What about all those Chinese DACs?

@willywonka 

Fair enough, my apologies! Specifications are wonky and you did not commit to them. OP is delinquent and his whole thread idea may have been a honey trap.

I do not frequent ASR but AMIR has measured Chinese gear and his take on inaudible specifications is that once measured distortion and noise fall below the threshold of human hearing, the gear is "transparent".

ASR/AMIR have also exposed legitimate, audible specs and flaws on certain models, such as high output impedance, channel imbalances, or lack of proper safety protections.

In addition, ASR frequently discusses how some Chinese manufacturers engage in a "SINAD race", prioritizing numbers that look excellent on a graph but provide no audible benefit over slightly less optimized, name-brand equipment.

Since the OP is not participating, he probably already knew about such vagaries when he began this thread. Maybe he was just looking for clarification, but it seems as if he has zero interest in addressing our answers to his question. 

@larsman 

I didn't think I crossed the line into political propaganda and felt that mahgister was being a bit quick with his emotions suggesting what I said had anything to do with being on one side of the isle or the other.

Perhaps Chinese and Russian gear are no-no's for some due to the fact that we are foes and work against one another in way's that blur lines between fact and fiction. 

China is free to advertise whatever specs what they want. There is no oversight. To be blunt, you are sticking your neck out and trusting a source that is not known to be trustworthy. 

@mapman 

The Thucydides Trap is a political theory 

I feel mahgister singled me out! lol

Such political talk is unavoidable when it comes to Chinese gear. 

Will folks stop buying Chinese gear if we go to war with them? What if you don't receive your product? Will Todd in Texas help you with that? Not sure Todd would be around to help if that conflict took off, but it sure should make on think twice about sending your money to a country that may bomb your house. Todd may be sympathetic to your cause if your DAC goes up with your house, but to what point? 

Welcome to reality. Brought to you by....(fill in the blank)!

@goodlistening64 - Fair enough, though I don't know which source/nation I should trust that IS trustworthy.

But my thoughts on Chinese DACs are like thoughts on any other international or domestic products; there's cheap junk that will not be reliable - I've bought my share of weird little adapter boxes from Amazon - and there are excellent quality products like Holo Audio, and I've had a wonderful-sounding May KTE DAC for over 5 years with no trouble. 

On a different, but related note, it will be interesting to see how MBL does under Chinese ownership. The buyer in acquisitions often says "no changes" but the realities are that buyers usually need to take costs out of the deal. Hopefully, that comes through reductions in back room operations, not engineering.