"Mini" to Optical for Airport Express

The analog outs on the AE are junk, trust me.

Use the Toslink out with an adapter and a glass cable such as:
http://www.soundprofessionals.com/cgi-bin/gold/category.cgi?category=220&item=SP-TOC-99HQ&type=store

The jitter from the AE is quite bad, but this will bring it up to most cheap DVD player kind of quality. You can do a lot more to make it lower jitter BTW.

If you need the Toslink adapter, I have a bucket of them. Just send me a postage-paid envelope and I'll mail you one.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio
Manufacturer

Steve,
I have an airport express and love the wireless capabilities. I have the cable and adapter. What is the best way to go about using the airport express? How much better is it going with a usb cable/dac{ wavelength ] vs using the AE into a toslink dac{ie altmann}? I would like to use the AE if it sounds very close to the usb dacs because i don't have to run a usb from my listening chair to the dac. What do you think?

Streetdaddy - the AE with Toslink is not even close, sorry. The problem is high jitter. However, there are ways to make it even better than most USB solutions. For instance, if you put a Pace-Car reclocker between the AE and the DAC, the jitter is minimized.

Modifications to replace the power supply and clock in the AE and making it S/PDIF coax output is also quite good.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio

Steve,
ok, so how much for the full mods to the ae and which $1000ish dac would you recommend?

There are two ways to go:

1) Off-Ramp Wi-Fi - modded AE - $1200 with Superclock4 and S/PDIF coax output

2) Stock AE with Pace-Car reclocker - $1350 with both I2S and S/PDIF coax output

#2 is better.

Decent DAC's in the $1000 range - IMO, there arent any, but you can get close with dAck2!, Benchmark DAC-1 or Lavry Black. Probably the most listenable in stock form is the Lavry Black. There are others, like the Channel Islands or PSAUDIO digital link III, but I have no experience with these.

Steve N.