Genesis Digital Lens and Airport Express = good
Thought I'd mention this for others like me who rely on the Apple Airport Express and AirTunes to get digital from the computer to my stereo rig. For me, the Apple Lossless + iTunes + Airport Express + iPhone Remote is a killer interface combination. So that is a nonnegotiable starting point.
Then the question is how to get that jitter-prone toslink output to sound good. The standard against which I'm measuring is my Mark Levinson 390S CD player/processor (into a Headroom Blockhead and HD650 or into my Quad 988 speakers).
I've been experimenting with a couple options. First, was feeding from the Express into the Benchmark DAC-1 ($700 used). That's actually quite good, demonstrating that $1000 today buys you about 90% of what $6000 bought you 5 years ago. The jitter rejection on the Benchmark apparently makes a difference, as it's much better than feeding the Express directly into the Levinson (which has an optical digital input, but without the sophisticated reclocking that the Benchmark does).
I also bought a Genesis Digital Lens ($500 used) -- essentially a RAM buffer for reclocking digital inputs. This product was the brainchild of Paul McGowan of PS Audio, who was among the first to implement this digital buffer approach. While the buffer is laughably small by today's standards (where PS Audio and Boulder just rip the whole CD into RAM), the product is remarkably effective. The Airport Express is hugely improved by having its toslink output reclocked by the Lens, and then sent via coax to the Levinson.
I'd describe the difference as making the sound much less "hi-fi," much more life-like. But it's not subtle -- the Airport direct into the Levinson was obviously less involving, obviously less dimensional. From the Lens, it's very close to the sound of the Levinson reading direct from the CD. The same? Not sure yet. But very close, at minimum.
So the Airport -> Lens -> Levinson as good as the Airport -> Benchmark? Stay tuned -- haven't done that comparison yet.
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