usb dac

samnor

I'm interested in getting into the whole pc as a music server setup and I guess I need a usb dac to achieve this. Would anyone care to chime in on the dacs that they have used along with some recommendations. I was looking for something relatively cheap under 300$ to start with.

I've heard good things about the hrt music streamer dac.

Of course, the other aspect of all this is to get a dac to replace the cd player's internal dac. I have an oppo dv981hd which does a reasonable job but am interested in hearing options on the non usb dac area as well...

samnor

Seems a lot of folks like the squeezebox as well. how would the squeezebox dac compare to a standalone dac.

samnor

some other interesting dacs seem to be cambridge audio NP30 (would be interested to hear how it compares to the squeezebox), and a jolida fx tube dac.

coolsax

I have the HRT MSII and I think it works great. I use it from my laptop and it works great. but if you're wanting to integrate your cd player into as well and aren't too strict on your budget I would also look at the Arcam Rdac and the Schiit bitfrost both of which use Asynch USB and can accept other inputs as well. but they are both around $500 each.

from what I hear squeezebox is a nice option as well

also, are you planning on using Hirez files? b/c I don't think the cambridge player play's hirez files. also if you don't care about hi rez files then i would look at the sonos player too.. i've heard that it can't be beat for the simplicity of it all.

samnor

you mean the 24bit files.... probably not as much... yes, I've heard good things about sonos. but I dont mind things getting complicated. Am also coming to the opinion that I may need to go to 500$ to get something decent.

6 moons had a review of dacs from including Keces DA-151 Mk2 ($250), the Styleaudio Carat-Topaz USB ($449), the Mhdt Laboratory Paradisea 3 ($569), the Music Hall DAC 25.2 ($595) and the non-budget Benchmark DAC1 USB ($1295).. seems like the keces was not too bad though havent heard much in the forums about it.

Drenis

Forgive me for pulling noob here... but whats a USB DAC? And why is it needed?

I run my HTPC with HDMI out for sound straight to my Pio Elite to process and play. Music is streamed over my network to this machine to play. For CD's I just usually use either media player or the Zune Software to play my music.

And now I read possibly that there is much better out there? Educate me please!

dhart86

A USB DAC, simply put is a DAC that has a USB input (to connect to computer) If PC is your source of music and it doesnt have coax or optical outputs, then you connect PC to DAc via usb cable.

Now, a DAC (Digital Analog Converter) converts the digital signals to analog thereby increasing the quality and fidelity of digital music. Most digital sources and AV have a DAC, but a stand alone DAC ussually is a better option than most internal DACs

AsSiMiLaTeD

Do some searching on here from posts by myself and falconcry, there has been lots of discussion around this very topic recently.

Personally I don't recommend the HRT device, it sounds sterile to my ears but then I'm used to Musical Fidelity which has a much more warm, musical sound to me.

I would recommend the MF V-Dac which has a USB input along with coax and optical inputs. That USB input is not asynchronous though, so it won't give you the best possible sound, but it's still very good. Then when budget allows down the road pick up a MF V-Link that is a USB to SPDIF converter, that would complete the loop and provide a great setup.

EndersShadow

I am going to throw out the Musiland Monitor 02 as another option. It isnt super expensive (~150) and H9 has been using one for quite a long time and seems to like it.

Its externally powered so the USB connection ONLY transfers data. Some folks like having the power and signal lines seperate.

I started a couple threads a long time ago when I was looking for one (which I still havent bought) and that model seemed to be the best bargain.

punk-roc

don't forget these..

http://www.halidedesign.com/dsdac/

dhart86

AsSiMiLaTeD wrote: »

Do some searching on here from posts by myself and falconcry, there has been lots of discussion around this very topic recently.

Personally I don't recommend the HRT device, it sounds sterile to my ears but then I'm used to Musical Fidelity which has a much more warm, musical sound to me.

I would recommend the MF V-Dac which has a USB input along with coax and optical inputs. That USB input is not asynchronous though, so it won't give you the best possible sound, but it's still very good. Then when budget allows down the road pick up a MF V-Link that is a USB to SPDIF converter, that would complete the loop and provide a great setup.

I had both the HRT and V-Dac. Personally I like the v-dac coax connected sound better than the HRT

samnor

looks like I am narrowing it down to these 3..

arcam rdac
MF v-dac
Cambridge dac magic

Based on price and performance, I'm leaning towards the arcam since I can get a slightly used one on the 'gon for a similar price to the v-dac. The v-dac looks quite good but the usb seems limited to 48khz and having to buy another adaptor to output via spdif as Assimilated suggested above seems to be a some costlier option.

The dacmagic looks nice (but am not too keen on upsampling products and it doesnt have async usb) and it has a plethora of inputs which would be wasted in my use case.

Would like to hear any opinions on the above 3 if you feel strongly for one vs another...
thanks for the input so far.

falconcry72

samnor wrote: »

The v-dac looks quite good but the usb seems limited to 48khz and having to buy another adaptor to output via spdif as Assimilated suggested above seems to be a some costlier option.

FYI: the Musical Fidelity V-DACii is coming out soon. It basically combines the V-DAC and V-Link in a pretty silver case. Check it out on their website.

I just want to mention that the V-Link is a great little piece of gear, and the nice thing about it (or any other USB to SPDIF converter) is that you can use it in conjunction with any non-USB DAC out there, so it really opens up your options for DAC's, especially on the used market.

The nice thing about the Musiland Monitor 02 is that is has its own DAC built in, so you could just use it for now, then save up and add a better external DAC later while still using the Musiland as a converter. I will warn you though, the Musiland has issues with PC's running Windows 7 64 bit with an AMD processor.

samnor

Falcon, yes, I did see the website for the v-dac2... looks nice. I dont see a price yet though... probably dont have the budget to buy both a usb dac/transport and a non usb dac. I'd prefer an all in one package which the rdac and the forthcoming vdac2 would address nicely.