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Barriers to Computer Audio


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Over the past few months I've been researching computer audio to learn more about the topic in preparation to acquire the necessary components, e.g., software and hardware, for an audiophile quality computer audio system. One of the recurring themes I discovered as I conducted my research on this and other web sites and at Best Buy, hi fidelity audio stores, and other sources, etc., is the amount of divergent, conflicting and confusing information regarding high resolution computer audio. What software to use, what type of storage to use, hardware requirements, connectivity, etc. This may explain why computer audio as a consumer phenomenon has been slow to catch on - it's currently too confusing. Mac or PC, J.D. Rivers, D.B. Power Amp, I-Tunes, DACs, NAS, SSD, USB, SP/DIF, Ethernet. This is the tip of the iceberg.

 

The analogy I like to use is buying a basic stereo system to play records: you need a receiver or separate components, a turntable, a cartridge, interconnects and speakers. Sure the cost and quality varies depending on how much you have to spend but at least you know what you need. Somehow this decision making process needs to be simplified and standardized so that the average consumer is able to make informed choices regarding audiophile quality computer sound. And it needs to be much easier to set up. Currently one needs to be a computer whiz or electrical engineer to put together a computer system to download and play computer files and stream music from various web sites. Make it easier and the consumer will buy it.

 

As for me, I will sort it out but it will take some additional time and, even then I may not end up with the optimal system, but I will persevere. By the way, I have been audio enthusiast for many, many years and have a graduate degree in Finance. I think what we need is a step by step approach that provides examples of computer audio systems at various price points, e.g., what hardware, software, storage mechanism, file formats, interconnects, etc. Some of you may think this information is readily available but I can tell you that most of these examples assume a level of knowledge well beyond someone who is just starting to consider computer audio, e.g., the average consumer. I would be interested in others comments.

 

At this point, you're right. :)

 

Describe what you want for yourself specifically a little more and we'll try to help, though don't be shocked if there are multiple, sometimes conflicting opinions that have to be sorted out.

 

You want something close to all-in-one and be done, don't mind spending? Value for money and don't mind a learning curve? Something in between?

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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I see we've managed to get to a bunch of recommendations and even an old argument or two prior to the OP ever answering the question about what his own preferences are. :)

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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Yep, you heard it right...

 

This is completely OT. it would be very considerate of the OP if it stopped right here. If it doesn't, I'll ask Chris if he'd be kind enough to remove all the OT posts.

 

Can we work on helping the OP now, please?

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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Thanks. This would be very helpful and greatly appreciated! See my post today at 4:20 pm. for particulars of my current system and thoughts on what I may need.

 

Will try to give you a useful response later this evening. Right now my lovely wife requires my presence for family TV watching. :)

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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rn701, seems like I read somewhere that an ethernet connection would access files more reliably than USB. I want to keep this as simple as possible, so if USB 3 will be sufficient then that works for me. I hope to spend less than $1,500 on a DAC, would go as high as $2,000 if the additional bang for the buck is worth it. I would also consider gently used equipment. A lot of audiophiles move from component to component in search of the holy grail. I'm just looking for great sound reproduction!

 

Storage - The "action" and biggest "bang for the buck" seem to be happening right now with USB input DACs. There's been a fair amount of discussion on the forums saying you probably don't want to have both DAC and file storage on the computer's USB bus. I can tell you on my Mac computer I felt I got better sound when my file storage was not on USB. I'm using FireWire (one of the OWC enclosures George referred to), but that's a dying interface even on Mac. So my recommendation would be to avoid USB and use a NAS. Since I don't use one I don't have a particular one to recommend, but others already have, and perhaps there will be more. Synology seems to have a very good reputation.

 

DAC - I looked around at various DACs available in your price range. I haven't listened to many of these myself because I haven't been in the market for one in a couple of decades. :) (My own is a semi-DIY project put together from circuit boards and various other parts.) However, I try to read up and stay informed, and I would say it might be hard to beat the TEAC UD-503 at $999, no tax and free shipping. https://www.hideflifestyle.com/catalog/product/view/id/11095/s/ud-503-dual-monaural-usb-dac/?fee=5&fep=11095&gclid=CjwKEAiAs4qzBRD4l-2w7qOoqEMSJABauikXUHR90LAQxsAfOIWg-BWyMIQ0dUbkKE-JB6iEu-HuSRoCmzLw_wcB

 

TEAC UD-503 Dual-monaural USB DAC

 

There are a lot of very happy user reports about its predecessor the UD-501. It will accept virtually any sample rate music file you can buy or rip. It also offers a choice of a couple of filters of its own or allows you to turn its filters off and use external filtering of your choice, which I consider very important. What are these filters and what do they do? I'll explain when I talk about software.

 

Computer - There are a couple of schools of thought here. My thinking is you want something robust to run software really smoothly, that won't be working at the edge of its capabilities running the cooling fan on high while you're trying to listen to music. Don't screw around with i5, get something with an i7 in it; and put at least 16GB of RAM in there. After that, whatever you like.

 

Software - You know and like JRiver. That's cool and it may be all you ever want or need. Let me throw out another couple of ideas. If they make your eyes spin in your head, ignore them and be happy. If they intrigue you, try them and see what you think. All the stuff I'm going to talk about has free trials available.

 

- Filtering: You don't listen to 1s and 0s, you listen to music. What changes the former to the latter are a series of filters. Just about any DAC, including the one in your OPPO, uses a series of upsampling and conversion filters before getting to the final conversion from digital to analog (music). Right now I won't go into detail about what these filters do, though if you want to know, just ask. What's important is that these filters (along with hardware quality and design) are responsible for a large part of the sound of your DAC.

 

The chips in your DAC are somewhat resource-limited in terms of running filters. The CPU in a PC will as a general rule be capable of running better, more sophisticated filtering (i7, remember?). If you have a DAC like the UD-503 which allows you to turn off its internal filtering and do your own filtering in software, that makes it possible for you to listen to different filters and decide what you like without having to buy a new DAC. Or if you decide you like the TEAC's own filters, great - you can use those. You have the choice.

 

Software that does inline filtering runs while you listen to music, doing its upsampling and filtering "on the run." Two such programs for Windows I think very highly of are XXHighEnd and HQPlayer. I have to say, though, that XXHighEnd is for the geeks and tweakers among us, and may not be something you want to try when you're just starting out. HQPlayer has an interface that many people don't love either (more on that in a minute), but what it has in spades is the widest selection of excellent filters you will find. Signalyst But what if you don't like the interface? Well, apparently HQPlayer capability is about to get incorporated into the new hottest thing in interfaces, Roon. I haven't tried it myself yet (been waiting for the HQPlayer integration), but lots of folks rave about it. To get some idea of what it's about, here's the website: https://roonlabs.com.

 

Software that does offline filtering converts and filters your files offline, and outputs the upsampled, converted file that you then send to your DAC to play. JRiver will conveniently convert your regular FLAC files to what's called DSD, which is what you want if you do external filtering because it bypasses any need for further internal filtering or conversion in your DAC. Another program that does these conversions that I use and like is called Audiophile Inventory (the PROduce-RD version - AuI ConverteR 48x44 - HiEnd audio converter ISO DFF DSF WAV FLAC AIFF; don't be put off by the rather garish website design). A TEAC UD-501 owner who does a lot of "objective" testing of various audiophile things on the web praised the performance of this software: Archimago's Musings: ANALYSIS: DSD-to-PCM 2015 - foobar SACD Plug-In, AuI ConverteR, noise & impulse response....

 

I slightly prefer the sound of the files I convert offline, though inline conversion is more convenient - you just play your music and the inline conversion is done as you sit there and listen.

 

If you've got questions about any of this, let me know.

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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I haven't found the need for a NAS at home. I have a few USB drives plugged into my Airport Extreme wireless router.

 

Have you ever gotten dropouts in the music using wireless?

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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Be very careful with that 3TB Seagate drive. (I have one too; picked it up at Costco cheap.) The failure rate is very high.

 

+1

 

Also: I've found Seagate drives to be noisier than WD.

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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Thanks Bill. I was using it for off-sight backup purposes. Actually, it's fairly quiet .. oh, BTW I have the 1 TB drive not the 3 TB:

 

My noisier one (not awful, but the WDs are quieter) is a 4GB.

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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OK, at least now I know what this is really about.

 

But "this" is not really about the thread topic, so let's get back to that.

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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People who have wireless might be more ready to blame dropouts on the connection to storage than people with wired interfaces.

 

In any case, it doesn't seem as if people are saying a wireless connection to storage creates constant dropouts or any sort of intolerable situation. So bottom line looks like either wired Ethernet or Wi-Fi will do.

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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I haven't opened it up to see what brand of HDD is inside, but my 5+ year old Neptune 500GB Firewire external drive from OWC has been working flawlessly.

 

The takeaway from this is that OWC has good products.

 

They do. I have one I'm very happy with. FireWire is not an interface of the future for the Windows OS the OP says he'll be using, though.

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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I say any DAC above the $1000 should have a GB of RAM that it stores everything in locally and plays back out of.

 

Could be done that way and raise the price of DACs, plus requiring redesign of current DACs, possible changes in current form factors, circuitry, etc. Or you could accomplish the same thing a lot more simply by using the RAM already in the computer, which is what player software already available does.

 

But what does this have to do with what the OP is asking?

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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Laptop, at least 16gb of ram, jriver21, dbpoweramp to rip (it sounds better) use Aiff it's ubiquitous and you don't lose meta data, external storage ( back it up always and frequently) whether Nas or USB external hard drive.

USB capable DAC, half decent cable (Supra), interconnects, Amplification, Speakers or Headphones. DONE, Nuf said. Simple.

 

Sent from my SM-T113 using Tapatalk

 

DEANO2 has mentioned a "half decent [uSB] cable," the Supra. The topic of USB cables and whether they provide any difference in sound quality of the system is a topic of some, errm, "discussion" here, even in our forums, which as you have seen are ordinarily quite peaceful. ;) [sidles out of the way to avoid any divine retributive lightning.] Nevertheless, I want to provide a couple of options for you should you decide to look into USB cables other than the most basic "printer cable" type, one a little more expensive than the Supra, one slightly less expensive.

 

The less expensive cable (~$30 for .75 meter) is the Audioquest Forest. https://www.hideflifestyle.com/catalog/product/view/id/2643/s/audioquest-forest-usb-cable-0-75m/?fee=5&fep=2643&gclid=Cj0KEQiA-ZSzBRDp3ITHm5KO_JYBEiQA1JjHHL8yzqEqO-UazvIcwByQd2-J9pGAKs65v3iru0Ts8p8aAl3Q8P8HAQ

 

The more expensive cable ($135 for 3 feet), and the one I use, is the Mapleshade Clearlink Plus. Male A to Male B - Most Popular-shop.mapleshadestore.com

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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Agree, no plans to use iTunes. Although I have most of my CD's already ripped to iTunes on a desktop PC, I will be repeating this process likely using DB Poweramp and J Rivers Media Center on a separate computer.

 

What format are the rips? There may be no need to do the work of re-ripping.

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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Of course this says as much (more even?) about the source than it does the DAC.

 

Exactly. Implementation, implementation, implementation, at both sending and receiving units.

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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We are audiophiles. We don't need no stinking evidence.

 

Anyway, at least let the poor guy get his feet wet before we start throwing accessory suggestions at him.

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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Any suggestion to which signal is the best from a pc to a dac? And which kind of card is suggested? Some say spdif, some say aes-ebu, some say usb. I dont have the option to test all kinds of connections and cards, so if anyone can suggest a affordable solution to get the sound-data from my win7 pc to my dac(still havent been bought but looking into several 1500$ dacs atm) i would appreciate it. I know there is not 1 single perfect solution, but USB as I read it in this and other threads, is the worst option, and spdif the best? And does it matter how I output the signal, does it matter which kind of soundcard or other dedicated card I buy? Dont have the optical out on my MB unfortunately.

 

No. Individual implementation in a system trumps generalized notions of which interface is best every time. In my system, with a coax SPDIF cable more than twice the price of my USB cable, the USB input easily sounds better than SPDIF.

 

Different interfaces each have different advantages and disadvantages. For example - async input USB probably has lowest jitter, all else being equal. AES-EBU and optical probably have better noise rejection, again all else being equal (though you have to watch out for the noise generated by opto-electronics on the DAC end). USB has greater bandwidth, followed by AES-EBU and SPDIF, with Toslink last (which may have practical impact if you want to listen to files at 192KHz sample rates and above).

 

So decide what DAC to buy, get a soundcard that outputs optical if your DAC has such an input, try out each available input to your DAC and see what sounds best to you, in your system.

 

As far as soundcards, ASUS makes some nice ones at non-astonishing price points. The ESI Juli@ has had a fine reputation for a long time, and I owned one and liked it (sold it only because the FreeBSD operating system I occasionally run didn't have drivers for it at the time), but I don't recall whether it has optical output if you decide you definitely want that.

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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