[uzziah]

i like the airport idea, but i have to ask - what's the point?
oh wait, maybe i'm understanding. is it to get the digital music out of my computer without using a garbage connector such as the headphone jack? i was thinking you were sugesting it as a portability-only thing, but if i'm right, i see where you're going. humm

and yes, my computer isn't super fast, but it would be tough for me to buy a new one right now

sounds like osx panther and 320mb should do me fine? no?

 

[uzziah]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelFranks 120 bones for the airport express, enough said. It amazes me that not a single person mentioned this yet! Stream everything wirelessly straight to your amp or DAC, no other mac equipment can offer this power! If you really want some kind of external soundcard I would recommend the terratec phase 26 usb which has native drivers. Take your choice from the myriad of external hard drives. Add on a DAC if you like and spend as much as you want. Don't buy a PC, you would be nothing but disappointed.

ok, so external hd
i can build my own 200gb for about $150

airport (express or extreme - does it matter?) $100 or so used

dac - recomendations? do i need this?

amp - i've been looking at headsave classic

if i do this, it seems i'd definitely be spending a lot more for the convienience of having all my music in one place, for the same sound quality as a dedicated cd player (yes?)

will this setup really compete with a comporable cd player?

and yes, this is strictly a home-use setup. no problem buying used, ugly or otherwise, just must have sound quality!

it just seems a lot of extra money for convienience. then again, maybe it's worth it

 

[uzziah]

not to mention, i already have an airport card installed, that i'm using right now

 

[Stecchino]

Quote:

Originally Posted by uzziah i'm running osx panther 12.4 i have 320mb ram

I used to have the 500 Mhz iBook as well. Before I sold it, I was running 10.2 with 640 MB of RAM. Encoding wasn't too bad. It wasn't a zippy process, however, encoding into Apple lossless doesn't take nearly as long as encoding into mp3's. I don't recommend getting a new computer at this time, even if you could afford it, until you've gotten a handle on your real audio needs. Which leads me to my next comment...


Quote:

Originally Posted by uzziah ok, so external hd i can build my own 200gb for about $150 airport (express or extreme - does it matter?) $100 or so used dac - recomendations? do i need this? amp - i've been looking at headsave classic if i do this, it seems i'd definitely be spending a lot more for the convienience of having all my music in one place, for the same sound quality as a dedicated cd player (yes?) it just seems a lot of extra money for convienience. then again, maybe it's worth it

You're right, it will be a lot of extra money. I am also relatively new to the hi-fi arena. But I don't need experience with a lot of hi-fi equipment to know that you really should upgrade slowly.

Before you buy an amp of any kind, you should just listen through the DAC you end up choosing. Listen to that for a while, get used to it. You mentioned that you were going to upgrade your phones as well sometime soon, so I would spend money on an amp last.

Airport Extreme will not allow you to stream your music in the manner everyone's been talking about. Airport Express is what you would use for that purpose.

 

[3lusiv3]

An iBook G3 500 with 320MB RAM should be fine. You should run Mac OS X 10.3.5 and the latest QuickTime and iTunes. If you decide to get an external hard drive you should make sure it isn't a cheap noisy hard drive. You'll want a large but quiet one. You could store all your music on an external drive, like I do, and stream it to an AirPort Express. Or you could use an M-Audio Transit to get a digital output to the DAC. Plug a DAC such as the CIAudio DAC into the AirPort Express, get a headphone amp such as the Headsave, get some AT A900 headphones and you're set.

 

[Zoide]

How does the CIAudio DAC compare to other DACs like the Piccolo?

 

[Coalescent]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dshea_32665 I am currently using an M-Audio Transit, Piccolo DAC and an SR-71 (formerly I had a portable pimeta). Just do a search on my name and Piccolo, I have written many impressions recently on my iBook setup. You could do the above setup with a portable pimeta for about $500. dshea

dshea,

Hey, great review comparison between the JMT PIMETA and the SR-71. I own a PowerBook G4 17" and I'd like to equip it with a portable sound setup. I just received a JMT PIMETA (which I love), so I've got that covered.

My question is: If a USB to optical cord can be purchased, what is the purpose of the M-Audio Transit? Does it function as a "sound card," so-to-speak, and otherwise the PB wouldn't be sending the audio data to the USB port?

Thanks for your help,

-Chad

 

[dshea_32665]

Good question. I guess I didn't know a USB optical chord existed? I would think it would work to an external DAC, but hopefully somebody who knows more about this than I can respond to it.

The Transit or Sonica are so cheap anyway, I guess I just didn't think to look further. Also, if you are not going to use an external DAC, or if it is going to be awhile, the Transit or Sonica will still provide a better soundcard as well as leaving the option of the optical out for a future DAC.

For a portable DAC that is inexpensive, I can't recommend the Piccolo highly enough. It is a great budget component that is smaller than your portable Pimeta.

dshea

 

[Nospam]

Quote:

Originally Posted by 3lusiv3 An iBook G3 500 with 320MB RAM should be fine. You should run Mac OS X 10.3.5 and the latest QuickTime and iTunes...

I agree 100%

I've been using a 500mhz iBook with various flavors of OS X for over two years. Sure, it's not as snappy as OS 9, but it sure isn't "crazy slow".

Definitely install the Quicktime update that just came out. It supposedly fixes a bug with Apple Losses encoding.

Funny thing about "speed"... My iBook is still my main computer, even though I've got a PC that's over 4 times faster. OS X doesn't seem all that slow, compared to Win2k on my PC. Of course, at present, various spyware and virii have rendered the PC nearly useless until I reformat and reinstall.

BTW, this thread is perfect timing for me. I'm planning to get a G5 iMac within the next month or so, freeing up my iBook for audio jukebox duties

 

[Stecchino]

Nospam, I wish I had a spare iBook laying around like you will

I love my eMac in so many ways (1.25 Ghz G4, 1 GB DDR RAM, 160 GB HDD, 8x superdrive...at the education discount a great bang for your buck)...but now that I'm getting into higher-end audio equipment, the fan noise will become an issue if I ever buy any open headphones (I have the HD-497 on order). In the past 3-4 years I've had a couple of iBooks (including the 500 Mhz G3 model) and an iMac, all of which were practically silent. The eMac fan is not obnoxious in any way, but it's something I fear will hamper my listening and may become obnoxious. We'll see.

By the way, the originator of this thread recently started another thread and mentioned that his iBook "was dying" so no further posts here are necessary, it's accomplished its purpose.

 

[Edwood]

Does iTunes support lossless audio codecs of some kind like FLAC? Or do you have to use Apple's proprietary codec? Either way, lossless is the way to go if you really want a "powerhouse".

Either way, you're going to need to get a lot more hard drive space. External drives are noisy, and those that aren't usually die quickly due to overheating.

$500 budget for a "powerhouse"? LOL, time for you to join team Ramen.

-Ed

 

[3lusiv3]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Edwood Does iTunes support lossless audio codecs of some kind like FLAC? Or do you have to use Apple's proprietary codec? Either way, lossless is the way to go if you really want a "powerhouse". Either way, you're going to need to get a lot more hard drive space. External drives are noisy, and those that aren't usually die quickly due to overheating.

iTunes only supports Apple Lossless, which is a very good codec, but it is a pity that other lossless compressed codecs, such as Flac, aren't supported. I'm hoping it will be supported soon.

I agree that external drives can be a bit noisy. I try and keep mine a bit further away by using a long Firewire cable, but my LaCie d2 drives are still relatively quiet.

 

[Coalescent]

Quote:

Originally Posted by 3lusiv3 iTunes only supports Apple Lossless, which is a very good codec, but it is a pity that other lossless compressed codecs, such as Flac, aren't supported. I'm hoping it will be supported soon. I agree that external drives can be a bit noisy. I try and keep mine a bit further away by using a long Firewire cable, but my LaCie d2 drives are still relatively quiet.

Anyone know what the update that came out a few days ago to the Apple Lossless Codec and AAC does? I almost hope it doesn't offer improved SQ in some way, because I'd have to re-encode all those CDs... and that's scary...

-Chad

 

[Nospam]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jonathanlucas ...By the way, the originator of this thread recently started another thread and mentioned that his iBook "was dying" so no further posts here are necessary, it's accomplished its purpose.

True, but I think this thread still offers some good info to others, such as myself.

I am a bit curious how uzziah's iBook is "dying". My iBook currently has the following "problems":

1) Battery lasts less than 10 minutes
2) Airport card doesn't work
3) After-market 30GB hard drive I installed overheated and died, so I'm back to using the original 10GB drive.

However, it still works just fine for email, web browsing, word processing, iTunes, etc.

I do have a new dilemma... I just realized that the G5 iMac has optical out. If I use that for music, I won't need an USB-Optical adapter (was thinking of the M-Audio Transit, based on all the recommendations).

That's $80 more I can put aside for the Benchmark DAC1

 

[uzziah]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nospam True, but I think this thread still offers some good info to others, such as myself. I am a bit curious how uzziah's iBook is "dying". My iBook currently has the following "problems": 1) Battery lasts less than 10 minutes 2) Airport card doesn't work 3) After-market 30GB hard drive I installed overheated and died, so I'm back to using the original 10GB drive. However, it still works just fine for email, web browsing, word processing, iTunes, etc. I do have a new dilemma... I just realized that the G5 iMac has optical out. If I use that for music, I won't need an USB-Optical adapter (was thinking of the M-Audio Transit, based on all the recommendations). That's $80 more I can put aside for the Benchmark DAC1

ok, i think i owe it to you find people to let you know where i am on all this:

when i say my ibook is "dying," that's not necessarily the case
if i use it for awhile, i get a "do you want to shut down message"
then it usually shuts itself down anyway
if anyone has any ideas about what this might be, i'd really love to hear it

as of right now, i'm selling my ibook on ebay. it's possible i might change my add and revoke the listing, but if anyone's interested:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...e=STRK:MESE:IT

as of right now my latest thought is that a computer based system is just to much money for what it would be worth to me right now. i have about 50 cds; if i had 500, i would probably more readily go with a computer system, as changing cd's would be even more of a pain, big time.

i'm not even going to build a home system at first. i'm just going to have a portable system. most likely:

iriver imp-550
super mini moy
ety er4s

i would like a home system, but it's too much money right now because i've realized i don't really spend a lot of time listening at home. when i'm sitting down at home, i'm reading. i don't know about you, but i don't read and listen well at the same time

thanks, everyone. you've really got me thinking