USB port on nDAC or BNC in?

Posted by: totemphile on 14 April 2011

Does anyone know whether it is possible to stream into one of the nDAC's USB ports directly, i.e. via a USB cable from the USB port of a MacBook Pro? And if so, would this be preferable to the Hiface/DC1 BNC route?

Thanks

Posted on: 14 April 2011 by John R.

No, only USB memory sticks. Take a look at the product page

Posted on: 14 April 2011 by totemphile

I know, this is what I thought and have gathered from comments here on the forum, but then a Naim dealer told me today that apparently this was possible and that some of his customers have it set up this way. Or did he not know what he was talking about and might have confused things? I specifically asked whether this was USB to USB or whether there was a USB/SPDIF converter such as a Hiface in between, he said nope, USB direct via a USB cable, hence my question...

Posted on: 14 April 2011 by gav111n

Tp,

As far as I’m aware the answer is no. Unless there is some kind of emulator software for the MBP that presents a folder of music as though it’s a USB stick but I’ve not come across such a thing.

The nDAC white paper says that naim investigated the use of a direct USB connection between computer and nDAC but rejected this due to excessive electrical noise.

Gav

Posted on: 14 April 2011 by Hook

Hi Totemphile -

Sounds like a confused dealer, but would be interested to hear the end of this story. As Gav says, even if there is some secret backdoor way of enabling the USB port for computer access, then in Naim's view, it wouldn't sound as good as S/PDIF...so why bother?

A while back, someone (AMA?) mentioned something about a "networked" USB stick. Looks like a flash drive to the system, but in fact, was a wireless dongle of some sort. Not sure if that was a real product, or some demonstration technology. My thought at the time was, even if it did make a larger amount of information visible to the DAC, then so what? There's just no getting around the lack of navigation.

Hook

Posted on: 14 April 2011 by AMA

Google "wi-fi flash" and find a good number of various devices, for example AirStash.

I have no idea is it compatible with nDAC or not as we all know that nDAC does not read all types of regular USB flash drives.

Posted on: 14 April 2011 by totemphile

Thanks everyone for the clear feedback, much appreciated. I guess the dealer must have confused things then or pretended he knew....

Posted on: 19 April 2011 by murkku

Airfoil Remote Speakers app on iPhone/iPod work just fine.

You can then stream any application's sounds from your computer onto iPhone->USB->nDAC, wirelessly.

Qualitywise it's pretty close to Airport Express actually... neither approach supports hi-res, though.

Posted on: 20 April 2011 by DavidDever

Same thing can and has been done with PlugPlayer, by the way. Enable UPnP control in the settings, Airplane Mode (turn Wi-Fi on!) and you're off to the races.

Posted on: 20 April 2011 by Kuja

Originally Posted by totemphile:

Thanks everyone for the clear feedback, much appreciated. I guess the dealer must have confused things then or pretended he knew....

Or maybe there is something in his story...

Take a look a this photo of nDAC during its development:

Inside the DAC there is an hidden internal USB connector.

This white cable that is connected to it is going somewhere.

Where?

Posted on: 20 April 2011 by BigH47

Looks more like an ethernet plug to me. It looks too square for a USB plug, maybe it's the angle?

Posted on: 20 April 2011 by fatcat

Originally Posted by BigH47:

Looks more like an ethernet plug to me. It looks too square for a USB plug, maybe it's the angle?

It's a USB socket that receives power from the component it connected too. Unlike the front and rear USB sockets that supply power to the component it connected too.

Posted on: 20 April 2011 by fixedwheel

Looks more like one of my photos to me.

John

Posted on: 21 April 2011 by Kuja

Originally Posted by fixedwheel:

Looks more like one of my photos to me.

John

Nice photo! When was it taken?

Do you know something more about this internal USB connector?

Posted on: 21 April 2011 by Kuja

Originally Posted by BigH47:

Looks more like an ethernet plug to me. It looks too square for a USB plug, maybe it's the angle?

It is an USB type B connector:

You can see it more clearly here:

http://www.aviyaffe.com/images...DAC_6%20-%20full.jpg

...and here (scroll to the bottom of the picture):

http://www.audiosarang.com/upf...e/naim_dac_info2.jpg

Posted on: 21 April 2011 by fixedwheel

Originally Posted by Kuja:

Nice photo! When was it taken?

Do you know something more about this internal USB connector?

More of a snapshot taken as we were doing the factory tour on the day of the barbeque in August 2009.

The DAC was still in development at that time, so I'm assuming that it was connected to a computer for programming at the time. Another photo taken at the time:-

HTH

John