[sinizstar]

any of you ppl use a netbook as source gear ??

if so which one and what amp , headphones?

 

[SoulSyde]

I played around with my EEE PC 1000H for a while as a source device. I used an M-Audio Fast Track Pro as my DAC fed through my previously owned Little Dot MKI amp, to various headphones.

It was fun playing with MediaMonkey as the storage medium because of the DSP add-ons that are available for it. See the following link: MediaMonkey » Addons » DSP

However I've gone back to primarily using my iPod 6G and Rockboxed iPod 5G as my source devices so I'm not tied to the couch or desk to listen.

But with all of the available software out there a netbook can be a fun project.

 

[linuxworks]

I'm going to try this, maybe today. just got my first netbook a few days ago (asus 1005).

I see no reason why it can't convert ethernet based storage (nas, etc) on one side and usb-audio on the other side (spdif out, of course, to a dac).

small footprint, probably the fan will stay low or off for 'just audio' and the form factor is sure convenient.

 

[sinizstar]

let me know how it went linuxworks im intrested to know ,

i think im gonna try this too with dell mini 10 , wonder if i can make it portable enough to take it with me .
would be nice if i can swap a bigger hd in it too so i can store all my music on there.

And thanks for the mediamonkey link soulsyde looks promissing
how did you exp M-audio FTP at the time?

 

[Armaegis]

It's no different from a regular computer/laptop in that regard. As something to stuff in your pocket while on the go, it's a wee bit inconvenient

 

[srserl]

I use my Acer AspireOne with a gamma1 usb dac and a Cavalli Audio CTH for my sound system at work. It sounds just as good as my desktop at home when using the same dac and amp. It will run about 6 hours if using it only for music with the screen off and wifi disabled. It is great for long airport layovers (where I substitute a mini^3 for the CTH).

 

[elliot42]

I'm giving this a go as well. I've ordered a touch screen for my eeepc 701 (currently sitting in pieces on my desk, ready for the TS to be installed) and will give AlbumPlayer a go with music retrieved over the network from my server. It will be feeding my LD DAC_1 via USB, but I may look at getting a USB-SPDIF dongle and installing it in the eeepc at some point.

 

[linuxworks]

confirmed working on an atom netbook using usb-audio (gamma1 lite usb/spdif).

software is linux (ubuntu 'netbook remix') and either rhythmbox or mpd (server) and ncmpc (client).

the only gotcha is that when you plug in usb audio the netbook sees 2 audio devices to you have to be careful to pick the right one.

what's amazing is that I'm using built-in wireless-G and I'm still able to get nice clean flacs (!) coming out of my DAC with this lowly little atom pc.

even more interesting, the wireless interconnect just maps NFS to a local mount-point ('share'). NFS over wireless - LOL! I would NOT have recommended this, but .....


anyway, the hardware was quite a good deal at about $200 shipped

(someday I'll try windows audio, but I trust linux mpd/ncmpc much more. a lot less hassle to go thru to get bitperfect output)

 

[netsky3]

have you already try foobar on wine??

 

[Welly Wu]

I am running Ubuntu Netbook Remix on a Toshiba NB205-N310/BN-G netbook. I use Rhythmbox as my player and Ruby Ripper to rip and encode low bitrate .mp3 files. I may spring for an external 2 terabyte hard drive for my birthday next month.

 

[forbigger]

if you use notebook/netbook as source then you're subjecting your amp/headphone to the crappy sound card and headphone out on it. most likely you wont like it. i know i dont like it

different story if you use it as transport where you hook the netbook to a decent dac and then to amp then headphone. i currently use notebook and netbook for my transport. no complaint whatsoever

 

[Welly Wu]

It is both for me. When I am not at home, I use the internal sound chip built into my Toshiba netbook and it sounds decent. When I am at home, I use my netbook as a transport and my Resolution Audio Opus 21 as the DAC which makes it sound excellent.

 

[GilesM]

I use a netbook, Asus eee pc, 1005HA.
I couple this with a Cambridge Audio DAC Magic (connected via USB, thus avoiding the soundcard in the netbook) and a Cambridge Audio amp.

Software for the music library is iTunes with windows Audio session enabled.

The system works great, but can suffer a little from fan noise, especially if one enables the iTunes visualiser, this really cooks the processor.
Otherwise it's fine, works very well indeed.

 

[thoppa]

Hi,

My Nokia 5800 is a better source than my netbook, but it only has 16Gb.....but this has got me wondering if I could use the Nokia as a wifi streaming audio player....hmmmm....

However, my netbook is fine as a usb 'source' when I use Foobar and the sox resampler to output 48Khz. The netbook ( a BenQ with AMD chipset) has a low dpc latency so it seems it is sending the usb packets on time and this helps keep jitter down.

cheers.

 

[parskey]

I have had the idea of using a netbook+a usb dac as a high quality portable(stuff it all in a messenger bag) source Does this just seem silly or does it seem like a good idea?