Wake up to the potential of Audio PCs

JLM · « **on:** 24 Jan 2004, 02:45 am »

In the Square Circle forum the buzz is all about using PCs in your audio system. (The AVS forums have had this figured out for 2 years.) The idea is to copy your CD onto the hard drive and play it back via the hard drive and a quality sound card (M-Audio Sonica) with (FLAC) software. Jitter is eliminated and dynamics are improved. 100's of CD's can fit on the drive. Software is available to organize, catalog your music. All that's left is a convenient user interface, like Bluetooth, infared, or other technology.

Michael has been trying to tell us all this over the past few newsletters and that his Panda PC (with no fan, quiet hard drive, and capability to use a TV for display) would be perfect for this application. From what I can see he very nearly has all the pieces together.

In a world of $10,000 CD players, VRS has developed a dedicated audio PC for $4,000 that blows them out of the water. This explains why so few high end CD players and so little progress in SACD/DVDa has come about in the last couple of years. Expect news instead from Gateway and Dell.

I'm sure Michael is working to blend his audio interests with his computer expertise to create a high value alternative and come up with his most significant product yet.

Any comments?

Marbles · « **Reply #1 on:** 24 Jan 2004, 02:58 am »

MB demenstrated this quite convincingly at the MAF last spring with the LA2's as the amps and mini column marble 9.0 speakers.

srclose · « **Reply #2 on:** 24 Jan 2004, 05:15 am »

What are the best choices for software to transfer CDs to harddisk? And sound cards? I have just seen the threads here related to PCs but have not had a lot of luck finding the information on the AVS forum. Is there any consensus for the best approach other than using the packaged VPS system?

Marbles · « **Reply #3 on:** 24 Jan 2004, 05:20 am »

I would copy CD's using Exact Audio Copy (freeware) and play back using FLAC.

Lots of very good cards these days.

srclose · « **Reply #4 on:** 24 Jan 2004, 05:35 am »

Thanks, found references to Exact Copy and FLAC. What output is necessary/desirable from the soundcard? It appears that a digital stream is fed to any DAC? or are soundcards performing D/A conversion for analog input to preamp?

JLM · « **Reply #5 on:** 25 Jan 2004, 01:34 pm »

We are in a very confused time for audio as we transition from analog to digital:

1. Many confuse digital with solid state.

2. Many digital amp vendors offer only analog input.

3. Audio PCs don't offer digital output.

4. Several have written off digital due to low price, poor specifications, unexpected break in required, or the technology being so early on the learning curve.

One of the results is finding so many unnecessary D/A and A/D conversions within the signal path (spending extra money for distortions and take us further from the "straight wire" ideal).

Given another couple of years the dust should settle and we'll see fully digital receivers (with digital FM which has just been introduced) and transports or digital only audio PCs, or just all-in-one audio PC/tuner/amp units. Maybe that's what MB is up to?? Again, he is in a great position to be a leader in developing this technology.

Eventually I forsee two camps:

1. Analog (much of it vintage based, with lots of tubes and vinyl)

2. Digital (music downloaded over the net and played through pure digital systems with the amount of compression based on the end user's needs)