2. digital
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How to get into high end digital? (Feeding a DAC)

I am looking primarily at the Schitt Yggdrasil or the Topping D90.
  • How does one feed those?
  • I am assuming any sort of CD transport would output the bit stream?
  • or… they get saved to file and played from some media player into the DACs.

Some example of what is commonly done would be great.

The system currently consists of:
  • TT —> Audio Research PH2
  • An old Nakamichi 5 disk CD player
  • TV
  • Audible Illusions line stage (New tunes on the way, but it still sound OK to me with the old tube in it)
  • Prima Luna (with GoldenLion and TS KT-120 one the way… and I might I’ll get the VTL mono blocks 100w/ch serviced)
  • Vandy 2C and Vandy sub

I also have a Home Theatre pre, which is Roon capable, on the way… So that maybe does some of this for me as well? 

But to be totally honest, the digital side is a bit of mystery to me.
I have always thought we plug in a CD player and the signal comes out. (Maybe with some nuance in DACs, clock jitter, and filtering to separate the higher end from the lower end products.)
128x128holmz
holmz's avatar
holmz OP
2,328 posts
 
@larryro2 are you referring to their Belden USB cables?
or the BNC?
or ??l
sbank's avatar
sbank
3,378 posts
 
Blue Jean ethernet cables are good too! 
sbank's avatar
sbank
3,378 posts
 
@donniewn IME, even with a better USB card, a standard computer running iOS or Windows has so many processes running unrelated to optimizing audio. They also require more power (aka more noise). If you run linux stripped down to single purpose and a great linear power supply, that might be close to performance to a good renderer/streamer, but all that trouble is easily overcome with a purpose-built device...no extra processes, lower cleaner power, and ideally optical isolation. YMMV.

IME, Audirvana+  updates corrupted my library and required finding hidden files and reinstallation on more than one occasion to get back up to speed. Damien helped when he got around to it, but he was too busy to help promptly and (at least at the time) was a one man show.
I also find the multi-device experience and the discoverable links embedded throughout Roon to provide way more FUN! Cheers,
Spencer
missioncoonery
1,221 posts
 
 "Dont believe the pundits saying that spending ever more on a transport gives "better" sound quality. Not true! Digital is NOT like Analog! The same thing applies to cables. Cheap here works just as well as expensive. A $10 Monoprice digital cable is indistinguishable from a three or four figure cable - regardless of what the "golden ears" crowd claims.".............................
.Boy you sure do talk alot of BS..I find normally when one post like this they simply dont have the funds to aquire a system that is reveiling enough to hear differences for better or worse
holmz's avatar
holmz OP
2,328 posts
 
@missioncoonery do you mean me?
Boy you sure do talk alot of BS
Usually my BS is offered sarcastically, which many say, “is the lowest form of humour.”


I generally find the idea of cables somewhat snake oil laden, and multiple stereophile routers could be in that list. But proof they work would be nice to see.

I need to find my CD s transport for the NUC later today as it is supposed to rain. Before that rain starts, I should do my outside work.
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