[twodeko]

Howdy All,

I recently bought an IBM T60 that I have been very impressed for minus one thing, the output audio quality. Intel "HD" Audio doesn't really do it for me, so I looked on the boards to find a USB DAC that would be adequate for my music listening needs. I am an electrical engineering student here, with enough education to understand most of what is being discussed here and would love to build one myself, but I have never started with a piece of paper and built up a design myself yet. I would not mind working off a schematic, and if there are any recommendation or components I should be looking for please let me know.

My main question is regarding to the sound quality of a nice USB DAC... I know jitter is a problem over USB and read that people here have tried to remove the jitter with different IC's but will it be very noticable? I will also be ideally using the DAC with headphones (I do not have any yet) as well as my Yamaha analog/stereo amplifier that goes to my speakers.

Any advice/help/direction will help! Thanks!

 

[tomb]

Refer to the Alien DAC thread in the Group Buys section of the Head-Fi forum:
Alien DAC Group Buy Thread

Alf's first post points you to the support web site for his design. Reportedly, he will offer another Group Buy shortly. They are limited because his board mfr increases the price beyond a certain number of boards. It is highly recommended for simplicity, low cost, and high quality. I just received the boards yesterday and they are little jewels.

This would be your shortest ticket into building/designing DAC's.

 

[twodeko]

I sent him an email a while back without realizing that the DAC was limited to a certain amount and missed the group buy (first round at least). Hopefully another one comes through, looked solid.