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Vortecjr said ... "Pretty sure the wav out plug-in cames with the download."

If it's included in the download then fine, but how many beginners know that they need to select it

 

Vortecjr then said ... "Clay, just saw your last post...cool! We are splitting hairs on this...."

Personally I thinK Clay's comments have real value - the orginal poster was asking which he should get, so is obviously a beginner

 

Eloise

---

...in my opinion / experience...

While I agree "Everything may matter" working out what actually affects the sound is a trickier thing.

And I agree "Trust your ears" but equally don't allow them to fool you - trust them with a bit of skepticism.

keep your mind open... But mind your brain doesn't fall out.

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"On any other day Mr Morden you would be wrong...."

 

The problem with liking Macs is that people always jump to the conclusion you are just some effete fanboy with advanced Steve Jobs syndrome. I understand that PCs attract those with a garden shed tinkering disposition (deliberately antagonistic imagery) but you would have to be blind not to appreciate the aesthetic qualities of OSX and the design nuances of the Macintosh. The facts? well I have used Windows and mac OS extensively since the early 80s and can confirm that windows is a complete mess. Mac OS/X is far from perfect but at least was designed for specific purposes and OSX's Core Audio was designed by people who liked music.

 

You can build a windows PC that will make fantastic music in the same way that I can turn a Porsche 911 into a pickup truck but life is too short and you would scuff the paintwork.

 

Mac OS X works out of the box ... I don't think my facts are wrong but i am quite happy if you want to reinvent the wheel ... badly....

 

Eloise, I am in awe of your B5 knowledge....

 

Yours "The trouble with being infallible is that you have to deal with everyone else making mistakes." , tog

 

 

 

 

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I like the apple products as much as you do and you can connect your usb and firewire units all day long to them and get great sound. However, the picture you paint that the sound from a pc is bad and not designed by audio guys and so on is a function of your predisposition for apple. Its not based on fact no matter how you say it or how often you say it.

Taken from the Ayre website:

"There are currently two commonly used versions of Windows—XP and Vista—with a third looming on the horizon (Windows 7). All are capable ot excellent audio performance when properly configured." Yes properly configured and ps they due have a site to properly configure your apple. Gee I wonder why?

Also taken from the Ayre website:

"For most users we recommend J.River for its combination of ease of use, excellent ripping capability, flexible tagging options, and high sound quality. J.River it is a ready-to-go, all-in-one solution yet is highly configurable with many features."

 

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1. Knowledge: I have technical expertise to support it and provide help to others.

2. Familiarity: I’m more familiar with Windows hardware/software than Mac hardware/software

3. Organization: My iTunes library is a bloody mess. For instance with the Kent Poon discs I have several format versions of the same album including 16/44.1, 24/96. 24/192, AIFF, WAV, and MP3 versions. Using a program like XXHighEnd or MediaMonkey multiple libraries can set on the fly using the typical Windows Explorer interface. With iTunes I would get 5-10 versions of the same track before moving on to the next track.

4. Open source or Non-proprietary: iTunes is proprietary and obscure. True Windows does not measure up to Linux but it is much better than Mac. For instance, the import and export capabilities of iTunes are too limited for me. Even though I have a well organized music library on the Windows side the best way for me to get the music library with all the database info and artwork into iTunes is to re-rip.

5. Cost: Windows solutions are usually cheaper. For instance, it’s rather obvious that the cheapest Mac laptop is far more expensive than a comparable Windows laptop.

6. Flexibility: there are more very good options on the Windows side whereas things are more limited on the Mac side. For instance, based on the CA recommended “Audiophile Reference Music Server For A Song”, I have a Lynx AES16 PCI card. Sorry, but while Windows computers support PCI and PCIe cards there is no good solution for using my Lynx card in any of the few and expensive Mac computers.

7. Database Info: Because my Windows players draw info from a multiple of sources my music library is more accurate and complete. My iTunes library has too many missing album cover artwork or the music data retrieved is incorrect which would require considerable editing effort.

8. Superior Sonics: Windows solutions can be more easily tweaked to sound better than Mac solutions. For instance, cMP/cPlay users and Linux fans go to considerable lengths to optimize the hardware/software for superior sound. What these users want is a stripped down OS, no applications other than what’s required for the music server, ultra quiet and very low power components that generate the least noise, vibration, heat, and EMI/RF transmissions.

9. Plug and Play: There are many toss-ups here. Mac computers are much easier to use straight out of the box however the upgrades and replacement of parts is generally more difficult. Apple would just prefer that you take your Mac computer to the Apple Store or dealer for all repair swaps or upgrades. Windows users just accept the fact that they provide the free labor. And I believe most Mac users on the CA site will admit that parts from Apple are more expensive.

10. Reliability: This one favors Mac computers since there are fewer options and choices that may be incompatible or inferior. Of course the flip side is that Windows will usually provide the best and the worst since the Windows market is so much larger. For instance, you are more likely to find that Windows drivers for hardware may be better than for the Mac just because there are significantly many more people working on them, i.e. the dollars follow the market.

 

I am sure that any of the above can be argued. But this is MY OPINON and MY ADVICE and the above may not be applicable to you.

 

I have used iTunes on my Windows computers for years. Then about 4 years ago I received a MacBook Pro as a gift. Only then did I ever take computer audio seriously. Later, I bought one DAC, then another and evaluated more. Bought different cables, tried different software players and started to rip my CDs into a digital music library. Then after being somewhat negative against the CA recommended “Audiophile Reference Music Server For A Song” since 60% of the cost was attributed to the Lynx card, I decided to try.

 

As they say the rest is history. I am comfortable with cMP/cPlay, XXHighend, and MediaMonkey. I will often use WaveLab as a benchmark but it is not a suitable music player. So iTunes, even with Amarra, is the odd man out. If Chris has the time and opportunity to explore these alternative perhaps you will value his recommendations more than mine. That’s okay, this is a hobby to be enjoyed and explored. If you are looking to get to the end of the road without traveling it you will be missing many things. Around the World in 80 Days starts in London and ends in London, but the travel and adventure is its soul.

 

 

 

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Nice post, Audio Zorro.

 

it was a good read.

 

Sorry to hear that your iTunes library is a mess. Yes, the duplicate songs in different formats is an issue for me as well, but I'm too lazy to sort it out. I'd much rather Xslimmer my apps, or OmniDiskSweep for unused files to reduce the disk space.

 

clay

 

 

 

 

 

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So far, there's been a lot of excellent 'Mac or PC' info, so I'll leave it there. What I would say is that, until you've had a chance to evaluate them, don't stick all your eggs in the 'Toslink, usb or firewire' basket. The best sound I have so far heard from a computer has come via a soundcard. I've said this before, and raised a few hackles in the process, but in the comparisons I have carried out the 3 'standard' computer to dac interfaces lose out by a country mile when compared to either a dedicated soundcard or a network solution - which is effectively a soundcard, at the end of a network cable, anyway! This is all IMHO of course and is not to say that the other interfaces cannot be made to sound good - but my ideal source computer will have AES outputs and that only comes with a good soundcard.

 

At least going the PC route gives you the opportunity to try the differences for yourself. You've got to buy a lot of Mac before you get the same flexibility.

 

So my point really, is that there is no good answer to the Mac versus PC debate. If you buy a Mac you'll always wonder if a PC would sound better, if you buy a PC you'll always wonder if you should have bought a Mac. So, research the interface first and see if that helps you choose the computer you need!

 

PS - Playful hint - Macs are for people who have trouble tying their own shoelaces and eating with a knife and fork!

 

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Bob says:

 

"but in the comparisons I have carried out the 3 'standard' computer to dac interfaces lose out by a country mile when compared to either a dedicated soundcard or a network solution"

 

Bob, with all due respect, if you've compared an S/PDIF interface DAC to any of the DACs recommended here - Weiss (firewire), Metric Halo (firewire), Ayre (Async USB) or Wavelength (Async USB), and they lose by a country mile - then a 'country mile' just ain't what it used to be. Just my humble opinion, of course.

 

Have you indeed compared your preferred DAC setup to any of these? :)

If so, which DAC did you compare to, and which DAC did you find bested these by 'a country mile'?

 

If you're just referring to TOSlink, then I would agree with you.

 

If you're referring to the 'me-too' USB implementations, an AES DAC might also be superior, but a country mile is a long way where I came from, i.e. the 'country'. ;)

 

Clay

 

 

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I hoped the 'standard' reference would do it but no, I haven't compared against any Async implementations - everything else, but not Async. Perhaps I should have been a tad more specific, no worries I still stand by my opinion that, if one is starting out, restricting your interface choices by your choice of computer makes little sense, unless you are very sure of your preferences. A soundcard with coax spdif and/or balanced aes outputs, fitted into a standard computer, opens up the world of Dacs to just about everything ever made.

 

A Mac with Toslink/Usb and/or Firewire restricts the choice of available dacs quite severely. Yes, it's a good choice of computer IF you are sure that one of these interfaces will meet your needs, but it can be a big 'if'!

 

Too big for me, of course! :)

 

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I'm learning lots (and seeing quite a bit of passion) from the posts recently generated by this thread. I appreciate them all and the facts that are presented in them are valuable and the hyperbolic opinion is rather interesting.

 

Bob, on your last post, you provide a good piece of logic and the earlier superb post by Audiozorro on the ten reasons to go with Windows has some compelling logic. I'm not a PC builder, so any choice I make will be somewhat of an out of the box machine. One of the advantages I see for a Mac (either a Mini or more likely a Mac Book with a SSD) is their ability to be relatively quiet in a listening room. On the PC side, the quiet servers (I'll use Goodwin's as an example) are very pricy. [Jesus, if you want to weigh in here, I'll correspond off line given your business.]

 

My questions for Bob (or anyone else who wants to weigh in):

Do you agree on the relative quiet of a Mac Book with SSD in the listening room hooked up to a storage device outside the listening room?

Are there ways to build an equally quiet PC to have in a listening room?

How long a cable run can you use with the PC cards you recommend, so that the server could be outside the listening room?

If this is doable, is there a remote means of control?

 

The PS Audio Perfect Wave Dac seems to be a possibility here (if the bridge comes out), but this again takes us away from the flexible server Bob and Audiozorro are discussing.

 

Thanks all.

 

 

MBP13-128gb ssd using VoiceOver to hear the screen, iTunes, Ayre QB-9, McIntosh mx119 & mc207, Thiel CS2.4

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A MacMini with a Weiss AFI1 allows you all manner of AES compatible DACs without costing much more than a bespoke "silent" PC. And using Firewire this way is just as good as using PCI bus to Lynx AES16, etc.

 

Eloise

 

Eloise

---

...in my opinion / experience...

While I agree "Everything may matter" working out what actually affects the sound is a trickier thing.

And I agree "Trust your ears" but equally don't allow them to fool you - trust them with a bit of skepticism.

keep your mind open... But mind your brain doesn't fall out.

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Bob says:

"I still stand by my opinion that, if one is starting out, restricting your interface choices by your choice of computer makes little sense, unless you are very sure of your preferences"

 

The very first sentence in the very first response (mine) to the opening post:

 

"Pick your DAC first, or at least the style of DAC you think you'll wind up with. Doing so will prevent you from possibly having to buy an expensive 'converter' later when you discover that there's no 'direct' connection possible between your chosen computer/OS and your preferred DAC."

 

Bob also says:

"A Mac with Toslink/Usb and/or Firewire restricts the choice of available dacs quite severely."

 

Not if one is willing to purchase a converter (aka soundcard). Your recommended approach seems to assume the need for the soundcard/converter as a starting point. My approach is the opposite, decide if you need one. Good sound can be had either way, but why buy a converter as a starting point?

 

As Eloise has already pointed out, there are very good Firewire converters (that are being used into, e.g. the Berkeley Alpha, Pacific Microsonics Model Two, etc.). There's also the Bel Canto USB Link (already mentioned in this thread) as well, which costs half as much as the 'de rigeur' AES converter, the Lynx.

 

So, no one is boxed in with a choice of Mac OS that I can see. The only lack of flexibility I see with Mac is that the esoteric playback software is NOT available on the Mac. But neither does iTunes sound as good on a PC as on a Mac, and neither does the PC run Amarra. Apparently, there will be another high quality Mac-based software player soon as well (from Wave Editor?)

 

So, Rayhil, I guess the choice of software is another factor - if you want to avoid limiting yourself by the choice of OS.

 

respectfully,

clay

 

 

 

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You won’t get any arguments from me using a Mac Mini and a Weiss AF11 or Weiss DAC2 as an interface or just a DAC for the latter. Those are excellent setups, it’s just that add Amarra and it gets rather expensive. However, if I ever found that Mac solution to be sonically superior to a cMP/cPlay build, the Mac/Weiss/Amarra would be my choice.

 

I am not a fan of the Mac laptops if you intend to run it for hours but it’s great for traveling and portability, though again pricey. My MacBook Pro runs pretty warm and I never run it 24/7 like I do my Windows music servers. I do use a Thermapak heat shift cooling pad with my laptop to keep down the temperature for the few hours while the pad is effective.

 

I am very comfortable building my PCs so for me quiet and inexpensive is no problem. But I am finding many new stock computers to be a lot quieter than they used to be. An out of the box solution I may evaluate later this year or next is the fanless miniature Fit-PC2 for traveling with a Devilsound DAC instead of using my iPod. Obviously that setup would be limited to 24/96. One of the cMP/cPlay users has reported excellent SQ with the Fit-PC2. I would assume the Wavelength Proton DAC would also be an excellent DAC for traveling.

 

So the conclusion for anyone reading through this thread is that excellent computer audio solutions can be found down many roads, whether Windows or Mac. Since I would like to operate in both worlds I am committed to the WAV audio file format as oppose to FLAC or AIFF. I believe the library limits I find with iTunes would disappear if ITunes had import/export capabilities to the usual CSV or Microsoft Excel or Access programs. And then it would not matter which platform you started with, it would be easy to change. That problem I place squarely on the shoulders of Apple or iTunes supporters to fix, assuming they care and want to.

 

 

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One thing to note - it may not be as simple as a CSV file, but the iTunes library stores a copy of it's information in XML format - there's not a lot more open source than that ...

 

Eloise

 

Eloise

---

...in my opinion / experience...

While I agree "Everything may matter" working out what actually affects the sound is a trickier thing.

And I agree "Trust your ears" but equally don't allow them to fool you - trust them with a bit of skepticism.

keep your mind open... But mind your brain doesn't fall out.

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Sorry about the tardy response, but by the time his thread got going again me and my bad-tempered bones were safely tucked up in bed!

 

Anyway, on with the show..........

 

I can't really comment on the quietness of a Mac Book, having never owned one, but I would think it would do the job just fine!

 

For building a quiet PC you could do a lot worse than take Chris' mCubed server as an excellent reference : http://www.computeraudiophile.com/mCubed-hFX-Silent-Fanless-Music-Server-Review

 

Remote control - ok, it's a fair cop! There are solutions out there for MediaMonkey, I think, and maybe JRiver too, but I think you would be hard pressed to better an iPhone/iTouch and iTunes set up if remote control is important to you. My own solution to this problem, bearing in mind that I do not use iTunes, is to have a silent server under the equipment rack and a small monitor and mouse on a table next to me. VGA and USB cables can run for 5m quite happily and that is more than I need. But it has to be said 'remote control', 'PC' and 'elegant' are unlikely to crop up together in the same sentence!

 

Eloise is quite right in that the Weiss AFI1 is an excellent solution. Whether or not it justifies its rather high price is up to you. Personally I shall probably be using something like the RME HDSP 9632 which, at UK retail prices, is some £800 cheaper than the Weiss. The problem is finding out whether this will result in an audible difference in sound quality - these are generally not things you can go to a dealer and try out first, unfortunately!

 

So to recap. My 'fit for purpose' list has AES to DAC connection at the top of it. This is because I already own the Dac I want, and have heard both its AES inputs and its coax spdif inputs and prefer the former. On the basis that I do not wish to use iTunes then there is no compelling reason for me to buy a Mac. The Weiss AFI1 is more than I am willing to pay, at this moment, for computer to Dac interfacing, so that leaves me with looking for a soundcard. There aren't many! My shortlist is the ESI Juli@, the RME HDSP 9632 and the Lynx AES 16. The Lynx rules itself out, for anything other than second-hand, due to a rather hideous, and all too familiar, $US to £UK conversion that leaves us Brits paying more in pounds than our US cousins pay in dollars! And the Juli@ has a reputation for somewhat flimsy output connections. RME it is then, fitted into something very close to Chris' mCubed server. External usb drives for storage, job done!

 

Or I might just buy a Transporter, to replace my Squeezebox Duet, that will give me AES outputs but with a limitation of 24/96 file resolution! Still pondering that one!

 

Hope this helps.

 

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Macbooks and their Pro brethren are relatively quiet but earlier models (2006) with Core duo chips run hot (although in most cases bearably so) and many early mbps have the processor idle whine that came courtesy of Intel's new chips. In my case the whine was fixed by a free utility and my old laptop works beautifully as a server for my system.

 

"Remote" is simply brilliant and considering its costs has little to moan about.

 

The new models have faster wireless and run cooler but the mini makes more economic sense.

 

Joking aside I have no issues with PC based servers in the same way that you can build a beautiful kit car if you have the time and the inclination. You can also buy a Porsche and drive it straight away.

 

Of course you might always worry that the kit car might go faster....

 

Me... I can't stand sheds and I'. too impatient to read the instructions on kits.

 

yours, getting on with it, tog

 

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The only FireWire to AES converters (without inbuilt DAC) I am aware of are the Weiss AFI1, Sonic Studio Model 3 (not sure if they still advertise this) and the TC Konnekt x32 (corrected) Digital Patch bay at £1000. Other interfaces contain a DAC as well.

 

Eloise

 

Eloise

---

...in my opinion / experience...

While I agree "Everything may matter" working out what actually affects the sound is a trickier thing.

And I agree "Trust your ears" but equally don't allow them to fool you - trust them with a bit of skepticism.

keep your mind open... But mind your brain doesn't fall out.

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Hi Eloise and Chris,

 

Thanks for the feedback. The TC Konnekt x32 'only' does 24/96 by the looks of it. To get the iTunes with Amarra and AES setup, it looks as if I will have to dump my Mac Mini and find a second hand Mac Pro. This way I can install the Lynx card. That will still be cheaper than the Weiss family.

 

Bloody hell this hobby is expensive. ;)

 

The Lynx Aurora8/FW I was playing around with is going to have to go back to recording duties soon.

 

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I'm pretty sure the TC Konnekt x32 does support quad speed (192 and 176.2). In fact i'm sure it will even do dual-link AES. The reference to "only" doing 24/96 is it's sample-rate conversion is limited to 24/96 (not that you'll want to use that).

 

Actually in the UK the AFI1 is reasonably priced (£1100) compared with the Lynx AES16 (around £700 IIRC).

 

Eloise

 

Eloise

---

...in my opinion / experience...

While I agree "Everything may matter" working out what actually affects the sound is a trickier thing.

And I agree "Trust your ears" but equally don't allow them to fool you - trust them with a bit of skepticism.

keep your mind open... But mind your brain doesn't fall out.

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