Does the Quality of the USB cable matter?

Correct me if I am wrong but I have read that after the drawing out process The grain sructure of the metal alows resistance to be more going one way than the other and that is presumably why the manufacturer labels their cable in the direction of least resistance.

Correct me if I am wrong but I have read that after the drawing out process The grain sructure of the metal alows resistance to be more going one way than the other and that is presumably why the manufacturer labels their cable in the direction of least resistance.

I have a found a usb cable that is the best I have tried thus far. Its made by a longtime member grannyring.

It is called the "Acoustic BBQ". He sent me one to try against my Curious usb. It was so good that I bought it ! 
It has the openness that the Curious has but with a slightly warmer sound.
And...it is available at a much lower price and shipped from the USA.
Here is a link to his ad.
https://www.audiogon.com/listings/lis9636a-acoustic-bbq-full-rack-usb-cable-new-digital

Give it try and post your results.

ozzy

Let’s set the record straight here. For your use case, this is the signal flow:

External drive --> USB --> Laptop

Laptop --> Ethernet --> Squeezebox


With this specific setup, the USB cable will make zero difference. This is why. Communication between your laptop and the external drive attached via USB will result in bit perfect transfers to the laptop _EVERY_ time due to the error correction built into the protocol used to transfer data to/from the PC and USB mass storage devices. The data is then sent from your laptop to the Squeezebox using a standard networking protocol (either TCP or UDP as I’m not sure which the Squeezebox uses). TCP has error correction built in. If the data sent from the sender to the receiver does not match the checksum, it is resent. This is GUARANTEED because of the TCP protocol. The Squeezebox then buffers the data in local memory and then processes it for output. Because of the communication protocols in use between your devices, you are guaranteed bit perfect delivery to the Squeezebox. What happens from there is a matter of exactly how the software on the Squeezebox has been programmed to handle the data it has locally buffered.

USB cables only make a difference when the signal path is directly from source to processing device (e.g. PC USB output to DAC USB input). This is because the transfer of data over USB for audio purposes does not utilize any error correction. Zero, zip, zilch, none, nada. Errors in signal transmission are never corrected because there’s nothing built into the ’protocol’ to perform the necessary operations to achieve error correction.

jeenam,

Actually today I am using the usb cable from my Bryston BDP-2 to a PS Audio Direct Stream Dac. So to me the usb cable matters.

Also, I just tried a iFi usb purifier #2 along with some AQ jitterbugs. And in both cases the soundstage shrunk dramatically. The phrase "its only as good as its weakest link" applies. The Acoustic BBQ usb is better on its own without any addons. That is within my system, my ears etc.

ozzy