The link to the measurements from your source: https://kenrockwell.com/apple/lightning-adapter-audio-quality.htm https://kenrockwell.com/apple/lightning-adapte

The link to the measurements from your source: https://kenrockwell.com/apple/lightning-adapter-audio-quality.htm https://kenrockwell.com/apple/lightning-adapter-audio-qualit... According to those measurements the adaptor's DAC is fantastic, especially for a $9 part. And in the spirit of anecdotes, the old iPhone DACs were notoriously hissy and weak, and if you're buying high impedance headphones you have no business plugging that into a phone's headphone jack... spend the $20-50 on an amp/DAC and call it a day. Just a bigger dongle.