db. I know a lot of you are wondering how X16 compares to the best Gustard has ever made, so let’s get it done.

Gustard went overkill with the I/V conversion stage, as they used eight OPA1612A for the I/V conversion stage, meaning that all 8-channels of this DAC chip are being used. X18 performs an independent I/V conversion for all 8 channels and then connects them in parallel, squeezing the best this silicon is capable of. As for the OPA1612 themselves, those are regarded as warm, smooth and natural sounding, exactly what a super-linear silicon like ES9038 PRO really needs. Depending on where you live, the time it may take for your exchanged product to reach you, may vary. Please allow 3-5 business days for mail-in exchanges to be processed. For this comparison my weapon of choice was the Hifiman HE1000SE, which seems to be extremely detailed and transparent, more so than my loudspeakers and more so to the Audeze LCD-4, Kennerton Wodan and Erzetich Phobos, so it was natural using some detail-oriented headphones. This DAC is using a dual 9038Q2M chips and fully balanced and also equipped with DIP8 OP amps and removable BT module. It is using the same chips as the Soncoz SGD1 ) BT Power: SELECTED or ALWAYS. Self-explanatory, leave it at Selected if you are not using the BT input that often.In the MAC system, the volume operation in the system directly calls the "hardware volume", and the mac tries to avoid software volume due to sound quality considerations. An interesting feature of the device is the ability to reverse phase of the signal. You can enable this in the “phase invert” menu. As a result, any phase is reversed 180 degrees. This function will be useful when listening to phonograms with the phase reversed during recording. Leave this feature disabled of course.



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