TOPPING E30 Reviews Compendium

Compendium updated February 11th, 2021

In a few short years, TOPPING has come to dominate the audio world. The TOPPING E30 is often overshadowed by its more popular siblings, but it might epitomize the company’s approach better than any other TOPPING product: hifi at a bargain. 

We’ve compiled reviews from across the web for your reference. What you’ll find here are the TLDR versions of the full reviews (which you can access with the provided links). We’ll continue updating this compendium as reviews come in. 

 

From Headfonia's review of the TOPPING E30, first published on May 25th, 2020:

“It’s a great time to be a budding personal audio enthusiast when affordable audio gear is as well-packaged, well-specced, and well-performing as the Topping E30. In fact, audiophiles with a little more experience who know that investments in transducers and amplifiers will yield greater net audio performance in their system should absolutely consider the E30 as an affordable and utterly competent DAC that ought to last them a very long time without the worry of ‘upgrade-itis’ creeping-in. I finished the listening component of my review several days ago, and yet I still have the E30 sitting right here on my desk feeding much more expensive equipment, and I’m not about to take it out in a hurry – it sounds awesome.

“The E30 gets an easy recommendation from me as an affordable and highly versatile DAC, and its remote functionality and overall usability make it an easy choice over pretty much everything else under $200. Thanks again to HiFiGo for sending us this sample!”

 

From SoundNews' review of the TOPPING E30, first published on April 14th, 2020: 

“Topping E30 is such an overachiever in every possible way that I can’t tell you enough how awesome it is at such an attractive price point. Putting my objective opinions behind, I can tell you that I liked it more than some pricier digital sources (DACs and DAPs) from the land of the red dragon. E30 is small, cute and really cheap but once you connect it to a serious system, it starts blooming and showing all its awesome skills. I consider it having a great tonal balance, being slightly on the warmer side, infusing just a bit more joy to the listener and increasing the void space between all musical notes. Connect it to a fast sounding solid-state amplifier and all the tiny cons of E30 could be easily counterbalanced.

“E30 is an amazing achievement for Topping and if you really don’t need a Bluetooth input, a headphone output or some balanced outputs, E30 could be the perfect unit for a secondary acoustic chain or for anyone that just started this wonderful hobby.”

 

From AV Forum's review of the TOPPING E30, first published on January 27th, 2021: 

“With the Editor’s Choice Awards for 2020 still only a scroll down the front page away from this review, the inevitable question of where the E30 sits compared to the iFi Zen DAC is one that needs answering. With a round of drinks between them in pricing, the iFi is a better preamp, has headphone amp functionality, balanced operation, MQA decoding and is fractionally better built. It remains a phenomenal bit of kit. The E30 is cheaper, has better connections, a remote and a display and should you be the proud owner of a copy of Brothers in Arms or whatever masterpieces are available in DSD512, it will play those too.

“In a way, it’s irrelevant which one is better. Both are outstanding and they cumulatively lower the price that you can add seriously capable digital decoding to an affordable Hi-Fi system. The Topping E30 drops this price another few pounds lower for a truly superlative bit of kit. The E30 might be small but it is unquestionably brilliant and has to be seen as a Best Buy.”

 

From Gadget Guy's review of the TOPPING E30, first published on January 18th, 2021:

“9.6/10

“I wouldn’t be surprised to see the performance of the Topping E30 DAC in a DAC priced ten times, even a hundred times, higher. As it stands, the Topping E30 is truly a bargain.”

 

From The Audiophile Man's review of the TOPPING E30, first published on May 21st, 2020: 

“Used as a DAC only and at this price? The Topping E30 offered a goodly selection of features and, as a DAC, performed as well as or better than similar units of twice the price, the E30 is a dinky marvel that features a small footprint and is perfect for any budget hi-fi set up. Spend a bit of time getting the right DAC filter for you in place, one that is suitable for your ears and sonic tastes and you’ll have tremendous fun with this box that offers excellent value for money.”

 

From iiWireviews' review of the TOPPING E30, first published on April 18th, 2020:

“By now you already realized how impressed I actually am with the Topping E30. It offers fine build, remote control, and a preamp function. More than that, it sounds astonishingly good for the price. Backed up with a low noise power supply and clean digital source, it doesn’t feel out of place even in a pricier system.

“The only thing it won’t do is to soften the truth so it’s more pleasurable. Personally, I love it just the way it is and my opinion wouldn’t change if E30 was twice its price. But the $130 price tag makes it one of the easiest recommendations I’ve ever made.”

 

Editor’s note: Emphases ours.