[ac500]

I'm getting exactly the same setup . It's exciting to hear that it sounds really good!
 
At the same time it's really frustrating since my NFB-12 won't arrive for several weeks..

 

[Justinnn]

I ordered from pacificvalue and had it within a week.

 

[ac500]

Yeah, but unfortunately they're out of stock. So I had to order directly from China.
 
Edit: In fact I first checked almost a week ago, so you might have gotten their last one

 

[Chris_Himself]

Hey lets see some pics! I always wondered what the NFB-12 looked like in person. I've heard similar setups with relatively the same build and DAC chip but were much more expensive so I always felt confident in recommending this little wonder.

 

[muad]

Yeah, audio-gd's lower tier stuff is excellent bang for the buck. Just the quality of the power supply is not usual in this price range. Many others use wall warts etc. I can't recommend their stuff enough!

 

[Chris_Himself]

I mean it competes with the Cambridge DACmagic and I always thought it was an excellent unit but it seems that the NFB-12 is built with brand name internals and electronics on a decent pcb so it really screams value to me, but then again sound isn't always the sum of parts so who know?

 

[muad]

Well it's a great design, with quality parts making it will last forever! 

 

[ac500]

Here's a review with high res photos, and with the HD 650
 
http://www.head-fi.org/forum/thread/561299/audio-gd-nfb-12-impression
 

 

[Justinnn]

Quote:

Hey lets see some pics! I always wondered what the NFB-12 looked like in person. I've heard similar setups with relatively the same build and DAC chip but were much more expensive so I always felt confident in recommending this little wonder.

http://imgur.com/a/983wr
 
Also, this may be a pretty stupid question but I'm assuming this a coax cable?
 

 
This came with the NFB-12 along with those black thingies in the same package. Any clue what the black things are for lol? Also, there's some plastic or something around tips of the cable that I don't think I can remove? What. Help please!

 

[muad]

That's an optical cable, the rubber caps keep dust out of the ends. The black things are jumpers, they complete circuits on the NFB12 and probably fell out during transport. Your NFB12 is probably broken... I'm just messing with you   The black things are jumpers, they are for switching on the digital filters of the WM8471 chips if you want to adjust the sound. I think the filters roll of the highs if I am not mistaken. Maybe someone else can elaborate...

 

[Justinnn]

Quote:

That's an optical cable, the rubber caps keep dust out of the ends. The black things are jumpers, they complete circuits on the NFB12 and probably fell out during transport. Your NFB12 is probably broken... I'm just messing with you   The black things are jumpers, they are for switching on the digital filters of the WM8471 chips if you want to adjust the sound. I think the filters roll of the highs if I am not mistaken. Maybe someone else can elaborate...

Should I be using the optical cable? Will my PC even have an input for it?
 

 

[muad]

Depends on your computer, do you have a sound card? or is it onboard sound? You don't have to use optical, as the nfb12 can be used with usb alone. Using Optical, coaxial and usb is up to you. Some people claim optical/coaxial sound better and other say it makes no difference. The new USB connection on the NFB12 is well implemented and can do bitperfect, meaning it can accept various qualities of audio directly without the need to  down sample the data as with the older usb connection. You shouldn't notice a difference in quality between inputs...

 

[Justinnn]

It's onboard sound. I'm using USB now and it sounds amazing, no complaints. Isn't Coax/Optical the preferred method though if possible?

 

[muad]

well onboard optical can be a pain since pc audio is usually 48khz while cd's and mp3's are 44khz. So the onboard will upsample the 44khz to 48 khz since it can't output both 44 and 48 khz audio at the same time.
 
My advice is to use Foobar2000 as a player with the wasapi driver. Make sure to set the device to usb: wasapi and bit rate to 24bit in the preferences. Heads up, your windows volume control will cease to function and you will not be able to play other sounds/music while foobar is playing music. But your music will be as pure as... I can't think of anything. Let's just say it will be really pure

 

[Justinnn]

Misread, sorry.
 
Using the WASAPI dll now!