Incremental improvement...

[islandraider]

Hi All,

I am really excited to have found this site. Great to have a place dedicated to making music sound great coming off a computer! I located this site very recently. Until now, I have been getting little bits of info from here & there and trying to assemble a good system on a budget.

 

What I am hoping to do with this post is describe the system I have assembled and get ideas from the collective on how to make the best incremental improvements in overall sound by replacing or tweaking various components. Here goes:

 

Mac Mini playing iTunes, FLAC files all converted to ALAC and mp3s that were imported using the 192kbps setting

Seagate 2 TB external hard drive has about 500 GB digital music stored

NuForce uDAC imports digital signal from Mac Mini USB and exports analogue to:

Rotel integrated amp RA-840BX3 playing through:

Sonus Faber Toy speakers (newest addition) and

REL T5 subwoofer (got at same time as Toys)

 

I listen to mostly live (flac > alac) downloaded music, world, rock, jazz, classical. Room is very small: ~13' x 12', some carpet, wall hangings & furniture to soften the sound.

 

So, I guess the essence of the question is what would you do next to improve a system like this? Better DAC? Which one? Add Amarra? Which one? Update amp? Speakers? What is the weakest link & how can I fix it... afford-ably? I understand this is a bit difficult without coming over for a listen, but I really would appreciate ideas & suggestions from folks that have been doing this longer than I.

 

Thanks in advance for taking the time to respond!

IslandRaider

 

[Daren F]

Your weakest link is having 192 kbps mp3 music in your library. You may want to replace the mp3 files with lossless formats.

 

For what you are listening to and for the size of your room your equipment is decent. If you ever want to get in to listening to 24 bit 96 kHz or higher files you will need to upgrade your DAC as it's maximum resolution is 16 bit 48 kHz. Here's a list of 24/192 USB DACs from the Audio Stream website http://www.audiostream.com/content/24192-usb-dacs-list. Another very affordable preamp/DAC not listed is the Emotiva XDA-1 http://www.emotiva.com/xda1.shtm.

 

[islandraider]

Thanks, Darren. Honestly, that is really good news... I have more time than money! Would you simply use iTunes and re-import the old cds using ALAC? I can do that.

 

Ah, now for the DAC. When I started to build this system, I was using the headphone jack. It sounded bad. The uDAC was such an incredible improvement that words fail me! Holy moly. The damn thing is smaller than a pack of smokes! So when I am playing 24/96 flac/alac files, is my DAC downsampling them to the 16/48? How big of a difference is it in sound. Is it going to be another 'holy moly' moment?

 

The Emotiva looks interesting. There is no way I can spend $1000 on a DAC at this point. What kind of an improvement can I expect from a $250 DAC, compared to my NuForce?

 

Thanks again for taking the time. I live on an island. It is a real bitch to get anywhere to compare things... I tend to read, learn & take some chances after learning as much as I can.

 

IR.

 

[islandraider]

I am a bit confused about sample rates. Most of my music (including most, but not all, of the flac downloads) show up as "44.100 kHz" in the Sample rate column of iTunes. Some of the flacs are 48 kHz and there are a few MPEGs that show up as 22.050 kHz. Most of the MP3s are also listed as 44.100 kHz.

 

This is one (or several) of those newbie types of questions I am not really sure how to ask: With these files will I notice a difference with a DAC that will process 24/192? If yes, can you point me in the direction of some basic, easy to understand, education on this subject. If no, then what can I do to start getting music with higher resolution? I currently download most of my music from traders den, dime-a-dozen, etc. I use Vuze. I download in flac and use XLD Decoder to convert flac to alac for use with iTunes.

 

Thanks again for the help!

IR

 

[wdw]

....bus- powered FireWire drive for all music files...use your Seagate drive for backups and time machine only, add an internal SSD drive, say, 20 gB, if the Mac is used music only that is more than enough storage the system files and Pure Music!

 

 

...and strongly recommend WAV rather than other file formats.

 

WDW

 

 

[islandraider]

Hi wdw. Thanks for the comments. Questions/clarifications:

 

I am not familiar with "bus-powered firewire drives". I honestly just tried to google it... lots of purchase options, very little in the way of describing what it is/what it does/why is it better? Is it the speed that is better? My Mini has a Firewire 800 port. Something like this(??): http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other%20World%20Computing/MS8U5S1GB8/

 

An aside... what about using the Thunderbolt port? I think there are some storage devices coming on line?

 

some reasonable: http://www.google.com/products/catalog?q=LaCie+Little+Big+Disk&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=shop&cid=12393965082043102477&sa=X&ei=DpfRTszVPOewiQLTkNT8Cw&ved=0CGoQ8wIwAw

 

some really expensive: http://store.apple.com/us/product/H5186VC/A/Thunderbolt

 

 

Similarly, solid state drive drive dedicated for system files? Is the idea to get away from the traditional "spinning" hard drive? There was an (expensive) option for one when I bought the Mini. I opted for the 'stock' spinning hard drive thinking that I would use external hard drives to augment as needed. I would like to hear more about the logic behind your idea. My Mini is not dedicated to music, but rather dedicated to entertainment. We have no tv. We use the mini for music, streaming movies/shows, surfing internet.

 

Seriously... thanks for sharing ideas. I am trying to learn a lot fast & I appreciate your willingness to take the time to share your thoughts!

 

IR

 

[Daren F]

If disc space is not an issue, you may want to rip your Cd's to an uncompressed format like WAV or AIFF. There is a lengthy debate over whether lossless compressed formats (FLAC, ALAC) sound inferior to uncompressed formats (WAV, AIFF). I have my files in WAV. You can read more on the debate on the CA forum or here at http://www.audiostream.com/content/cut-flac. If space is an issue, ripping to ALAC with iTunes is fine.

 

I think that your DAC would reject high res files and you'd get an error message saying there is a playback error. I use J River Media Center that can re-sample the output to match the DAC. I don't think iTunes is capable of re-sampling.

 

I don't know much about the Emotiva DAC. I have 2 Emotiva amps and am very happy with them. Emotiva will normally give you a 30 day in home try with a no questions asked return policy but I see that doesn't apply on sale items. Most of the DACs on the list are in the Audiophool price range.

 

This site should answer your bit rate/sample rate questions https://www.hdtracks.com/index.php?file=staticpage&pagename=faq. HD Tracks is one of the best sources for hires downloads. Other sites like 7 Digital are also starting to sell lossless and hires downloads as the industry slowly shifts away from CDs. Also search the CA forum for lots of debate on whether hires sounds better or not (ie. Fleetwood Mac Rumours release).

 

Hires files also take up substantially more disc storage space. Up to 10 times more.

 

[mlauria]

I use the Music Fidelity V-DAC2 and am very pleased. It goes for around $350. A great value, ansyn USB, 24/192.

 

 

 

[wdomeika]

If your mac mini is 2010/2011, if you haven't upgraded ram yet, you should max ram to 8gb (I've heard unconfirmed rumors that you can get 12gb into a 2011...but can't verify it. You'll need this extra memory if you decide to use Amarra, PureMusic or most other high quality players to their fullest advantage. You can do this yourself for about $120.

 

Also, once you decide on your DAC upgrade, you might want to consider a SSD for your mac mini. I had a 120 GB SSD put in my mac mini and it indeed makes more than an incremental difference running PureMusic. Cost was $200 including shipping and labor trough OWC...took a whole 3 days start to finish. I'm assuming your running firewire 400/800 from your external HDD. If you're not, you should be.

 

I'm not a evangelist for usb cables and interconnects, but I'd recommend that you look on Agon. You can get a pretty great discount on a high-end USB interconnect. All this investment will put you in good stead even as you upgrade components below your music server.

 

My two cents...

 

 

Cheers,

 

Bill

 

[REShaman]

islandraider: Avoid bus powered drives as you do not want any conflict with computer audio player. Are you aware that it is best to connect your HDDs using firewire if your dac is connected by USB or the reverse?

My main storage drive is a Promise Pegasus 12TB Raid 5, and it performs flawlessly. My back up drives are OWC external connected by firewire (yes 800) as my dac is connected by USB. No conflicts or interference/degradation.

I own all (I think all) the Mac computer audio players. I have favored Amarra for the last several months, but many others perform wonderfully.

 

By softening the sound, do you mean reducing the reflections which interfere with and cause a degradation in the blackness, muddy and create bass boom bloat and nodes? There are acoustic remedies for that.

 

As for upgrades: Have you created a budget for what you are willing to spend, then purchase the best equipment you can afford. I have read different opinions on which components are more important than others to improve, but, frankly, the head bone is connected to the neck bone which is...so how can music sound good through excellent speakers if the players isn't as good or the source, or the dac to pre-amp or straight to amp; and, if you regard cables as good and better, re ICs and speaker/subwoofer cables buy good performing connections.

 

Rather than identify specific brands, you may wish to listen for yourself to determine what sounds the best that you can afford.

 

Good fortune with your endeavors. And enjoy the music.

Best,

Richard

 

BTW: you want to be sure your Mac Mini is configured with the best possible synergy of ram (8GBs)/internal drive (SSD preferred) and keep the OS simple. You can review at several different sites recommendations for how to configure your computer setup for optimal operations and playback, i.e., Amarra, Pure Music, and several other sites.

 

[islandraider]

Hi Richard & thanks...

The 'bus drives' are new to me. My Seagate 2TB hard drive came with a USB cord. I don't know if firewire is an option. Right now, I am connected with a USB cord from hard drive to mini and, again, USB cord from mini to NuForce DAC. I have already maxed-out the RAM to 8 (at least I thought that was the max).

 

Regarding the room, I remodeled recently & put in cork flooring, which has been very nice acoustically. It is small, but the boomy-ness of which you were referring is mostly gone. I may explore some additional options, but I am pretty happy with the space.

 

Regarding players, how bid a difference can I expect? When I was running PC, I was using Foobar for all my flac files and playing the older mp3s on iTunes. At this point I am delighted to be working on one platform for all the music (after a VERY tedious couple of weeks coverting flac & shn to alac & re-tagging some of the stuff that went missing in the conversion (mostly the shns seemed to struggle in the conversion). What do these other players offer in terms of sound quality that iTunes does not. I noticed some nice looking equalization, but are there other important differences? Also, it is really nice to be able to use the old iPhone as a remote... I can control song choice & volume from any room of the house - great!!!

 

Regarding upgrades, I guess I was hoping to identify weakest links and fix them as I am able. The trick for me is to make educated decisions without having to travel to the mainland. I simply can't make the trip very often & when I do I usually have a huge list of 'must-dos' and little time for other stuff. Strong recommendations from knowledgeable people and online purchasing from reputable stores with liberal return policies are my friend. The mac is a nice upgrade over the pc. The DAC was a HUGE upgrade over the headphone jack. The recent speaker purchases have been very sweet. Next, reimporting the cds to ALAC makes good sense, but the majority of my music is already flac/shn converted to ALAC. Other than that the DAC upgrage mentioned above is intriguing, but I am not sure what to expect from the upgrade.

 

Finally, I am not sure I will jump at the SDD quite yet but would like to learn more about configuring the mini for optimal playback... can you recommend a specific site to begin my research?

 

Thanks again. It is fun to be back in the world of hifi. We lived on a boat for a while & great sound was really difficult to come by. Back on land now & I am really enjoying the experience.

 

IR.