Apple tv - is it worth getting a dac?

If you always use the sound from the optical out into DAC (for video, music, music over photos, trailers etc) then best go for component lead as that does not carry audio. If you use HDMI in this instance you will have to mute the TV or turn down the volume. HDMI cable is neater thugh.

quote:

Originally posted by gazla:
Why ...? Wireless streaming maybe?

Ah.... I always forget that.

I seek to avoid wireless activities in my music replay. But thats just my application of a musical Occam's razor.

I figured it would be just another possible way of degrading the sound, in an already troublesome set-up.

I was told by DaveD, and MANY others here, only ONE YEAR AGO, that a Computer based DAC source COULD NEVER equal that of a Naim CDP, nor most transports.

Basically I was laughed out of many posts for even asking about DACs... In fact I feel slightly responsible for the segregation of "Computer music".

In that time I have watched the tides turn. Munch, George and countless discriminating, discerning members, have taken the plunge. People with 500 series kits are fully enjoying Lavry's. Mac minis are sitting on Fraims everywhere.

But I have been scarred by my initial experience and continue to seek the best possible extraction of the data to feed the DAC. In so doing, I have shunned wireless streaming.

Also, I have a nice silent computer within a toslink cable of my kit.... so no need.

I think you could pick up a Mac Mini for about the same price as a Apple tv... and then simply hide it away with your NAPSC as far as possible.


Oh, and I have ZERO interest in listening to streaming, compressed, shit-bitrate radio stations regardless of the content. Unless of course it is NPR, and even then, that will not be played through my Naim kit. Home theater or car only.

US Radio is horrible....

quote:

Originally posted by pcstockton:
US Radio is horrible....

Best on vinyl.

quote:

Originally posted by Harry H. Wombat:
If you always use the sound from the optical out into DAC (for video, music, music over photos, trailers etc) then best go for component lead as that does not carry audio. If you use HDMI in this instance you will have to mute the TV or turn down the volume. HDMI cable is neater thugh.

If you have a "flat screen" TV that takes HDMI, and an HDMI source, then it is the best option for digital video sources, even if the sound is done separately. The HDMI sends the signal digitally (as does DVI), and flat-screens can use this directly. If you convert to component, then the TV will just convert it back to a digital signal in order to display. CRTs use component video directly, though.

I'll take this one.....

The second of three so far.... or 60 or so more to go!!!

Lagunitas Brewing.... Seriously good ales, made by someone with seriously good taste in music.

Just hooked up a Beresford DAC to my ATV via Toslink. Straight off the bat, Apple Lossless files sound very good but you can really hear the difference with anything less than 256, but even these sound closed in. Looks as though I have some re-ripping ahead of me.

Oddly, the lower compressed files seem to sound better going out of the ATV analogue out to the TV and from there to the NAC - where D/A conversion has happened in the ATV. Analogue out from ATV to NAC does not sound as good as when routed through TV (bizarre). The lossless files sound better via Toslink to DAC and then NAC.