[its_cheez]

I intend to build a computer to store all my cds on that provides a comparible sound quality to my existing Hifi (Marantz CD6000KI sig. player, NAD C350 amp, B&W 601 speakers + good cables and interconnects).

Most sound cards seem to me rather cheap and have only 3.5mm jacks. I am looking for something a lot better quality ideally with RCA phono jacks, and digital outputs (should i need them later).

Having read your articles you rate highly emu 0404 and 1212m.

1. Please could you tell me what jacks are on the back of these.

2. Do they have onboard DACs with RCA analogue outputs or do they only have digital outputs (so that I would also need a separate DAC)?

3 Would you advice if they have both buying a separate DAC? or would this be very expensive and unnecessary?

4. How do the 0404 and 1212 compare?

 

[its_cheez]

ps thank you all very much for your help,
John

 

[MD1032]

The M-audio Delta has RCA outputs and inputs. Great for recording. The EMU 1212m has about 15,000 connections of basically every type...except RCA. But, you could get a nice 1/4"-stereo RCA cable for it.

 

[Asmo]

Get the 1212m, or the RME HDSP 9632 (costs a lot more though).

 

[tiberian]

umm since you already have a good rig i guess a emu and a DAC will serve you well...

 

[cadobhuk]

Emu OR the dac,no point in using emu for digital out if connected to hi end dac,most hi end dacs are immune to jitter and supposed to sound the same from $25 chaintech and from emu.Getting not-so hi end dac doesnt make much sense since EMU would be about as good and cheaper.If you get $1000 benchmark,from what owners write about it,it'll rival your cd player in sound quality.

 

[Jasper994]

To more completely answer your question, the E-MU 1212m has optical input/output that can be configured for either spdif or adat. It also has electrical spdif out via rca phono plugs (aka coax) these may also be configured for aes/ebu. On the analog card for the 1212m you'll find two pairs of 1/4" jacks that will run either balanced or unbalanced. It's pretty easy to find cables to convert 1/4 to rca, you may also use standard rca interconnects with 1/4"-rca adapters. Of note here, the spdif output on the 1212m is currently stereo only and while it is physically capable of outputing DD/DTS, they have yet to implement it in the driver. The RME HDSP 9632 does not suffer from this issue and does sound a bit better than the 1212m so it may be worth the extra cash for you.

On its own the 1212m has been compared to some very nice stand alone CDP's and will sound as good as or better than just about everything in the <$1000 category. If you'd like better performance than this, may I suggest a Benchmark DAC1 paired with either the Chaintech AV710 or E-MU 0404.

Some other things to think about, make sure to design the computer for quiet and efficient cooling. Edwood and Iron_Dreamer are good sources for information on quiet PC's and there are several sites that may be very helpful as well. I'd highly recommend you use EAC to rip your CD's and then encode to either FLAC or APE. If you do a search there's quite a bit of info on this subject. Also of note, Foobar2000 is a great player and gets more powerful all the time. Some of the things I really like about it: It's queryable, you can output ASIO, it supports upsampling should you chose to use it, it will allow you to burn CD's from a playlist converting them for you in the process, and will also convert files from one format to another (very useful if you have a portable mp3 player but want ape/flac on your pc).

 

[ChemicalKing46n2]

Another thing to consider would be building your computer around the Mini-ITX form factor rather than the standard ATX format. Mini-ITX based computers (EPIA MII 6000E [600MHz] or EPIA SP 8000E [800MHz]) can provide passive cooling & solid state power supplies with more than enough processing power to function as a music/multimedia server. The only nosie you would get will be from your CD/DVD-ROM and HD (I suggest a Samsung HD with fluid bearings for minimal nosie).

For more information checkout these two websites:
http://www.epiacenter.com & http://www.mini-itx.com

 

[vanillawafer]

ok, so what I'm getting from all of the thread searching is that if I swap my audigy for a EMU 1212 I will now have a very high end source. Is this true? I have been thinking about purchasing a Rega Planet 2000 CDP, but since I would put it in my office next to my computer I would just rather get this type of quality out of my PC if it is possible, so will the computer as a source perform as well as dedicated sources like the Rega Planet 2000?

 

[Solude]

2 things are important when building a PC based source.

1) you need a good soundcard... E-Mu 1212m is my favorite right now.
2) you need a tank of a case to keep the PC sounds in... I use a ~00 AOpen full tower that is solid steel, prob 20LBs empty, and no fans other than the PS, CPU and Video built on ones. Cause if your audio has to compete with 60dB of noise there isn't much point.

The 1212m uses 2 1/4" mono outputs for L/R. You can have a cable built for you or get 1/4" phono to RCA adapters and use any old interconnect.

 

[vanillawafer]

ok, so all I'm lacking is the emu 1212. Is another aproach to go with the AV710 and a nice DAC like the Benchmark? I'm guessing my transport is the harddrive? I also heard some talk about comparing the emu 1212 to the Benchmark, is that reasonable considering the benchmark is 5 times the price of the emu 1212?

 

[Solude]

Quote:

Originally Posted by vanillawafer I have been thinking about purchasing a Rega Planet 2000 CDP, but since I would put it in my office next to my computer I would just rather get this type of quality out of my PC if it is possible, so will the computer as a source perform as well as dedicated sources like the Rega Planet 2000?

When done right, yes. But since you are putting at your PC anyway the problems carry over to either source making the E-Mu 1212m a much better choice. I had the Arcam CD72T before the 1212m. The Arcam was much more musical than the Rega and the E-Mu is even more so.

 

[vanillawafer]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Solude When done right, yes. But since you are putting at your PC anyway the problems carry over to either source making the E-Mu 1212m a much better choice. I had the Arcam CD72T before the 1212m. The Arcam was much more musical than the Rega and the E-Mu is even more so.

Wow, $200 (emu 1212) compared to $900 (Rega Planet) and the lesser priced component sounds better? Is this to good to be true? I keep falling back on the age old saying "If it sounds to good to be true it probably is" I'm hoping "probably" is the key word here.

 

[Asmo]

Quote:

Originally Posted by vanillawafer Wow, $200 (emu 1212) compared to $900 (Rega Planet) and the lesser priced component sounds better? Is this to good to be true? I keep falling back on the age old saying "If it sounds to good to be true it probably is" I'm hoping "probably" is the key word here.

It is not entirely fair to directly compair them in price, the E-MU 1212m alone will do nothing, you need a computer to make it work

When you factor in price of computer components, for transport and power for the emu card, the price is different. But yes, from many different people on these forums, the e-mu card compares favorably to many cdps, but you cannot simply look at it as $200 vs $900.

 

[Iron_Dreamer]

Quote:

Originally Posted by vanillawafer ok, so all I'm lacking is the emu 1212. Is another aproach to go with the AV710 and a nice DAC like the Benchmark? I'm guessing my transport is the harddrive? I also heard some talk about comparing the emu 1212 to the Benchmark, is that reasonable considering the benchmark is 5 times the price of the emu 1212?

If you have the money, the Benchmark system is definitely worth it over the 1212M. It is not 5 times better, maybe 30% better, but that is pretty darn significant to me. I would call the 1212M a great value mid-fi source, and the Benchmark a great value high-end source.