USB to audio adapter recommendations?

[VDB]

I don't mind saying a lot of this is starting to go over my head, me being unfamiliar with much of the technical stuff here.

Something dawned on me, which is that I bet I can't use on Airport Express to get online while connecting to another to use AirTunes. I'm sure the wireless card can only connect to one AE at a time. So guess I'm back to a wired solution.

hard to find a decent DAC with features under 100, if you want

Can't say I'm really concerned about features -- really I'm just trying to replace the functionality of my fried headphone jack (matching my onboard sound quality if not exceeding it a little) so I can plug in some decent 2.1 computer speakers. My sound card still functions (my speakers still work) but it's the jack that's dead -- I guess these USB devices aren't able to simply function as an output like the headphone jack, but rather have to replicate the functionality of the sound card altogether? Is that why they can get so expensive?

Help me, if you can, to better understand the difference between some of the pricier options recommended so far and cheaper options like these. I'm still a little puzzled by the wide range of prices out there. I get that quality and features will increase with price, but enough so to justify some of the three-figure numbers I'm seeing?

- SYBA USB stereo adapter, 10 bucks. Some reviewers note the inferior sound quality, so I'll stay away.
- Turtle Bay analog & digital audio adapter, 25 bucks. Some reviewers say the sound quality is on par with or better than their computer's built-in sound.
- Star Tech USB to stereo adapter, 17 bucks. Some reviewers say the sound quality is on par with or better than their computer's built-in sound.

[mattstick]

Try this guy out...

http://www.tascam.com/product/us-100/

[VDB]

Try this guy out...

http://www.tascam.com/product/us-100/

That's looking better. I think I did see that listed on Newegg as well. One quibble though -- I'm sure all the recording capabilities help contribute to that price. Those features are superfluous to me, so I wonder if there's a unit out there with similar audio out capabilities but none of the input features -- if so, I assume it'd go for less. I don't see any such items on the Tascam site.

[mattstick]

There isn't much market for USB > 1/8" seeing as most devices have 1/8" speaker or headphone outputs - so you're really looking at a niche market of people who have broken 1/8" adapters.

The US-100 doesn't require a driver, it uses a generic USB audio codec.

I can't speak for everything out there, but in the Tascam product line you're not going to get any cheaper than that.

[postjack]

voodoo, there are a lot of different opinions into what makes a DAC sound good. I'm generalizing here, but users on one side generally look at the DAC chip in the DAC and what resolution it can process (16/44, the standard for "redbook" or traditional CD audio, up to 24/196, the standard for DVD) and say that pretty much dictates how it is going to sound, and anything else is just in your head. users on the other side say that other things go into how good the sound is, like the quality of the output stage, overall quality of parts used, topology, and maybe even things like the case. I fall into the latter category.

Having said that, the truth of the matter is on just about any $500 and up DAC, 60% of the cost to build is in the case. Hell, some have said 30% of the cost is just having a nice faceplate.

anyway, this is above your price range, but I thought it might be interesting to others browsing the thread:

http://emotiva.com/xda1.shtm

For a while now Emotiva has been making quality, good looking components at rock bottom prices, but this one is just ridiculous. I have no idea how they are charging so little for this DAC, other then the opamp based output stage. I'm not totally anti-opamp so I am very interesting in hearing reports from my friends at Rocky Mountain Audio Fest this weekend.

[mbw]

maybe this?

http://www.zalmar.com/detail-Audio-Personal_Audio-LFH_9034.htm

[ph92]

I don't mind saying a lot of this is starting to go over my head, me being unfamiliar with much of the technical stuff here.

Something dawned on me, which is that I bet I can't use on Airport Express to get online while connecting to another to use AirTunes. I'm sure the wireless card can only connect to one AE at a time. So guess I'm back to a wired solution.

hard to find a decent DAC with features under 100, if you want

Can't say I'm really concerned about features -- really I'm just trying to replace the functionality of my fried headphone jack (matching my onboard sound quality if not exceeding it a little) so I can plug in some decent 2.1 computer speakers. My sound card still functions (my speakers still work) but it's the jack that's dead -- I guess these USB devices aren't able to simply function as an output like the headphone jack, but rather have to replicate the functionality of the sound card altogether? Is that why they can get so expensive?

Help me, if you can, to better understand the difference between some of the pricier options recommended so far and cheaper options like these. I'm still a little puzzled by the wide range of prices out there. I get that quality and features will increase with price, but enough so to justify some of the three-figure numbers I'm seeing?

- SYBA USB stereo adapter, 10 bucks. Some reviewers note the inferior sound quality, so I'll stay away.
- Turtle Bay analog & digital audio adapter, 25 bucks. Some reviewers say the sound quality is on par with or better than their computer's built-in sound.
- Star Tech USB to stereo adapter, 17 bucks. Some reviewers say the sound quality is on par with or better than their computer's built-in sound.

well all the things you linked simply just make the audio signal go to the usb>headphones, there is no processing in that little stick, so if you just want a input from a usb go for that

that being said, those little dongles (the actual word for usb devices like that :-D ) wont make it sound any better, but if you want something to up the sound quality, you can go for a multitude of things, you can get a sound card, a DAC etc.

DACs/Soundcards have a chip in them that takes the digital signal from your hard drive and converts it to a digital signal. Since it starts out as 1's and 0's and not an actual sound wave the chip does the best it can to mimic the actual sound wave here is a example of what it would look like on a graph



if you took calc 2 this should look familiar, its an integral. but as you can see, there are those blocks or columns, this would be an example of a very low grade DAC (if it were a sound wave) and the actual smooth line (the function) is the sound wave itself. Basically the higher quality the chip, the higher sample rate it can utilize. the columns are the sample rate and the chip does its best to try and fill in as close to the line as possible. so the higher the sample rate it can utilize, the higher quality the sound because of the less amount of area under the curve. On top of this certain chips have better specs as far as power consumption, some extremely high quality DACs will even have multiple chips.

im not sure if that makes sense, but i did my best to explain the technology.

But on the topic of pricing, when you buy a stand alone DAC (keep in mind the only people that generally buy stand alone DACs are audiophiles and produces/pro musicians) the parts they use to build it will generally be immensely higher quality then ones on a soundcard.

And when i said with features, im talking about internally as well as inputs/outputs, the components they use in portable DACs are alot lower quality than one that is ment to sit on a shelf, they cant use as many parts, the size of the components makes a difference.

All in all you can get a 24/96 soundcard for 100-150, but even still they arent that great sounding because alot of soundcards arent so focused on the hi-fi audio as they are focused on the options they give you as a producer/recording artist.

But the optimal setup you can run to make your speakers sound nice is optical/coax out (from computer)>external DAC> RCA out> Amp>speakers

Optical/Coax are about the same in quality until you have cables that are 50ft+, in that case optical is the best because it can carry the information longer distances w/o degradation of the quality.

[mbw]

the dude says this is all a little over his head and you bust out calculus graphs?

[ph92]

the dude says this is all a little over his head and you bust out calculus graphs?

hey man, i learn visually, and when i first saw a graph like that i just made total sense, i mean its easy to think about it that way, actual sound is the function, and the DAC tries to mimic that by sampling as many times as possible to cut down on false sound recreation

[VDB]

There isn't much market for USB > 1/8" seeing as most devices have 1/8" speaker or headphone outputs - so you're really looking at a niche market of people who have broken 1/8" adapters.

Yeah, I can appreciate that. Little wonder lots of the reviewers of the products I mentioned talk about trying to overcome a busted jack, driver-less sound card, etc.

voodoo, there are a lot of different opinions into what makes a DAC sound good. I'm generalizing here, but users on one side generally look at the DAC chip in the DAC and what resolution it can process (16/44, the standard for "redbook" or traditional CD audio, up to 24/196, the standard for DVD) and say that pretty much dictates how it is going to sound, and anything else is just in your head. users on the other side say that other things go into how good the sound is, like the quality of the output stage, overall quality of parts used, topology, and maybe even things like the case. I fall into the latter category.

Makes sense.

phishhead92, I get what you're saying, 'preciate the detailed discussion.

maybe this?

http://www.zalmar.com/detail-Audio-Personal_Audio-LFH_9034.htm

Yup, that's exactly the kind of solution I'm looking for. Now to decide whether it gives any appreciable quality boost over the Turtle Beach unit (that costs less than half as much)...

Of course, if I were flush with cash I'd love to go all out here, but last week's $700 computer repair bill is going to sting for a while.

[ph92]

np man, glad we could help, and it says no degradation of quality, it doesnt have any kind of real specs, its just looks like it lets you use a USB for a headphone jack, it doesnt look like it has any kind of digital audio processing. im guessing the signal that is used is one that would be going to a normal headphone jack but it is just re-routed towards the USB that its plugged into, so it uses your motherboards DAC.

personally, i would just wait it out and get a entry level DAC when you get the money instead of just grabbing this quick fix. this is IMO of course

[MeltMe]

i've been using this for about a year now.  i run multiple puters so i was looking for an easy way to switch my speakers between them when needed.  i found it on ebay for like $20 i think.  works good for what i wanted, which was just listening to tunes and easy swapping on a 4.1 system

http://sewelldirect.com/USB-20-External-71-Surround-Sound-Box-wDigital-Output_specs.asp