Another optical out question

Maybe Pure Music is messing things up, or the settings are wrong .. why not take the WAV file from the USB stick and play it back directly through iTunes with sensible settings - volume max, no eq etc? before throwing more money at things?

Firstly, Wav format on Naim DACs sounds better than Flac, AAC, MP3 and other commonly used formats - tried a few times and definitely convinced.

Secondly, the performance of Mac's optical out is, although being the digital s/pdif type, not that good. There was a similar comment made on one the posts in this forum and I second it.

I am afraid wired network streaming from NAS is still the one to beat.

And a select few internet radio stations are also top choice (just to consider)

Bobby

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Firstly, Wav format on Naim DACs sounds better than Flac, AAC, MP3 and other commonly used formats - tried a few times and definitely convinced.

If you mean USB than you could hardly perform such a test as nDAC supports WAV only (so far).

If you mean playing bitstream through nDAC S/PDIF input then the quality of bitstream will depend on the quality of your transport. If your transport processor is not fast enough it may screw up the bits during the FLAC decompression and this may result in worse performance than WAV.
I use Logitech Transporter as a transport into nDAC which provides indistinguishable SQ between FLAC and WAV.

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Originally posted by AMA:

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Firstly, Wav format on Naim DACs sounds better than Flac, AAC, MP3 and other commonly used formats - tried a few times and definitely convinced.

If you mean USB than you could hardly perform such a test as nDAC supports WAV only (so far).

If you mean playing bitstream through nDAC S/PDIF input then the quality of bitstream will depend on the quality of your transport. If your transport processor is not fast enough it may screw up the bits during the FLAC decompression and this may result in worse performance than WAV.
I use Logitech Transporter as a transport into nDAC which provides indistinguishable SQ between FLAC and WAV.

Good point, I always thought the bit stream to spdif is close-to-bit-perfect.

I played the same Wav and Flac test files and my own songs (Air, Moon Safari) on Uniti and Unitiqute and also on SN (spdif feed from Mac) and I was convinced the Wav sound was fuller and smoother. Not by huge margin but audible - yes.

Thanks for the comments so far. I'm really hoping for some simple thoughts. Likesmusic makes a very valid point which I'm trying. Assuming there is still a difference would the addition of an S/PDIF improve on the sound through the optical cable?

Two approaches to the problem of getting your music into dac / amp; streaming and spdif. You will get a very different message from each camp but in the end the audible difference, once you have got it "right" won't be that great.

Choose high quality components and try to keep things simple.

Streaming is very much the thing of the moment and in theory it looks very promising. Using an optical, spdif or USB approach can be just as effective and the technology is a little more mature.

The Halide Bridge is a great place to start and does improve on the optical out from the Mac. However, I've never had that much of an issue with the Mac's toslink output and am quite happy
to listen via an Optichord cable into my Uniti.

I have always argued that the recording quality of a lot of Redbook CD material is dreadful anyway. The Halide is better, a Wavelength USB Dac is even better and at that
point I'm not sure I would worry about the nDac too much.

At the moment most of my listening is done via streaming which very convenient and sounds great.

Tog

Just wanted to thank likesmusic and endorse his comments. I didn't think I'd made many tweaks to Pure Music at all but when I returned it to the original settings, suddenly things sounded a whole lot better...

Thanks v much (and worth bearing in mind to anyone else who feels SQ has dropped when using PM or similar).

A lucky guess! It's so easy to change these settings by accident, or when you're playing around, and forget to change them back. Not a bad idea to 'print screen' of the settings you've used, so that in 6 months time you won't go through the same misery. The irony is, of course, that there shouldn't really be any settings to vary in an audiophile player - it should just be right! Maybe someone will bring a really simple one out .. like Naim did with pre- and power amps all those years ago .. just on and off.

In my opinion, and that of many other forum members, toslink optical out from a Mac is easily bettered by a USB -> S/PDIF converter. The Halide Bridge you mention is admired by some; my personal favorite is the HiFace EVO, but there are many choices out there. The search function will produce numerous discussions of this topic.

I'm sure this must be a dumb question, so apologies in advance...

What is a DC1 cable? Can I not use this to connect a mac mini with my nDAC instead of the Halide Bridge or EVO?

The DC1 is a coaxial (copper, not optical) cable terminated with either BNC or RCA. You need one of these, or an equivalent, to connect the EVO to the nDAC. You use a standard USB cable from Mac to EVO.

Obviously a coax cable cannot be plugged directly into a Mac, there is no suitable connector.

The Halide Bridge, on the other hand, has a coax cable integrated into the design, I believe.

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Obviously a coax cable cannot be plugged directly into a Mac, there is no suitable connector

Unless the Mac (not mini or lapper) has a sound card that accommodates this. I know someone who uses a Juli@ with their G4 or 5....

If you are going to use the mini with a nDac then a USB convertor like Halide is the way to go. Without an nDac your choices are wider but a asynchronous USB dac like the Wavelength Brick or M2Tech Young would make for an interesting journey.

Tog