Opus 21 CD vs Mac Mini... Opus wins

Very interesting. The comment that I have introduced three links in the chain is true and may be a contributing factor to degrading the sound (M-Audio unit, Digital SPDIF cable - Canare Digiflex Gold, and the 'out of the box' Firewire cable). Three out of six comments so far seem to indicate that the problem is not the computer storage itself, but what is downstream in the chain. Thank you for your contributions.

Bwyoung, hi. I'm not aware of any premium FireWire cables but they are sure to be around somewhere. S/PDIF cables abound of course, and I've tried several, from Canare Digiflex (your current cable and a terrific value) up in order of price through Apogee Wyde Eye to VH Audio cryo Pulsar, Zu Ash, Wireworld Gold Starlight and the Atlas Opus I own now.

I've found that the S/PDIF cable's quality makes a big difference but even more important is cable length. In my setup a 1.5m length of Apogee Wyde Rye beat a 1m length of it for coherence and clarity. Others have found the same, including UHF Magazine and its Audiophile Store.

The M-Audio FireWire-to-S/PDIF converter is another key element. I don't know yours but I use a M-Audio Audiophile USB from time to time, to change USB to S/PDIF. It is dated now and a 60-dollar Valab converter box from eBay does the job better, especially in the highs.

Just as a rule of thumb, I would have thought a fair budget for the outboard gear, when you compared, would be the price of the CD player minus the price of its DAC (which you are of course using in the comparison). Hard to put a dollar value on just part of the unit, of course.

OMO, either upgrade your firewire to spdif converter, or look into a good usb to spdif converter (Empirical Audio Offramp 3). Make sure you have a good spdif cable (and usb cable if you decide to go that route). Cables do make a difference. I use a mac mini and send firewire out to my firewire dac (Weiss Dac2) and it sounds excellent.

Heymikey, or others, any suggestions on upgrading firewire? I looked at a couple of well known audio cable manufacturers and they don't seem to offer upgraded firewire cables.

My friend got the MSB mod done to his ipod (his ipod mind you), and ran the digital directly into his MSB DAC and it was probably the best digital audio I've ever heard. Sure, a $14,000 DAC helped but still. It smoked any stand-alone CDP I've ever heard. Who wants to change cds anymore anyway? As soon as my Minerva comes in, I will run my Mac Mini (AIFF) into the Minerva via firewire. Mmmmm.