Seeking lower cost alternatives to Berkeley Audio Design Alpha USB converter


I am looking for a USB to optical audio converter.
The Alpha USB from Berkeley Audio Design is an external asynchronous USB to S/PDIF (or AES) interface. It's strictly a D to D converter accepting USB digital audio input and delivering digital audio output.
That's the type of product I'm looking for. However, at $1,895 the Berkeley Alpha USB is far more expensive than most similar products I've seen. Some of these products sell for less than $100.

I'm on a budget. Can anyone recommend one of the lower priced alternatives to the Alpha USB from Berkeley Audio Design?
lowoverdrive
@pengun - the video you shared just turned everything I thought I knew upside down. Fortunately, I didn't know that much. 

However, I can't immediately go down the Ethernet, I2S path. As it stands now, my two best DACs do not have I2S inputs. 

In another post you said: 

> Just got a Denafrips Ares II. Its really good, a wonderful source for any digital system. 

That doesn't appear to have an I2S input either. Did you switch DACs? What are you using now? 

I learned a lot from the video you shared. GoldenSound makes a compelling case for using Ethernet and I2S instead of USB (or Bluetooth aptX HD). I'm also fortunate that my entire place is wired with cat-6.

However, until I can acquire the hardware that will let me use I2S everywhere, GoldenSound's comments about using a Raspberry Pi 3b+ caught my attention. However, this video does not explain the basis for his recommendation. Is he saying to replace your PC with a Raspberry Pi 3b+? If so, is the reason simply to get rid of GPU and other noise from a complex system? I already have a simple but powerful headless PC running Linux. It uses a server mb without any GPU. I'm not sure a Raspberry Pi gives me any advantage, and the video doesn't explain things well enough for a beginner like me.

I’m going just to use RCA SPIDIF from the Pi2AES to my DAC. I should have my Cable in a day or two.

I’m building a SV-EQ1616D phono equalizer for my SKY 20, from Bob’s Devices, right now, because the damn Area II is kicking my analog’s butt right now. ;)
The output of your PC, via Ethernet, goes to the Raspberry Pi , which uses the Pi2AES to reclock and generate clean digital streams from the bits, that came over the Ethernet port.

It uses your PC and the Pi, this way, to feed your DAC this rather nice stream, rather than the much noisier USB stream which the DAC has to deal with normally.

You can if you want just hook a USB drive to the Pi and eliminate the PC entirely, but you will need a different OS on the Pi to handle that kind of setup.
@pengun - thanks. I have another question.

> The output of your PC, via Ethernet, goes to the Raspberry Pi

Is that part handled by mpd (Music Player Daemon, https://www.musicpd.org/)?

What OS/software do you run on your Pi? Volumio?

Where are the instructions for setting this up as far as what software is running on the PC, etc.?
Thank you.


I dunno. The Pi2AES guy recommends RoPieee which runs headless, meaning no interface.

As I have not got my cable yet I have not set it up and figured it out. For me it should just be UPnP DLNA used with Foobar, or that is my intention anyway.

I don’t stream stuff, I just need to get my files off my NVMe drive, through the Pi Bridge, to the Pi2AES, which normally outputs on all outputs, to my DAC.

I have not seen detailed instructions but I was a Linux sysadmin for some years, so I expect I can get it all to do what I want. As I have not yet, I have no real useful advice, outside of searching. I did not look very hard once I figured out what was going on.

You could email the guy at Pi2AES and ask, he might have a good idea where to look for good instructions. I’ll know in a week or so, at present mail pace. ;(