USB DA recommendation needed


I have an apple G4 cube that i want to use as jukebox for my stereo. I am looking for an external soundcard that gives me good sound. I am getting a Linn Majik, which has only analogue inputs, so the soundcard should have rca jacks.

I tried the m-audio firewire audiophile, but it crashes the cube all the time, even though it sounds great. I also tries an imic and it sounds horrible, but works flawlessly.... so maybe usb is the way to go.

What other options are out there? not needing drivers is a plus.

thanks!

O.
runner77
the squeezebox looks interesting!
However, since I use the screen of, my cube to watch DVD's I cannot ban it from the living room. Thus wirelss is not needed, but maybe I get one for the bedroom!
I am leaning towards the 2 step solution (sonica-dac) or waiting for deals on the apogee :-)
A couple questions:
Did you ahve problems before with short cables going into the DAC?
Does the Sonica work without drivers ?
I know nothing about DACs. what is preferred, coax (s/pdif is guess), optical ? What use one is good for the $?

Thanks!
I looked at the Slimp3 from Slim Devices for my other stereos, and ended up with a bunch of Audiotrons instead:

http://www.turtlebeach.com/site/products/audiotron/producthome.asp

The Slimp3 (and the SQBX) are server push--means you have to have software running on a computer to push things out to the box. The Audiotron, on the other hand, indexes all the mp3s/wavs it finds in any public directories on the network and accesses them as you decide. Worked better for me. I do run one CD30 "server push" device in my bedroom hooked to a cheesy Nakamichi radio alarm clock. Might want to look at that too:

http://www.cd3o.com/

The ATron has ethernet, but no wireless (you could hook it to an 802.11 based bridge, however). There may be an issue w/wireless, however. For higher quality mp3s and wavs, the data rates of the 802.11 system may not be sufficient. Nominally, it should be good enough for most mp3s. The problem is that, in most cases, you aren't going to get ideal 802.11 rates in your house--depends on how many other 2.4 GHz appliances you have and how many floors/walls it has to go through.

The Sonica does require installation of drivers to, at least, reroute audio through USB rather than speaker output from the computer (it does on my WinXP box). My perception was that the sound quality was better with shorter runs of toslink, but the Q I asked was because it doesn't get to the quality of ATron-fed mp3 playback in my living room. There, the ATron feeds a Theta Casablanca via coax s/pdif, to a pair of ARC VT 100 Mk IIIs to a set of Proac RS 3.8s. The study system is Theta Pro Basic III (should be comparable to C/B as a DAC) into an ARC LS-16 pre into an ARC D240 Mk II into Proac RS2s. Should be comparable, but its not.

I think conventional wisdom is that coax sounds better than toslink, but I've heard contrary views expressed as well. I think its probably safe to say that on most systems, coax sounds better. The Sonica only has a toslink out, however. I've wondered about cracking the box open and wiring in an RCA plug--I think they use toslink b/c its cheaper to manufacture, but I've seen mods people have done to turn toslink into RCA... Heck, at worst I destroy a $50 box.
I'm having a similar problem with my M-Audio USB Audiophile DAC. It either crashes my computer and I have to reboot, or else it causes a condition where none of my other programs will open. I'm a tad frustrated. You said yours sounds great -- I haven't even been able to listen to mine. Arghh!!!
Thats bad to hear. I thought it was just the audio over firewire or the slowness of my cube (500MHz). But I guess m-audio just has bad drivers.
I actually just got an RMA to send mine back and am looking for a solution that works without drivers.
An additional rpoblem I encountered was that the audiophile seemed to only work with 44.1kHz sources (like itunes). Playign a movie with mplayer which has 48kHz audio would result in silence. I tried to change the sample rate in the control panel.. but guess what... it crashed.

Anyway, now I am looking at the edirol UA-1D or 1X. that would give me spdif and it does not seem to need drivers !

http://www.edirol.com/products/info/ua1d.html (coax+optical)
http://www.edirol.com/products/info/ua1x.html (optical+rca)

So:
- what are your experiences with the sonica ?
-what connection do I need for external "decent" dacs? coax or optical?
-what "decent" dacs can be had in the $300-500 range ?
I seem to recall seeing that there was some known issue with the Mac's audio USB interface. You might want to call M-Audio and see if they have any insight...