[jip]

hi, a lot of other people have been talking about this topic. i'm interested in getting a quality output from my laptop. i'm only interested in an spdif stream to a nice external dac. since i have a laptop i would want usb->spdif, and a device that leaves alone the sampling frequency of the audio being played. the m-audio sonica seems ideal (it doesn't resample to 48khz does it?) with the exception it has toslink optical rather than a coax spdif out. i have read that toslink is considered more jittery. would anybody reccommend the sonica or another device for running to a high quality dac? i'm curious, could i just open up the sonica, remove the led, and connect an rca instead or would i run into impedance/current problems?
thanks
jip

 

[jip]

hi, nobody can help

there's a lot of talk of pci sound-cards with digital outs, usb for analogue use, but... ? the sonica theatre has an rca spdif out in the pictures, but other websites, and even m-audio themselves say that the digital output is optical? anybody?

 

[roos]

best cost no object solution would be a echo layla24 with laptop card http://www.echoaudio.com/Products/Layla24/index.php and http://www.echoaudio.com/Products/Laptop/index.php

a friend of mine is currently trying the sonica with her apple powerbook, and it works.

as for toslink, if u use a cheap plastic $10 cable its gonna suck, but pay the $ for a glass fiber one and u will never go back to rca spdif. i believe the wireworld one is in the $100-150 range

 

[jip]

thanks for your comments roos