Frequency Response: White & Pink Noise Testing
There are a handful of different types of “colored” noise, white noise has equal dB across the entire frequency spectrum (limited in how high the range is in frequency by the track/album used). While “pink” noise has a perfectly flat line in the audible range with a -20dB drop (at varying slopes/shapes) after 20 kHz.
A perfectly flat line (on the FFT) is what we want to see on this first test (white noise is up first), and both DACs come very close using this method to “flat”. Pink noise is what you see below the first two photographs. Sadly I don’t have equal quality digital files (such as DSD256 as I do for each frequency vs. a sweep or colored noise that I only have in CD quality).


Now let’s look at how a 96kHz 24-bit FLAC pink noise and how this shows us the high frequency roll off.


Now, with the ES9038Pro, you can change the behavior/shape of the high frequency roll-off using FIR filters found in the menus. Each of the 10 or so filters have a noticeable impact on the shape of the FFT. This is one of the examples that show the flexibility of the ES9038P. We can see just from the last two scope captures that the Burson Play does indeed have a higher dBV value at parts of the higher frequency end of the FFT than the ES9038P (this matches what I noticed listening).
Note: I am working on doing frequency response using discrete frequencies as I have them in DSD256. However, I have run into some difficulties getting a fair score on both DACs. I am also working on THD, SNR, Jitter, etc. However, this may have to wait until the next review that is appropriate for. (Not enough interest in the Play now, to justify it).
Thanks for being patient!
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Table of Contents:
- Review Main Page
- Competition Hardware Descriptions:
- Review Hardware Info v2.0 vs. v1.6 Burson Audio Play:
- Digital Noise/Mouse Distortion + Solution: (USB Ground Headaches)
- Opening Thoughts on Voicing of Burson “Play” vs. ES9038Pro:
- Listening Tests Streaming: ES9038 on Coax + RCA out
- A Closer Look at Oversampling & Noise Filtering: (It’s Not Magic!)
- Listening Test Music (Pt 1): (Adele with ES9038P on I2S)
- Listening Test Music (Pt 2): (Tedeschi Trucks Band with ES9038P on Coax)
- A note on Converting PCM to DSD with Foobar2000: (DSD64 Clicking)
- Balanced vs. Unbalanced: (Understanding the ES9038’s Performance)
- Adding I2S Input To ES9038 DAC: (Power Tools and Soldering Irons)
- Measurements/Technical Page
- Closing Remarks: (The Verdict)
you did a great review im impressed keep going with different opamps and please listen this album https://soundcloud.com/baccident/long-after-you-re-gone-chris-jones-flac-lossless-download its epic
I’ll try and check out that album soon and thanks for the kind words! I wanted to perform more DAC measurements, but I could never find anyone who was comfortable enough with DAC performance measurements to help me validate my numbers. I even asked two of my former Electrical Engineering classmates, neither felt comfortable enough. Measuring amplifiers is much simpler than measuring DAC performance!
I am working on the Black Gate™ comparison currently, but I’ll try to return Review #3 and add in a section where I change op-amps. The only reason I didn’t do this before was because I wanted to focus most of the review on the DACs themselves, not so much the op-amps. This is why I gave both DACs the best op-amps I had at the time of the review (Sparkos SS3601/SS3602 and Burson’s V6-OPA Classics). If nothing else, I’ll swap op-amps from the Burson Play to the ES9038P and vice versa, looking for a change in the overall voicing of the DACs.
I always welcome feedback and thanks again for reading Hallman labs!
Keith H,