SMSL SU-9 Review II – Worth Less?

INTRO

Like a game on the Price is Right, is the SMSL SU-9 worth less or more than your favorite pair of headphones? With a simple wave of the hand by Barker’s beauties, he would ask is it higher or lower than a Casper mattress? Who cares, this thing is pretty awesome and I know Loomis also thinks so. Stacked with one of the jaw dropping DAC chip specs of the ESS Sabre lineup ES9038pro, and all the inputs and outputs you could ever need, the SMSL SU-9 is not f..king around. You want USB, optical, coaxial AND bluetooth input, No problem. You want unbalanced RCA and balanced outputs- sure thang. Being the frugal bastard I was forced to reckon with myself and ask why DON’T I need one of these DACs? I have been mulling over a $100-150 DAC for some time, but now that I have played with the SMSL SU-9 DAC, it is reminiscent of why the multi-function printer sits on my desk. It does everything you could ask and beautifully.

THE SETUP

I noticed upon connecting to my computer that it defaulted to 32bit 48Khz. Since music is pretty much defaulted to Redbook 44.1khz, I corrected that easily in the Windows sound settings. For those that really believe the hype about extra sampling, I suggest going with multiples of 44.1khz…so 88.2Khz or 176.4Khz instead of 96 and 192 respectively. The resampling can cause errors that are normally audible, however even with the SMSL SU-9 set at 48Khz I didn’t notice any irregularities. If you plan on utilizing DSD playback there are drivers to install, otherwise Windows 10 added it to my sound devices without any fanfare.

One feature that seems odd in a class leading DAC is bluetooth functionality normally known as the black sheep of the family. Logic the errors ensued since the bluetooth is phenomenal in terms of usability. It connects easily, painlessly, and the range with the stubby antenna reached from one end of my abode to the other, around corners and in another room. While that seems silly, it is greatly appreciated given experiences with my wireless Google Chromecast adapters usually in use for remote streaming wandering throughout my day. Another surprise occurred by accident as it streamed all day from Tidal without missing a beat unoticed until I turned my powered monitors back on and found my playlist still going. Sweet.

THE WEIRD

No way to exit the main menu, you just wait for it to timeout unless using the remote. Not a big deal, perhaps it is on purpose to keep the tinkers engaged, like a DJ that just cannot seem to stop turning knobs and dials to lay his or her masterpiece. The fixed volume display of “99” instead of 100 is another oddity, like it is egging the user on to drink the last drop that won’t quite exit the bottle of nirvana. Three feet instead of four makes it a little wobbly, I cannot make sense of that choice.

THE SOUND

Utilizing an 8 channel DAC to squeeze every last ounce of clean and powerful sound out of your music is quite amazing when you first hear it. Note the 8 channels are not used in individual channels, but rather to improve the 2 channel output in the SMSL SU-9. Stunning realism and transparency ensue, the SMSL SU-9 will not be the weak link, at least not in my desktop setup of feeding my O2 headphone amplifier. You know what transparency sounds like?-music. I tried the different PCM filters, and while I did not pick up any coloration there, I did notice some changes playing with the sound color modes. At middle age any changes in high frequency filtering is probably lost on me. The soundstage is wide open and depth excellent as the recording intends. The barebones of the SMSL SU-9 is however a strong arm in wrestling the finer details out of my recordings than I could notice on my lesser equipment. It sounds powerful in the low end and lets the mid-range come through clear, treble sounds precise and brisk. I am not suggesting it adds any color, only that there is plenty of drive. At low volumes the SMSL SU-9 really shines, noise is gone and all that remains is finer nuances of a recording. It boasts -130dB SNR and -123dB THD well below our hearing sensitivity thresholds so no surprise here. This is the first “real” DAC I have tested outside of my outdated pro-audio soundcards, so unfortunately I have nothing worthy to compare it to.

The SMSL SU-9 supports the highest available 32bit/768Khz DSD512 format and the more widely used MQA PCM format. DSD is likely to lose out to MQA as streaming and mixing/mastering adopts the MQA format, but it’s important for a high tier DAC to offer all the bells and whistles. Unfortunately my Tidal subscription does not include any MQA content, but the SMSL SU-9 can handle that format as well as HiBy’s UAT bluetooth format.

THE LOOKS

The display is bright and simplistic looking while having a nice elegant hoighty-toighty look to it that you can brag to all your audiophile friends about the high end look without a high-end price tag. Smooth rounded corners follow a basic design trend of smoothing out the rough edges avoiding that unfinished industrialized over compensating brick. The one lightweight control knob feels solid enough and easily navigates through the menu of every tuning option unlocked with the “pro” series of the ESS9038 DAC.

OUTRO

I put the value high on this DAC since a well done bluetooth adapter plus the cost of a good DAC puts this easily in the price of this one unit with all the ins/outs and tweakers delight settings. Damn you SMSL for creating a superb DAC shredding my desires for a lesser DAC. Definitely recommended and hard to part with when I send this loaner back.

TWEAKERS UNITE

Contact us!

DISCLAIMER

Apos Audio loaned audioreviews.org this unit for review; it will be returned to Apos.

Get the SMSL SU-9 from Apos Audio through our affiliate link. 100% of the money raised supports Chicago musicians via CIVL.

Our generic standard disclaimer.

About my measurements.

You find an INDEX of our most relevant technical articles HERE.