AudioCircle
Industry Circles => Bryston Limited => Topic started by: Slapshot on 5 Feb 2014, 05:38 am
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As the title says, I am planning on putting together a Mac Mini based music server, and pairing it with my Bryston BDA-1 DAC. I've read numerous articles, reviews and commentaries that all lead to the conclusion that you must use a high quality USB to SPDIF converter to produce excellent sound. All of the articles are a number of years older, such as this one:
http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/dacs/dacs-reviews/bryston-bda-1-digital-to-analog-converter-and-halide-design-usb-to-spdif-bridge.html
It appears this is necessary due to the early, and ultimately inadequate, sonically, USB implementation in the BDA-1 (which was common to virtually all DAC's of that time) and the poor quality of the Mac's headphone/optical out.
By now, I was hoping there might be a newer alternative to solving this dilemma. Paying nearly the cost (or more) of the Mac Mini just to overcome this issue with a quality PDIF converter is something I would rather avoid. Any new options out there?
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Hello,
Keep in mind that product, according to the review is limited 96khz; the same limit as the man mini's existing sound hardware. You could run an optical spdif 3.5mm to "standard" spdif cable between your Mac mini and BDA-1.
The BUC-1 ($750) that we released will do the same job, but up to 192khz and has a dedicated linear supply. If your unaware you also need some additional software to playback audio files that are greater then 96khz on a Mac.
Cheers
Chris