Brand: Venture Electronics
DAC model: Abigail - Tested on Pixel 6a
DAC model: AVANI - not owned, not tested
Price: 10$ USD
Store:
https://www.veclan.com/
https://veclan.aliexpress.com/store/group/Dac-amp/1924356_505051990.html?spm=a2g0o.detail.0.0.3c02743e8sO8ys
Both these DACs are made by audiophile enthusiast company and not your run of the mill Chinese company that wants to make a buck on amazon. They are very capable and are said to beat anything in the competition. They both outperform (considerably) apple and other "major brand" dongles for lesser price. Both are quite similar, but have small differences in sound, Abigail is more natural and AVANI is the more clinical. Both are quite powerful.
I have the Abigail and can confirm it works on Pixel 6a. It has a very robust sound. I am an audiophile type of guy and own 300$ DACs and other gear. I did not test this device thoroughly for sound but given a 5 minute listen I was impressed enough that I thought "no need for further inspection".
The max volume is very loud and if you are not careful you could blow out your headphones and your eardrums the first time you connect it. Plugging and unplugging the 3.5mm jack on some headphones causes an electrical noise to the headphone which means loud noise in your ears. so make sure the volume is low when you do this, or don't do it while dongle is connected.
Connecting the dongle to the pixel gives no notifications or indications that the device has been recognized and connected, so its a bit confusing at first.
Follow this procedure for first connect:
- Enable the relevant USB settings so the DAC gets detected.
- connect the DAC to your phone without a headphone plugged in.
- Without connecting a headphone play a song on your device with the DAC connected. If the device has been connected then no sound should come out of the speaker. Now turn the volume down to very low.
- Now Connect your headphone. Or for extra safety, pull the DAC out, connect your headphone, then reconnect the DAC.
- Now play the music and slowly turn sound up to your desired level.
While I would normally push the volume to 80-90% on most phones to get good volume on my headphone, with this one at 50% I am already beyond my loud listening limits.