What audio system do you have, or plan on getting?

[Spotted Horses]

Thanks. One more question, if I may: how does a power cable influence the sound proper? It either powers the system with the right voltage or it doesn't, but other than that what can it do in order to affect the sound quality for better or worse?

Now you are just provoking me. The answer is obvious. A power cable has to have sufficiently low resistance to transmit the voltage without significant loss. The higher the current drawn the larger the voltage loss over the cable. You wouldn't want to connect the power to a 1,500 watt toaster oven with a cable designed for a 5 watt CD player. It would take longer to toast your bread.

[Florestan]

Now you are just provoking me. The answer is obvious. A power cable has to have sufficiently low resistance to transmit the voltage without significant loss. The higher the current drawn the larger the voltage loss over the cable. You wouldn't want to connect the power to a 1,500 watt toaster oven with a cable designed for a 5 watt CD player. It would take longer to toast your bread.

Thanks. I was not being provocative, just genuinely curious about it. I'm a mechanical not an electrical engineer (had electric engineering courses during college but they were not among my favorites) so I thought there was perhaps something that I might have missed.

[AnotherSpin]

Now you are just provoking me. The answer is obvious. A power cable has to have sufficiently low resistance to transmit the voltage without significant loss. The higher the current drawn the larger the voltage loss over the cable. You wouldn't want to connect the power to a 1,500 watt toaster oven with a cable designed for a 5 watt CD player. It would take longer to toast your bread.

Not this only. AC power cables do influence audio sound quality — their construction, materials, shielding, and connectors affect how much electromagnetic interference, noise, and transient garbage reaches your audio system which in turn impacts clarity, detail, and the overall purity of what you hear. The difference becomes much more noticeable on high-resolution, revealing systems where small changes actually show up.

But — those who are used to listening to shitty sound from shitty devices shouldn't bother sweating over cables — they simply won't hear the difference anyway

[Roasted Swan]

The best audio device I ever bought was my Fiio DAC/amp for my PC.

I was very glad you posted this.  I have a Cambridge Audio DAC that I'd been meaning to hook up to my PC for ages - long story why I hadn't! - but your post prompted me to dig it out.  I have a pretty basic speaker system on the PC but the improvement does seem to be marked.  Quick question though - because I'm lazy I've plugged it into a basic front panel USB socket.  Would the audio quality be further improved by using one of the 'main' USB sockets on the back instead?

[AnotherSpin]

I was very glad you posted this.  I have a Cambridge Audio DAC that I'd been meaning to hook up to my PC for ages - long story why I hadn't! - but your post prompted me to dig it out.  I have a pretty basic speaker system on the PC but the improvement does seem to be marked.  Quick question though - because I'm lazy I've plugged it into a basic front panel USB socket.  Would the audio quality be further improved by using one of the 'main' USB sockets on the back instead?

There's really nothing difficult about giving it a try. I've come across situations where even identical USB ports — such as those on the rear panel of a Mac Mini — have produced subtle differences in sound. For example, some ports may be noisier than others. If you happen to notice a distinction, splendid; if not, it simply means there's none discernible to your ears, and that is perfectly all right as well.

[drogulus]

I was very glad you posted this.  I have a Cambridge Audio DAC that I'd been meaning to hook up to my PC for ages - long story why I hadn't! - but your post prompted me to dig it out.  I have a pretty basic speaker system on the PC but the improvement does seem to be marked.  Quick question though - because I'm lazy I've plugged it into a basic front panel USB socket.  Would the audio quality be further improved by using one of the 'main' USB sockets on the back instead?

     I've tried different ports. The one I'm using is on a hub connected to a back port on the mobo. I tried a front C port and as I expected it made no difference.

[drogulus]

     A PC is a noisy environment for analog audio. That's one reason to use a USB DAC. The second reason is to handle DSD files from SACDs without conversion. I could convert to high rez PCM with no audible change if I had a reason.

[Spotted Horses]

I was very glad you posted this.  I have a Cambridge Audio DAC that I'd been meaning to hook up to my PC for ages - long story why I hadn't! - but your post prompted me to dig it out.  I have a pretty basic speaker system on the PC but the improvement does seem to be marked.  Quick question though - because I'm lazy I've plugged it into a basic front panel USB socket.  Would the audio quality be further improved by using one of the 'main' USB sockets on the back instead?

Sometimes computers have different USB connectors that support different levels of USB (2.0, 2.1, 3.0, etc) which have different data rates. It can make a difference for a high data rate device like a hard disk. The data rate for digital audio is low, so I suspect there would be no difference.

The only time I had a problem with USB was when I was trying to use my Marantz SACD player as a DAC (it had optical, coax Toslink inputs and USB input). Worked fine with Toslink but the USB input had static. The thing also had the idiotic feature than when I programmed it to play successive tracks on a CD it would stop and the end of a track and seek the next track, producing a hiccup in continuous music. I think I had to pay $5 to dump that piece of garbage at an electronics recycling center.

[Roasted Swan]

I've tried different ports. The one I'm using is on a hub connected to a back port on the mobo. I tried a front C port and as I expected it made no difference.

thankyou!

[Roasted Swan]

Sometimes computers have different USB connectors that support different levels of USB (2.0, 2.1, 3.0, etc) which have different data rates. It can make a difference for a high data rate device like a hard disk. The data rate for digital audio is low, so I suspect there would be no difference.

The only time I had a problem with USB was when I was trying to use my Marantz SACD player as a DAC (it had optical, coax Toslink inputs and USB input). Worked fine with Toslink but the USB input had static. The thing also had the idiotic feature than when I programmed it to play successive tracks on a CD it would stop and the end of a track and seek the next track, producing a hiccup in continuous music. I think I had to pay $5 to dump that piece of garbage at an electronics recycling center.

thankyou - I really am a hi-fi dimwit so all insights gratefully received....

[Spotted Horses]

thankyou - I really am a hi-fi dimwit so all insights gratefully received....

We are all in the dark trying to deal with self-configuring digital components which we assume can talk to each other. The one observation I would offer is that a faulty digital connection will typically result in obvious gaps, clicks or static, since defective data will be random or replaced by zeros or a crude correction.