Crack Computer Source

[John EH]

I've got to be honest.  I always thought my Crack with Speedball was missing just a tiny bit of something.  My set up is this

Mac Mini > Fiio E17 DAC USB > Crack >Sennehiser HD650

Just for fun I hooked up the Fiio E17 to Optical instead of USB.  What an across the board improvement, at least in this setup.  I know the jury has always been out on what's better, USB or Toslink SPDIF however I think it varies DAC to DAC, system to system.  In this implementation it just works.

In the interest of upping the game a hair more I just ordered a Schiit Bifrost with Optical only and going to play around with that.

What say other users?  Optical or USB as your source AS IT RELATES TO THE CRACK ONLY?

[mcandmar]

Nice bit of kit.  The big advantage of the optical connection is it isolates the computer from the DAC electrically.  The other alternative is a USB isolator, but they wont work with every DAC out there.

[John EH]

Nice bit of kit.  The big advantage of the optical connection is it isolates the computer from the DAC electrically.  The other alternative is a USB isolator, but they wont work with every DAC out there.

I still have my USB plugged in to power the E17 which I suppose I could unplug and let the battery do it's thing but I'm one of those guys I hate to have to try to think about stuff like that.

[hwaitung]

I think each connection type have its supporter.

1. Optical - Impossible to have electrical interference between dac and amp, but there are two optical-electrical conversion which might increase jitter.
2. Coaxial - Opposite of optical connection
3. USB (async) - This is usually considered as good because the signals are synced using the dac's clock
4. USB (sync) - The dac derive the clock from the signal. Not as good as USB (async). I think your FiiO is USB (sync) which is more susceptible to jitter.

For me, I use coaxial and I don't see a huge difference with different types of connections.