USB to SPDIF converters eliminating PC intermediate?

There are audiophile hard-drive based transports with lcd screen, but last I checked most were like $1000+, some cheaper but I feel a little suspect at their sound quality. If you find a transport you like there are sometimes really cheap small tv screens on amazon so you don't have to use a tv to access music. What I use is iriver h120 mp3 player optical output to a reclocker, it only does 88khz output though, whether due to hardware or rockbox software configuration. And I'm not sure if it does 24bit properly either.

I imagine a decently priced hard drive based audiophile transport could easily obsolete cd players and be a power saving alternative to the computer. The hardest part would probably be writing the software, the hardware is certainly here. I tried asking rockbox and cplay if they were interested, but they don't seem interested in it. The next best thing would be to modify WD live's clock and psu etc, but I doubt its software is anywhere near ideal, ie loading music to ram and minimizing internal power usage, is the software even bit-perfect right now?

Better clock in the WD live is an option, and I imagine simply upgrading the wd live components would be much easier than getting m2tech hiface to somehow work directly from wd live's usb port. Something that can take wd live's spdif output and reclock it, however, is another viable option, but at the end of the day it is simply compensating for the jitter created by the transport. A good transport may not need a reclocker, but since manufacturers aren't making decently priced audiophile hard drive based transports, spdif to spdif reclocker may be the ticket.

Quote:

Originally Posted by haloxt 

What I use is iriver h120 mp3 player optical output to a reclocker, it only does 88khz output though, whether due to hardware or rockbox software configuration. And I'm not sure if it does 24bit properly either.

Hello Haloxt!

I am sorry to disappoint you but iRiver H120 can output 44/16 only (may be also 48/16, but I am not sure about that). As for higher formats, it can play them, yes (I personally tried 192/24 wav files), but all these formats are quite crudely downsampled to 44/16. This is what I read on tech forums when I researched this issue (I also own H120).

Quote:

Originally Posted by windbag 

Anyone know if a hybrid digital audio streamer exists, that is a sort of cross between the domestic video streamers such Western Digital Live TV and the audiophile M2Tech HiFace? Or if there are plans for one?
 

You can buy a small netbook or notebook and combine it with an USB-SPDIF converter.

I also heard that these media players are one of the best in terms of audio playback and support of hi-rez formats: http://store.duneplayer.com/shop/category.aspx?catid=4

When I go into debug of rockbox, it says 88khz "measured frequency", but 44khz "frequency", so you're probably right, ironmine, not sure what the "measured freq" thing is then.

As for my thoughts on the sq of h120 digital output... with a $30 glass optical cable it sounds a small degree worse than my computer usb output when I give the computer a power conditioner and use cmp+cplay.

I cannot understand why people want to walk away from a computer as a transport. The computer can digitally manipulate the sound before the DAC and this fact alone tethers me to my PC regardless of how I listen to music - through speakers or through headphones. When I listen to speakers I do digital room correction (and equalizing the sound sometimes when needed), which I cannot live without anymore. When I listen to headphones, I convert the sound from 2.0 to 5.1 binaural using "2 to VI converter" + Isone Pro Surround combo. I also remove a couple of ugly headphone resonances in the mids region with a hi-quality VST equalizer.