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USB DAC Cable

theparallaxview

theparallaxview

pfm Member
I've got my Eastern Electric Minimax DAC connected up with some old USB cable I had kicking around in a box for many years. To be honest it doesn't sound at all bad, but...:rolleyes:...Wondering what difference a dearer bit of wire would really makes here.

To complicate matters, it's also now fed into a Jitterbug and an equally old Swann USB hub and another tatty bit of USB cable that lived in the same box- this was the only way I could get the Jitterbug to work. And it did work - voodoo technology I'm sure but it made a difference!

All a bit Heath Robinson - is it worth upgrading this set up? How does the cable sold as USB DAC differ from bog standard USB cable?
 
I bought several expensive USB cables mainly on the suggestion by a certain trader here that they could do amazing things. They didn't. I am using the cable that came in the DAC box.
 
I purchased a Wire World starlight - and it was noticeable worse than the stock cable.

Go figure.
 
That Chord must really suck if it doesn't work with standard USB cables. Are you sure the original wasnt damaged?

On I see now, the cable was able to reduce jitter...
 
All that is necessary to put this to bed is to write a simple program.
The program receives the data from a dac and writes that data to a file.
Usb cable is changed and program is rerun.
The two files are compared using a file comparison tool.
The program could receive data raw, with no error correction or jitter removal.
But to be honest I doubt we really need to. Never, ever have I had the contents of a file be altered by a lead.
Any computer program, be it app, game or pc program is a collection of numbers. If one of these instructions are corrupted the program will crash. Never have I had this happen due to a usb cable.
I can only deduce that there is a real, psychological effect that wants to hear something is better. I don't think people are lying when they hear a usb cable is different, but it is in their mind.
But if anyone here can code, and has some free time, perhaps they would like to write the logger program.
 
cable fans often point to noise being transferred into the DAC from the USB connection, this noise then allegedly affects the analogue output of the DAC.

I am not convinced, nor have i seen the measurements at the input or output of this so called 'noise'.
 
lAmBoY said:
cable fans often point to noise being transferred into the DAC from the USB connection, this noise then allegedly affects the analogue output of the DAC.

I am not convinced, nor have i seen the measurements at the input or output of this so called 'noise'.
Click to expand...

Well yes, all of that.

But even if the noise thing is true, what can usb cables do about any of that? They are made out of conductors which err conduct stuff. The most they can possibly achieve with the noise is to conduct it. How will making the conductors out of silver help?
 
Adam I agree with you. I also think any input noise is likely lost during conversion to analogue anyway. I guess this could be measured pretty easily though.
 
There can be big difference in usb cables used for charging tablets, phones. I was surprised how varies amperes used to charge device with different cables according to simple gadget from Amazon. A couple of my cables went straight way to bin. That shows that electric characteristics of cable can be different with noticeable effect.
Why similar results can not be true for connecting dacs to computer? Data transferring still is an electric impulses, not just 0 and 1.
 
The thickness of the cable dictates how much current can flow, hence charging time.
But really, the electrical impulses are just 0 and 1 when it comes to data. Otherwise, when we wrote to an external disk through USB, all our photos and music and programs would be corrupted. I assure you this is not the case. If you think how fast a FLAC file can be copied across a USB cable to an external disk, it is transferred far far faster than playing the song in realtime. Yet, the song will be bit perfect at the other end, no matter what cable is used.
I do recall a data transfer error once, it was a zx81 program via cassette tape in the 80s.
 
Charging cables are not USB cables and shouldn't be assumed to be interchangeable with certified USB cables. Perhaps some of the issue stems from this mistake.

A decent USB cable from Belden or whoever will be as good as any other piece of wire. Only cables with filters in them can offer an improvement.
 
Why not? I can use the same cable to charge navigator, or read a data from navigator, or connect a portable cd/dvd writer to computer.
 
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