PC->USB->DAC setup versus streaming or disc players

[MadFloyd]

I have a CAPS v3 PC feeding my DAC via USB and thought I had a state of the art system, but lately I've been reading that USB is inherently noisy and won't sound as good as a streaming (DAC) player or disc transport.

My Playback Designs is not the one with a transport so I can't easily do any comparisons. Does anyone have any experience doing comparisons?

 

[Bruce B]

I have the MPS-5 with USB-X and much prefer listening files coming from the computer than listen to the spinning disc of the "same file".

I'm using a Light Harmonic USB cable which splits the power side.

 

[asiufy]

You could invest in a streamer (sans DAC), and hook it up via BNC, AES, SPDIF, etc to your DAC.

The CAPS will have to work as a DLNA/UPNP server for the streamer, but I believe JRiver can be made to do that.

Unfortunately, all the great streamers out there are "attached" to a DAC, like the Lumin. But Lumin (and Auralic too) announced new products at CES, and among them were dedicated streamers, at around the US$ 1000 mark. I have high hopes for those, as they'll allow us to keep the computer as simply a "file server", not connected (physically) to the audio chain. And if you have a properly configured NAS, you can skip the computer altogether!


alexandre

 

[edorr]

I have a CAPS v3 PC feeding my DAC via USB and thought I had a state of the art system, but lately I've been reading that USB is inherently noisy and won't sound as good as a streaming (DAC) player or disc transport.

My Playback Designs is not the one with a transport so I can't easily do any comparisons. Does anyone have any experience doing comparisons?

The beauty of streaming is it is dirt cheap (cheap DLNA server and some storage is all you need - no need for CAPS caliber hardware), and when implemented well at least equivalent to the best USB (I used streaming on the PS audio Perfectwave DAC with the bridge and it was equivalent to the USB signal path involving >$5K worth of source hardware). You sacrifice some functionality (notably you cannot use DRC on the PC). If you implement streaming in the DAC, the DAC does some of the processing that is otherwise done in a PC and then send out over USB (just a different architetcure). Hard to say categorically which is best. I think a lot depends on implementation of the DAC manufacturers.

I will say playing rips on a good server beats spinning discs in most cases though.

 

[microstrip]

I have the MPS-5 with USB-X and much prefer listening files coming from the computer than listen to the spinning disc of the "same file".

I'm using a Light Harmonic USB cable which splits the power side.

Bruce,
What is at the computer side? BTW, does the USB-X take power from the computer?

 

[MadFloyd]

Thanks, I had thought that playing rips beat a transport but there's some folks saying that the Lumin is the top dog in digital sonics these days. I was wondering if I was missing out on something.

 

[edorr]

Thanks, I had thought that playing rips beat a transport but there's some folks saying that the Lumin is the top dog in digital sonics these days. I was wondering if I was missing out on something.

To me it is a moot point. Even if some $50K transport could squeeze 5% more performance out of a disc, I would not touch it is I won the mega jackpot, because once you experienced having your entire collection at your fingertips on iPad there is no going back. This is why I am getting into the Blu Ray and SACD ripping business as well. I could easily live with performance of my disc spinner, but I don't get around to listening to a lot of good stuff, because I am too lazy to swap out discs. you might have guessed I'm not a vinyl guy at this point.

 

[Joe Whip]

I just added a computer to my system for audio playback and love it. I have Mac Book Air hooked up via USB to my DAC and have ripped quite a few CDs to it along with a couple of high res downloads. The Mac has a solid state hard drive and I run it on battery power only. The high res files sound superb, especially the Lyn Stanley Lost in Romance which sounds sublime. On CDs, I can swear that I notice a lower noise floor that my Sony ES SACD player than I have been using as a transport. I can hear very subtle details via the computer that I don't hear with the transport on the same DAC. My intent is to ripped all my favorite CDS to the computer via an external drive and listen to CDs that way exclusively. One step at a time though. Call me crazy, but the CDs ripped sound better than the use of a transport.

 

[Bruce B]

Bruce,
What is at the computer side? BTW, does the USB-X take power from the computer?

I use a Pyramix Native DSD/DXD workstation. It's a computer I built following the specs on the Pyramix site.

On the Mac side, I use Audirvana+ on a MacBook Pro

 

[MadFloyd]

To me it is a moot point. Even if some $50K transport could squeeze 5% more performance out of a disc, I would not touch it is I won the mega jackpot, because once you experienced having your entire collection at your fingertips on iPad there is no going back. This is why I am getting into the Blu Ray and SACD ripping business as well. I could easily live with performance of my disc spinner, but I don't get around to listening to a lot of good stuff, because I am too lazy to swap out discs. you might have guessed I'm not a vinyl guy at this point.

Well I'd never go back to spinning discs but a streamer like the Lumin has it's own iPad app and functions the same as JRiver /JRemote. And while I could believe that streaming is superior to USB I wouldn't know if it was enough to compensate for whatever shortfalls might be in the DAC itself (when compared to high end DACs in general). The chances of the Lumin being a better DAC than MSB, Playback Designs, EMM Labs etc seems it might be a stretch (then again the Trinity appeared out of nowhere...).

 

[edorr]

Well I'd never go back to spinning discs but a streamer like the Lumin has it's own iPad app and functions the same as JRiver /JRemote. And while I could believe that streaming is superior to USB I wouldn't know if it was enough to compensate for whatever shortfalls might be in the DAC itself (when compared to high end DACs in general). The chances of the Lumin being a better DAC than MSB, Playback Designs, EMM Labs etc seems it might be a stretch (then again the Trinity appeared out of nowhere...).

True, but devices like the Lumen are just special purpose computers.

 

[microstrip]

True, but devices like the Lumen are just special purpose computers.

Yes, I still can not understand why streaming sound be better than USB. I can believe that its performance is more predictable, but no intrinsic reason to sound better than separates connected by USB.

 

[edorr]

Yes, I still can not understand why streaming sound be better than USB. I can believe that its performance is more predictable, but no intrinsic reason to sound better than separates connected by USB.

I have not figured out why ANY of this makes a difference. You're just loading bits in a buffer.

 

[FrantzM]

To me it is a moot point. Even if some $50K transport could squeeze 5% more performance out of a disc, I would not touch it is I won the mega jackpot, because once you experienced having your entire collection at your fingertips on iPad there is no going back. This is why I am getting into the Blu Ray and SACD ripping business as well. I could easily live with performance of my disc spinner, but I don't get around to listening to a lot of good stuff, because I am too lazy to swap out discs. you might have guessed I'm not a vinyl guy at this point.

lol

My sentiments EXACTLY (sorry about shouting ) !!!

 

[microstrip]

To me it is a moot point. Even if some $50K transport could squeeze 5% more performance out of a disc, I would not touch it is I won the mega jackpot, because once you experienced having your entire collection at your fingertips on iPad there is no going back.

I would be very happy if it was only 5%. But unfortunately once you experience a very good transport DAC combo you will find it is more like 50%. I hope that in a few years musics servers will improve and settle down, but the situation is now a chaos in terms of high-end.

And for a few of us fingertips on iPad are not nirvana - you can call us old fashioned people ...

 

[MtnHam]

Yes, I still can not understand why streaming sound be better than USB. I can believe that its performance is more predictable, but no intrinsic reason to sound better than separates connected by USB.

Moving on from a 'high end' USB DAC (Wavelength Crimson) and MAC/iTunes combo, to a Lumin, the difference is astounding! Many others have agreed. Some even suggest it rivals the $108K dCS stack. It has been suggested that having the total process within the one box- no computer/usb/cable/dac interface to deal with, the designer has total control, and thus the results can be stellar.

 

[coxhaus]

The problem with streaming is you cannot control the noise on the network unless you are talking about streaming from one component to another across one wire like an I2S.

 

[marslo]

I have the MPS-5 with USB-X and much prefer listening files coming from the computer than listen to the spinning disc of the "same file".

I'm using a Light Harmonic USB cable which splits the power side.

Bruce,

Before switching to computer based music I did a test at home - I compared the same music ( for instance it was Ledonard Cohen's Old Ideas) from cd , vinyl and cd ripp ( done with dbpoweramp). As Audio Aero Music Center is a disc player based on Esoteric UMK -5 mechanism with a DAC it was possible to evaluate the differences between the ripp and
music from cd. I liked more the ripp because of better transparency and precision due probably to lower jitter. The source was then an Asus with Windows 64 bit and Jplay.
Then I bought my first Aurender s10 and in August last year upgraded to W20. I checked many usb cables and finally bought an Entreq Konstantin with Miniumus. I also auditioned at home a few expensive DACs like DCS Vivaldi , Metronome C8 and lately Gryphone Kalliope DAC.
In my setup La Fontaine is the best match with the other gear . And I still like more files than cds and even more than vinyl which I keep and listen from time to time. But every day music is from files No way back.

 

[Audioseduction]

I have a dedicated PC that I store all of my music files on and it’s backed by an external USB HD. I setup my JRMC server to pull the files from it across the Gigabit network. I find it a quieter background and more pristine playback then via USB HD attached direct to the music server via USB. Very easy to setup. Just set the music folder as share and point your music server to it. Works great!

 

[marslo]

George,

I looked to your system gallery, very nice indeed, congratulations.
I have rather big house and the upgrade to Gigabite ethernet would be quite expensive.BTW I experianced already issues when streaming Spotify from Ipad to W20 . Maybe I am old fashion but I like my W20 on the rack , the owners of Aurender reported problems with metadata when streaming from a NAS.

rgds
Mariusz