No problem, I bow before your deep knowledge.
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I donāt know what Iām doing, I only said Cam knows what he is doing 
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Maybe itās your style, I donāt know. Raising yourself above other people, itās super annoying.
Few points, there was nothing incorrect in my original post. -3dB is something Jussi has recommended all over the internet. Itās a good baseline. Using -3dB doesnāt mean you donāt know what youāre doing, like you imply. I know perfectly well what Iām doing and use -6dB in HQP volume control with the VBA DSP filter I use. I could bake it in the filter but I choose not to, since it doesnāt matter which way you do the -dB.
Also how tf could I know what Mr. Cam knows? Should I read his mind? Good to know that he has his filters generated with attenuation baked in.
And throwing around $50k price tags is somehow validating someoneās knowledge? Thereās people with million dollar setups who know nothing and people with $500 setups who know very much about this hobby. Simply a stupid comment.
I have no problem admitting that I didnāt know that the volume knob turns red in some other occasions than clipping. You learn something new every day.
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No need for NeuralLink, he wrote that his limited counter stays at 0 
it was a jokeā¦ you think there exists a $50k credit card size Raspberry Pi DAC HAT board?
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To more interesting discussion and on topic:
Reply from Topping when I told them they havenāt properly tested DSD512 and DSD Direct (after I sent them my measurementsā¦ for the anti measurement crowd it is not possible to detect these technical performance faults with your earsā¦):
āOur engineers have received your message and believe it will be improved for future products.ā
No word on firmware fixes for current products
Maybe their 1-bit SDM D900 wonāt be so broken now, if they check it ? Who knows
If I can do a free home trial I will check. Otherwise, I am happily enjoying Holo Cyan2 and I can sleep well at night that it performs really well with DSD256 especially
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Yet the knob turns red, which is something I didnāt know is possible in other instances than clipping.
It wouldnāt surprise me a bit if there was $50k Pi DAC HATs around in this hobby. Thereās freaking cables around probably costing double that.
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Since they put out a new DAC about monthly, I donāt think they have time or bother to maintain āolderā existing productsā¦
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Yes E30iii probably isnāt too far away
everyone here with E30ii can use it as a door stopper
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I agree with your comments. If not incorporating the headroom within the convolution filter implies someone does not know what they are doing, thereās probably hundreds of thousands of people out there not know what they are doing ā¦
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I am using wasapi with virtual Hi-Fi cable to feed music into HQPlayer from Foobar. Just wondering is there other way to do it better?
The issue I have is that I have to change the bitrate manually in the HQPlayer when Foobar feed music with a different bitrate.
For Roon, the bitrate is auto.
Wowā¦ E30II is pretty new.
For E30II, it supports āDSD Directā
For E30III, it will supports āTrueDSD Directā. LOL.
It reminds me wireless bluetooth earphone vs true wireless bluetooth earhphone 
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Today I also received the response from Aoshida which can be summarized as follows:
They advise against upscaling PCM files but donāt say why,
The maximum volume will be reduced after HQplayer conversion, thus losing the signal-to-noise ratio and dynamic range.
They recommend using JRiver because it is the one tested by Topping and which gives the best results in terms of signal-to-noise ratio and dynamic range
DSD frequencies (DSD128 and DSD256 can achieve a balance between distortion and in-band noise).
While waiting to buy the Cyan 2 I set the E30II to Fixed Volume, DSD 256, F1 and HQPlayer as follow
Thanks everyone for the help
yes but we have a better thread to discuss feeding other sources into HQPlayer , lets discuss there
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E30iii was a joke. I donāt know if such a product is coming
But since there is a ii it is probably safe to assume one day a iii
And the measurements i showed are still excellent really - any joke i make doesnāt change the excellent measurements
No you donāt, because then you need to attenuate less at your amplifier side and thus you have less SNR/DNR loss there.
You also win a lot lower distortion!
Generally yes
But there are now amps that have less noise and less distortion than most DACs
So in practical sense (not theoretical) when you reduce 1dB on the amp your THD+N also reduces by only 1dB, Just like digital volume control
Not the case with a lot of amps unfortunately
My headphone amp measures better than my Cyan2
ā¦measured at full power again? Not at your normal listening volume?
For example ESS chip has roughly equivalent noise itself as 600 ohm resistor. If you have a 20 kOhm potentiometer on the path, it will generate more thermal noise than your DAC output has.
Except that DACs usually have lowest THD at level below 0 dBFS. It is not unusual to have lowest THD+N at -10 dB.
But yes, so you donāt gain anything by trying to maintain high output level from DAC because the net DNR is result of all attenuations on the path. If your DAC output level is lower, you just can keep the amp volume higher up with best case situation Ā±0 change regardless where you do it.
My amps generally have more noise at my listening levels than my DACs at -3 dB output level.
But still, I donāt hear any hiss. In best possible situation, my listening background noise is about 30 dB SPL. If my DAC would have letās say just 110 dB SNR. This means that I would need to be listening louder than 140 dB SPL to hear the background noise. My headphones cannot do such, nor my ears.
Listening environments at 20 or less dB SPL become annoying, because you begin to hear your own heartbeats, breathing and your internal organs operating which is not at all nice.
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I always measure both at my normal listening level, and the standard 4V outputs. I never measure full output, doesnāt make practical sense to me
The Topping A70 Pro has one of best 50mV output measured, 95dB SNR
Majority of headphones amps on the planet are quite a bit worse
Mainly a problem for IEMs, less problematic for full sized headphones
Yes you donāt have one of these amps I am talking about that measure better than most DACs
And you are talking about noise only
But as I mentioned there are amps now with lower distortion than any DAC we have
Of course keep reading measurements beyond 1kHZ SINAD but there is virtually no measurable distortion here - this is insane
And look at the 50mV output, my IEM listening level - state of the art is over 90dB SNR at 50mV. It is a very short list doing this
Also because people measure those wrongā¦
Likely number of DACs would give just as good figures at -10 dBFS output levelā¦
But as side note, seems like AP has pretty bad clock phase noise on analog loopback!
And honestly, I donāt care about such SINAD figures. Likely that amp still sounds horribly bad for other reasons.
If I guess correctly, it is based on TIās INA1620 chip. Or tuned TIās TPA6120A2 circuit. These give good SINAD figures, but I never liked sound of those, transient performance is lacking.