Yet Another USB Soundcard question (Hopefully thoughtful)

[serqrevp]

Okay, so I've been lurking here for a while gathering up the nerve to post a question that has been asked a hundred times or more, but I really have looked everywhere on this site for an answer.. I need a recommendation for a USB soundcard. I've read and searched all the post I could find on the forums and am left with more questions than answers, which I suspect is rather normal around here.

My source is a Toshiba laptop running iTunes. I currently have a Xitel Pro-HiFi Link USB soundcard running via Coax to a pair of active Edirol MA-15D desktop monitors, which is in turn connected to Yamaha YST-SW015 Subwoofer. (I know it's not the greatest system, but it's all I have... I'm a starving undergrad).

I'm looking for a replacement USB soundcard that has digital-out (I'm toslink/coax neutral – trying not to stir this one up again…) and is bit-perfect. I don't want/need a MIDI port, analogue-in-or-out, or a headphone jack. All I'd be using it for is to listen to music. It's my understanding (correct me if I'm wrong, which I'm sure someone will

) that iTunes doesn't send out a bit-perfect stream as the sound is being routed through QuickTime to either waveOut or DirectSound (which in turn is going through kmixer), however, I may decide to start using foobar in the future. It seems from what I've read, that the M-Audio transit is bit-perfect, yet there was a thread that claimed the Waveterminal U24's sound was substantially better. I'm further confused as to whether I want/need 24-bit/96kHz (It seems the Transit is 24-bit/96kHz while the Waveterminal is only 24-bit/48kHz).

Are there other products I should consider (especially since all I care about is digital-out and possibly digital-in)? Hopefully someone can recommend a product that I can grow with.

Any help would be really appreciated as I feel a bit lost.

Thanks!!!

Fred

On a separate note, does anyone know what the difference is in the QuickTime preferences of setting the sound-out to waveOut or DirectSound, or for that matter what effect changing the sampling rate would have?

 

[serqrevp]

bump

 

[dallasstar]

The reason Waveterminal sounds better is because it creates less "jitter" which is basically a word that means timing aberrations in the signal. I can't really comment on whether you want 96kHz or not because I don't use an external DAC. However, I think I should note that if you're going to spend that much money on a soundcard, you should use the soundcard's own analog outputs rather than a digital output to your speakers because I'm sure that your soundcard (if similar in quality to Waveterminal) will sound better than the DAC on any speakers. So anyway, I think your biggest mistake has been to use digital output without having any reason for doing so. I'm going to guess that this fact alone simplifies your situation greatly.