advertisement


Recent content by ItemAudio

  1. I

    Is USB for audio worth the hassle?

    There's a world of misunderstanding in your use of the word 'shouldn't'. There should, and there is. That is it.
  2. I

    Is USB for audio worth the hassle?

    +1. Helpful post.
  3. I

    Is USB for audio worth the hassle?

    Driver conflict is always a potential issue. As a general rule, uninstall all audio and USB drivers apart from the one you're actually using. Then check with Autoruns to see if they've actually been removed! Have you checked your latency on this machine, too?
  4. I

    DBO IV: Mo-Fo (South) (Saturday, January 10, 2015)

    Not good enough. Say something snidey about someone, or - by affecting a general manner of superiority - everyone.
  5. I

    DBO IV: Mo-Fo (South) (Saturday, January 10, 2015)

    Stop being so sensible, Darren. It's strenuous to take issue with your comments. The point of a forum is to make controversial, self-aggrandising, sometimes inflammatory – preferably vapid and wrong-headed – statements in order to provoke time-consuming discord. No-one wants to read these...
  6. I

    DAC Bake-off III: Electric Boogaloo (Midlands) Oct 11th, 2014

    Mea culpa: the brevity of this spell was a function of me rushing over and silencing the DAC. At that point we were listening to a basic T1 via the Audiophilleo converter attached cable-free to the Mirus via a BNC/BNC converter. On the one hand, this was embarrassing. For products we make...
  7. I

    Is USB for audio worth the hassle?

    I'm trying to go with your metaphor here . . . surely post-CD a computer of some ilk is as indispensable to digital audio as water is to drink? The issue seems to be 'how much other common-or-garden junk is in the water'? And are you bothered by that?
  8. I

    Is USB for audio worth the hassle?

    The problem isn't the problem . . . the aim is to reduce noise and jitter. Zooming in on the problem in your specific system can get tricky because a computer motherboard is 20x more complex than the rest of the system combined. The OS may be 50x more complicated than anything else in your...
  9. I

    Is USB for audio worth the hassle?

    Broadly, a laudable point well made. However, merely questioning these gadgets isn't enough. Responses tend to be incompletely decipherable - and, practically, inconclusive. The better way is try before you buy. Anyone genuinely confident in the real-world benefits of their gadgets will be keen...
  10. I

    Is USB for audio worth the hassle?

    Feel free to suggest specific edits for style - I'll amend any posts you find offensive in this regard.
  11. I

    Is USB for audio worth the hassle?

    That's always been the promise of USB DACs, but we've not yet reached the finish line. Everything so far seems not to be transport-immune. Hopefully one day we'll get there. Natively streaming DSD in some respects gets us closer to the endpoint, but (ironically) resampling PCM to DSD makes us...
  12. I

    Is USB for audio worth the hassle?

    The Olimex is a classic case of 'bubble-wrap thinking': press down on a problem here, and another equally-sized problem pops up somewhere else. Repeat ad infinitum. It's interesting to see how SoTM has improved the latest version of their SATA filter: in V4, they leave the signal path alone and...
  13. I

    Is USB for audio worth the hassle?

    Some still do! SPDIF is inherently 'hardware-sensitive' (persuading two clocks to sync), but relatively simple re: protocols and 'software'. There are those who thought coming down from the trees was a bad idea in the first place. Life's easier when the transport and DAC are millimetres apart...
  14. I

    Is USB for audio worth the hassle?

    Glad you're making progress! It's important to distinguish between computer-generated 'noise' grossly audible via direct impact on the the speakers (hiss, hum, clicks, spikes when operating mice) and the noise that impacts more subtly through interaction with other power stages, and by...
  15. I

    Is USB for audio worth the hassle?

    The major distinction between options 1 (USB) and 2/3 (SPDIF) doesn't allow us to compare on a level playing field: you're talking about a different transmission method over a cable into a different DAC input. Which is best for a given combination of DAC and computer will depend entirely on...


advertisement


Back
Top