either for this get together or for another time in the near future, I'm looking for additional input on some things I'm trying out at the moment.
I've got a normal audio PC with commercial level sound card SPDIF coming out of it. Decent, but beaten by better CD transports playing the original disk. I've got a professional USB DAC/mic pre/SPDIF converter that is better than the internal card in some ways, not quite as good in others. It's cumbersome to work with and doesn't auto-recognize every time laptop is booted...
I've got a Lynx L22 card in a second audio PC that I'm having JPS modify the cable dongle/connectors on to be better quality. It can feed AES/EBU over XLR terminated interconnect to the Oracle DAC1000. It can also feed analog via balanced XLR to the analog inputs of the Oracle.
I've got a ART Legato USB-SPDIF converter coming (along with their SPDIF cable to listen and compare to JPS). This will feed the coax digital input of Oracle DAC1000.
I'd like to compare these solutions to see if there is a clear winner. I know we've talked about how to get the Sonos to be better quality. I'd like to somehow get that in the mix as well.
The key here is that I'm too much of a lazy bugger to get up and change disks for every song I want to listen to. With the exception of about 20 albums that I always want to hear at their very best, I'm willing to give up a smidge to a good transport to get the convenience of having 14 terrabytes of data at my fingertips. The better half also likes the visual of no cases strewn all over the place and walls of bookshelves full of disks.
While I'm sorting out some speaker choices (more on that later) as well as finishing my rooms (garage just got bumped to top of honey-do list given her purchase on Saturday...which is truely AWFUL to drive, btw. She won't have to worry about me disappearing with it anytime soon. I'll just keep driving my truck, thank you very much), it might be better to use your dramatically improving room and setup if you are up for it, Carl?