[irvin59]

I have a home network with a Mac G5 OS X Tiger and Windows machines running XP. I want to set up one of my machines to listen to music through a microdac into a preamp and amp etc..With the Mac I have the choice of optical or usb out, or usb from the PC's. Is there any advantage to Mac over Windows in this context or vice versa?

 

[zatara]

I find I get clicks and pops on my XP machine where as my iBook sounds great without any problems just using core audio nad my micro dac. With XP you can mess with asio and kernel streaming and still not get good or predictable results. With a mac it just works and well at that. any way that is my $.02

 

[blessingx]

Both are usually capable of very good sound, however if you're using iTunes use the Mac (bit-perfect output).

 

[dougwx12]

I agree with previous posters. Both are very capable, but Macs are easier to get right. PCs have more hardware and software options, though.

Or, throw an airport express into the mix and they become equivalently easy, provided you're willing to use itunes.

 

[irvin59]

Thanks for the advice. I do use itunes mainly but I also have quite a few Ogg files.