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My office setup

I recently put together a small office system and I'm trying to get the best quality of sound when I play music from my iMac Intel Core 2 Duo computer.

I am currently playing my music wirelessly through my AirTunes and then running a monster cable to my Parasound Halo 3 preamp. From the preamp, I'm using a couple of Mogami balanced cables to go to my two Quad 12L active speakers.

The sound is ok, but I have been noticing some distortion, even when I'm playing Apple Lossless files. I was wondering if anyone knew how to maximize my sound quality with this setup. I am not looking to buy a lot of extra components, but I just wanted to know if there was an easy fix to this problem?
bdogsquad
sfar's avatar
sfar
1,758 posts
 
Jax2 is right, I should have been more thorough in my response. The sound of the analog output of the Airport Express isn't nearly as good as using the digital out to an external DAC but you shouldn't be getting anything I would describe as distortion. Isolating what's causing the distortion before you spend money on a DAC would be a smart move. I've
bdogsquad OP
10 posts
 
Ok, I think that makes sense about trying to go directly from the AE to my active speakers. At least I can see if that takes care of my distortion issue.

I got the Preamp in the first place because I also use my office system to records on my Rega P3 (Rega P3 > Bellari Phono preamp > Parasound Halo 3 > my Quad 12L actives). I added the Parasound because when just using the phono preamp, I wasn't getting as full a sound as I wanted, especially in the low end. Records sound a lot better now that I added the Parasound to the mix.

jax2
3,031 posts
 
I'm pretty sure that you could také the preamp out of the loop in both scenarios. With your P3 just use the phono pre directly to your active speakers. Most active speakers have a pre section or some sort of attenuation already in them. Try it and let us know if the same "distortions" are there. I'd still think about going to an external DAC regardless. You should also avoid using the volume control on your computer - either disable it or turn it to full and use the attenuator on your speakers to control volume.
bdogsquad OP
10 posts
 
So I've taken the Parasound out of the equation. I gotta say, that I really didn't need it. The computer sounds better, and the records sound just as good as they did before. Only problem now is playing records and then switching to play stuff from the computer. I've got two different sets of cables that I'm going to have to plug and unplug accordingly. Any thoughts in that area?
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