# External DAC on Android head unit, is it possible?



## lpopa93 (Sep 23, 2017)

Hello, and nice to meet this community (this is my first post). I was looking into buying an Android head unit for my car, because I love the connectivity options and gadgets I could attach to the head unit. Also, I could use lots of Android apps and connect to the internet. My stock old Audi A4 can't even connect my phone through bluetooth properly. 

As we all know, these head units have poor sound quality, and I was thinking to use a good quality external USB DAC to fix this issue. I would connect the DAC to the head unit through the USB port, and then, through the RCA cables, I would connect the DAC output back to the head unit input. 

A regular android phone knows how to output digital audio signal through USB. Would this also work for my head unit. Did anybody try doing this?


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## AAAAAAA (Oct 5, 2007)

Yes people do it, certain usb DACs are android compatible however now all audio will be directed to tje DAC... Like Bluetooth.

I recommend looking on the xda forums and sticking to the brands joying and Whitson... Or Something like that.

It's amazing how well these cheep Chinese android integrate perfectly like stock in looks and functional and speed/power... Compared to the awful standard rectangles sold by the established head unit companies.


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## Swaglife81 (Oct 15, 2016)

There is an Android music app that bypasses the factory Android dac and uses it's own dac. I'm sure someone can mention the name. For the life of me I can't think of it. Plenty of external dacs compatible with Android however. Not to expensive these days either


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## Weightless (May 5, 2005)

Huh? Apps don't have DACs. A DAC is hardware, not software. 

What are you referring to?

Sent from my SM-N920P using Tapatalk


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## Pr_007 (Jul 14, 2010)

You can use Neutron Player App or USB Audio Player Pro... They play audio via USB.


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## AAAAAAA (Oct 5, 2007)

Weightless said:


> Huh? Apps don't have DACs. A DAC is hardware, not software.
> 
> What are you referring to?
> 
> Sent from my SM-N920P using Tapatalk


He may be referring to soundabout where you can chose what output for each app


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## dunksalot (Jun 12, 2016)

The Chinese Android units do not allow for what you are asking. The Rockchip and Allwinner chipsets are chip "SETS", meaning they have a DAC chip built into them and that's how the Chinese are designing these. 

They haven't figured out how to entirely bypass the internal DAC which destroys your audio quality...EXCEPT the Joying Intel Sofia units. A few years back Intel was looking at making an acquisition (of Rockchip I believe) so they partnered with them and offered the Sofia chipset as an entree into the Android HU market. Unfortunately, that relationship quickly fizzled in 6 months (for reasons I do not know.)

There are some threads on XDA that detail how you can use a Sofia-based unit to extract a clean digital signal into an external USB device capable of hi-res audio. But those are Android 5.1 only and you will be limited to what apps are still functioning at 5.1 when the handset world is running at 7.0 and higher going forward. Some apps already do not work so the Android functionality is lost.

I do know this market...invested in it and traveled to Shenzhen multiple times to visit factories and establish sourcing relationships ("cooperation" as they refer to it in China.) Little problems continued to plague our product line. For example, we launched with a cheap BT 4.0 module for handsfree but in China they still drive with their handsets to their ear - no handsfree laws yet. So my design engineer cheaped out on BT design rather than going Parrot or aptX because why not he has no concept of what we do here in the USA even though I explained just how important this was.

We were as good as anything out there but audio-wise we were still garbage compared to Japanese OEMs. Our "Phase II" plan was to pursue the QCOM line and revolutionize the HU market with hi-res audio via BT, all optical, Android-based functionality with no boot delays, and a host of other upgrades. That would take the average company $10M and a 2-year development cycle to build but we could have for maybe $2M and done in 1 year. Sadly, I ran out of capital and my engineering resource in Shenzhen won some big OEM deals so we became a lower priority.


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## Mohito (Mar 7, 2011)

hello people, 
So just to be clear, if I connect a USB dac (that supports Anderoid) to a 'Chinese HU' it won't play through it? 

My specific issue is that I'll need a dac with 2in 6 out to do a normal car + sub(s) but I'm not sure how to control fade and balance, at the moment I believe it's using the analogue outputs from the HU which are probably not very good.

ideas welcome


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## freetomfr69 (Jul 28, 2018)

dunksalot said:


> The Chinese Android units do not allow for what you are asking. The Rockchip and Allwinner chipsets are chip "SETS", meaning they have a DAC chip built into them and that's how the Chinese are designing these.
> 
> They haven't figured out how to entirely bypass the internal DAC which destroys your audio quality...EXCEPT the Joying Intel Sofia units. A few years back Intel was looking at making an acquisition (of Rockchip I believe) so they partnered with them and offered the Sofia chipset as an entree into the Android HU market. Unfortunately, that relationship quickly fizzled in 6 months (for reasons I do not know.)
> 
> ...


I'm a little bit surprised because it works with a simple cheap Android 5.1 Tablet but don't with an android 6.0 HU. I really don't understand why a so simple thing doesn't work.

I heard that it is only a problem of sound drivers (modules) not included in kernel:
snd-hwdep.ko
snd-rawmidi.ko
snd-usbmidi-lib.ko
snd-usb-audio.ko

So for you it is really complicated to do and need a lot of R&D?

It is not only a problem of drivers? 

Thanks


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## bigaudiofanatic (Mar 1, 2009)

Just pumping a thread what about a phoniex unit? I want to do a dac sense I'm feeding either my 3sixty.3 or bitten.


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## bigaudiofanatic (Mar 1, 2009)

Bump found an app called USB Audio Player Pro which stated it's configured to bypass the internal dac and use a external one.


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## bigaudiofanatic (Mar 1, 2009)

Bump


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## RazorRust (Aug 13, 2020)

Hate to bring up an old thread but this is my exact question.

Chinese android head unit. Is there anyway to bypass the internal DAC and use an external one? Do any of the apps mentioned above work?


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## bigaudiofanatic (Mar 1, 2009)

RazorRust said:


> Hate to bring up an old thread but this is my exact question.
> 
> Chinese android head unit. Is there anyway to bypass the internal DAC and use an external one? Do any of the apps mentioned above work?


Nope, I tried 5 different USB dacs. I even tried workshop 12's unit but their USB splitter they include wouldn't let it work either.


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## Slave2myXJ (Dec 18, 2021)

Bluetooth to external DAC? Not ideal, but ...


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## bigaudiofanatic (Mar 1, 2009)

Slave2myXJ said:


> Bluetooth to external DAC? Not ideal, but ...


Sure but you're not going to get aptX HD so you're not really going to gain anything.


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## Slave2myXJ (Dec 18, 2021)

Compared to only getting 0.7V out of the RCAs, the trade-off may be worthwhile


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## CrimsonCountry (Mar 11, 2012)

RazorRust said:


> Hate to bring up an old thread but this is my exact question.
> 
> Chinese android head unit. Is there anyway to bypass the internal DAC and use an external one? Do any of the apps mentioned above work?


In short, yes. The Douk U2 (popular, cheap DAC on here) works every time via UAPP on all 3 of the units usb ports. Its shows up in Poweramp as well but UAPP is where it's at as it actually completely bypasses the internal android audio layering that resembles to 48khz for a true bit-perfect playback. That is if you care about that. My unit (and all current models) run Android 10 so YMMV on others. 

USB DACs were supposedly made standard all the way back on 5.1.1 but you can see that's not always the case. Units like Joying also have optical out (albeit at Androids 48khz) so that's another option as bit-perfect playback is debatablely better in real-world listening scenarios at highway speeds...my experience anyway.

I wouldn't bother with the RCA outs unless I had to as I'd assume they're maxed at 2v. Not the worst, and better than some of these on the past, but I'd take optical anyday over that if you can.


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## Bikey (May 15, 2021)

Any good current-model head unit has RCA outs, spdif outs (toslink and/or coaxial) and USB. If USB fails, for whatever reason, you can always send the spdif output to a DAC.


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## RazorRust (Aug 13, 2020)

CrimsonCountry said:


> In short, yes. The Douk U2 (popular, cheap DAC on here) works every time via UAPP on all 3 of the units usb ports. Its shows up in Poweramp as well but UAPP is where it's at as it actually completely bypasses the internal android audio layering that resembles to 48khz for a true bit-perfect playback. That is if you care about that. My unit (and all current models) run Android 10 so YMMV on others.
> 
> USB DACs were supposedly made standard all the way back on 5.1.1 but you can see that's not always the case. Units like Joying also have optical out (albeit at Androids 48khz) so that's another option as bit-perfect playback is debatablely better in real-world listening scenarios at highway speeds...my experience anyway.
> 
> I wouldn't bother with the RCA outs unless I had to as I'd assume they're maxed at 2v. Not the worst, and better than some of these on the past, but I'd take optical anyday over that if you can.


So a Donk U2 will work with the uapp app on the Chinese head units? Just won't to make sure because it seems like others say it won't.


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## CrimsonCountry (Mar 11, 2012)

RazorRust said:


> So a Donk U2 will work with the uapp app on the Chinese head units? Just won't to make sure because it seems like others say it won't.


Yes, but so do many other USB DACs. I only mentioned that one as it's the one I have, well-reviewed (it is just a DAC afterall) and fairly cheap. The Toping D10 variants are another popular one if you want the playback rate screen.

I can only speak for Joying but all the decent Android 10 head units should work without issue. I'd get one with Spdif/Coax out as well so you have options: RCA, optical and USB. It's hard to go wrong at their price ($300+ for a good unit) given their flexibility.


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## RazorRust (Aug 13, 2020)

Oh ok. My unit does not have optical output or spdif. That's why USB DAC is only option. I'm guessing a USB DAC will not work with most of the Chinese head units, only a couple of brands. As bigaudiofanatic mention he tried 5 different ones and dunksalot said no one has been able to bypass the internal DAC.


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## CrimsonCountry (Mar 11, 2012)

Oh ok. I missed that you had already purchased a unit. Which one did you get? 

And most of the higher-end (for cheap Chinese Android units) use the UIS7862/Snapdragon chip and supports DAC playback. Just look over at XDA-Developer forums too for all the info you could ever want on these things. The catch is only the specific player's audio is routed through the DAC but it's a non-issue if you have the other outputs hooked up when Android audio takes over. Its pretty well reported that Joying and alike work with USB DACs now.


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