Digital Front End: Critical Listening

I have to admit, Aroc, that your suggestion is over my head. A USB fed buffer sounds like it uses a USB cable, but why that might be superior (bandwidth?), I can't figure out on my own. As with most of my hobby knowledge, I pick things up slowly over time, and that's what interests me in your post; I should probably have at least a conversational grasp of these subjects if I'm dropping over $4000 on digital gear (I love it when some bored looking saleperson tries to wow me with some marketing technobable and you just know they're full of shit,).
Is there a newletter or other publication for laymen that follows advances in digital audio, like Speakerbuilder was to DIY speaker building?

For analogue, my whole system is wired and connected with Audio Synthesis. Some of the RCA's(no balanced) are better than others but they're all at least "very good" according to the research I did when I bought the stuff. I also got a very good deal on most of it. I understand that varying cables can be used to fine tune a system but I don't think I'm there yet. First I need to get off my ass and build my DIY speaker which I finally got all the parts for but now need to design the crossover.

Ok I have my transport. The Thete Digital Data Basic II. What a difference over the previous combinations. I even A-B'd it aginst the MF A308CDR as a transport, no comparison. The Theta is warmer by far not nearly as bright, tonally the system is awsome even my step daughter things so. Well I also upgraded my speakers to the B&W Nautilus 803. It's only money. After almost a month of break in on the whole system it is comming in to its own. The Theta and the Tri-Vista are an execelent combo. Unfortunitaly I have little time to do critical listening as my grandson has taken over the Stereo and TV.

The system as it is today.
MF A308 Integrated
MF Tri-Vista DAC
Theta Digital Data Basic II Transport
Project RM-4 Turntable
Sumiko Blue Point Cartridge
Synergistic Research Kaladiscope Phase I Interconnects
Synergistic Research Signature 10 Speaker cables
Synergistic Research Digital Interconnect!
B&W Nautilus 803 Speakers
Monster Power HT5100 Power Conditioner

Remember to take the system as a whole.

Digital front ends although very similar in design, are as different sounding as analog. A Mark Levinson dac compared to Musical Fidelity, Chord, Krell, MBL, DCS all sound different from one another. The same sound differences are found in transports, interconnects, amps, pre-amps et.al. It is IMO very important to try as many component combinations as humanly possible, because some components just don't sound well together. I've heard systems that were well in excess of $ 100,000.00 that I personally could not listen to for any length of time. Everytime I am ready to upgrade something in my system, for several days I would only listen to several of my favorite CDs. Once the change was completed, I would relisten to the same CDs, which will allow you to easily pick out the perceived differences and if the differences are to your liking. I personally really like Mark Levinson dacs, I like MBL dacs better, although both are laid back, throw deep soundstages, very musical, revealing, but sound different from one another. To build a system that translates your listening preferences can only be built over time and through trial and error. Just my opinion.
My System:
Krell Amp and Pre
CEC Transport
Mark Levinson Dac
DCS Purcell Upsampler
Piega & Rel speakers
Hydra 8 AC cond.
Marigo Apparition- AC
Shunyata Power Cords
IC- Jena Labs & Purist Audio
Digital Cables- Goldmund Lineal 75 Ohm
Speaker Cable- MIT-MH-750 Magnum

Sjh32, the advantage of a USB connection is that it's bi-directional, meaning that it can feed back signals from the sink (DAC) to the source (computer) to implement perfect error recovery. In practice this means a very low-cost technique for doing error-free, zero-jitter data transmission. There is at least one DAC on the market, from Wavelength Audio, that uses a USB link from a computer - it has no SPDIF interface at all. You can use a laptop as the data storage and the transport, which has the added advantage the advantage of a nice screen/mouse interface for selecting your playlist. For a bit more info take a look at Wavelength's Cosecant page