[HypnoLobster]

If you have the choice, and you need a long run, always go with digital if possible.

It's just 1's and 0's. Legnth won't make it sound different, and it's generally cheap. Analog and legnth/price is a different story.

 

[00940]

Quote:

Originally Posted by boead As I understand it USB, Firewire, AES/EBU(?) transfer digital data much like a hard drive, in packets or groups and this digital signal needs to be converted into SPDIF so it can be clocked and feed into a DAC.

It's a lot more complicated than that. USB audio works similarly to spdif. http://www6.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=141238

 

[Spiug31]

Quote:

Originally Posted by boead I found that the longest a USB cable is sold is about 16 feet. Why? Can a USB cable for an audio device be longer then 16 feet?

I have a 20 metre fiber optic USB cable that I plug into a battery pack (4xAA batteries) at its downstream end = no ground loop, battery powered hub and it works well. This is only USB though not USB2 but I think it should be fine for connecting to a DAC.

A 33ft USB cable is sold here http://industrialcomponent.com/opticis/opm210010.html

incidentaly the longest uninterupted USB cable I've seen is a 40m (133ft) long fibre optic USB cable which is made by Opticis.

I only noticed this thread while searching for optical + jitter, sorry if its a bit late.

 

[nph134]

I spent quite a while looking into extended length USB cables. As part of my phd project I was using a usb camera that was quite a way from the computer it was attached to.

I tried several different solutions and the best was using a Icron USB 2 RAnger 140. All the other "extenders" etc just didn't perform as they stated in their specs.