USB Cable

No further affirmations needed! There are several folks here, who took the initiative to audition a high quality streamer over PC; heard the obvious improvements and couldn’t go back to PC as their prime source for streaming.

The 1’s and 0’s and bits are bits believers won’t understand the value proposition of a well-designed streamer. Just leave them be.

I am curious how many of these people used a fibre optic cable for the final feet just before the DAC. Something like a Sonore OpticalRendu or better yet a Lumin X1 with direct fibre into the DAC. Compare that to a million-dollar music server/streamer (or also called a computer). 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zncAhs44sp8&t=1564s

The reviewer offers a more objective assessment of Supra, Wireworld, and Oyaide USB cables. I encourage you to watch the video for a comprehensive evaluation if desired. In essence, the reviewer concludes that, in his opinion, Supra provides the best sonic quality with a slightly richer and warmer sound, possibly due to its better EMI/RFI rejection capabilities. He notes that Oyaide is less bright and harsh compared to Wireworld. I also looked into their impedance specifications; both Supra and Wireworld are rated at the standard 90 ohms, but I couldn’t find the impedance rating for Oyaide.

@soix

+1 Very true. PCs cannot compete.

I played with PCs for a number of years. I used different software, striped down the background jobs, Changed cables, added noice reduction… did the same on a MAC, ran it on batteries. Still my first stand alone streamer was completely blew away the PCs… the noise floor dropped precipitously, the treble improved enormously, imaging vastly increases… etc.

If you are using very inexpensive audio gear that itself is very noisy and low fidelity… then there may not be a difference. But as soon as you have a good system, there is no comparison. I am sure this line varies from system to system.

“I am curious how many of these people used a fibre optic cable for the final feet just before the DAC.”

@yyzsantabarbara 

I honestly do not know, you can start a new thread and conduct a poll. Million dollar or inexpensive music streamer/server…they all have a processor at heart. The premise here is, a general purpose PC is not optimized or optimal for audio streaming. You can add fiber or filters as alluded by @antigrunge2 ahead of a DAC to reduce noise but a general purpose PC will never sound as good as dedicated streamer designed specifically to stream audio. Fortunately, there are plenty of decent choices out there at all price points. 

Forget USB cable. Get a streamer instead. PC doesn’t compete with a dedicated streamer. But if you insist on a cable, the Mirage is very good for the money.