TAS 194: The State of USB Audio
September 6th, 2009 -- by default
Source: The Absolute Sound
Source: The Absolute Sound
A: No. As might be expected, there are significant variations in the quality of USB sound from different DACs. Among the four I evaluated, the Bryston and Resolution Audio have relatively poor USB sound. Meanwhile, the extra effort exerted by Benchmark and Audio Research has paid off in far richer timbres, more neutral tonality, and greater extension. The Benchmark and ARC don’t entirely circumvent USB’s flaws, but they do a good job of minimizing them.
Q: How does a USB-to-S/PDIF converter compare to straight-through USB?
A: Based on my experience with the Bel Canto USB Link 24/96, a converter can sound as good as or better than straight-through USB. (To read my review of the Bel Canto USB Link 24/96, click here).
Q: Do USB cables make a difference?
A: Emphatically yes. Much as I would love to report that USB is one area where wires are a non-factor, the interface proved no different in this respect than any other. Cables do make a difference, and a rather significant one at that.
I tested four USB cables: a stock “Brand X” strand that came with some peripheral I own (probably a printer), a Belkin Gold Series model ($44.99), a KimberKable ($50), and the dearly-priced Synergistics Tricon USB ($550). Of these, the generic and Kimber Kable cables were the least satisfactory—both reinforced USB’s synthetic quality. The Synergistics Tricon thankfully did not suffer that shortcoming, and was laudable in most every other way. However, the cable was notably bright. This trait can actually be an advantage in some applications. For example, if I owned a Bryston BDA-1 and were using its USB input, I would not be without the Tricon. Its top-end boost does indeed synergistically counteract the Bryston USB input’s high-frequency deficit, allowing instruments to breathe and strings to sound more like themselves. However, with more neutral associated equipment, such as the ARC DAC7 or the Bel Canto USB Link 24/96, the Tricon’s brightness exacerbated the shrieky nature of USB strings.
The best overall USB cable I tried was unquestionably the Belkin Gold Series. A huge step up from generic cable, the Belkin was very nearly the equal of the Tricon in every particular, with the added benefit of being dead neutral. The fact that it can be had for less than fifty bucks is a great bonus. For now, the Belkin Gold is my reference USB cable.
Q: Do Macs sound better than PCs (or vice versa)?
A: Not in my experience. In the course of my testing I did not detect any particular advantage of one OS or computer manufacturer over another. My iMac running OSX sounded very much the same as my HP running Vista when I compared them back-to-back playing the same music. Any minor differences paled beside the predominance of the “USB sound,” which was unwavering between machines.
Q: Does music software make a sonic difference?
A: A definitive answer to this question will have to await a more exhaustive—and no doubt exhausting!—survey of the myriad popular options. These include iTunes, Foobar, MediaMonkey, Windows Media Player, Rhapsody, RealPlayer, and many others. However, to get a taste for the subject, I did listen closely to Foobar 2000 and MediaMonkey playing the same music from the same HP laptop. I found that Foobar sounds a bit more open than MediaMonkey, probably due to its Kernel Streaming feature (not to be confused with XP’s kernel mixer), which bypasses more of the operating system than MediaMonkey can. But the difference was very slight, and insufficient to woo me away from MediaMonkey’s friendlier user interface.
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Comments
"Q: How does USB compare to S/PDIF?
A: There is no comparison. USB sounds much worse. All four of the DACs I tested support both USB and S/PDIF, making differentiating the interfaces a cinch. For each DAC, I compared the S/PDIF output of a good CD transport—as well as that of a budget CD player—to the USB output of a laptop, with both sources sending the same bits at the same rate (44.1/16) to the same DAC."
To be fair, this question should have read: "How does USB compare to S/PDIF" using this particular set of devices at this point in time"
IMO, jumping to generalized conclusions based on a small sample of products is like listening to 2 CD randomly selected players and declaring that all CD players sound harsh. There are other USB solutions out there and have been for many years that were not included in this shootout.
Alan! Full Steam Ahead!
How can you be staying the course with a reprint of this article when you have run aground with audio experts on so many fundamental points?
Is bad publicity better than nothing?
Alan,
The problem here is that you did not really prepare for the article. In the first place you are using totally outdated computers. From a background such as yours this just seems silly. Using a sub standard laptop, a totally outdated G series MAC... but here is the kicker... A Win2000 computer. Maybe you didn't read the fine print in the 2000 release notes but Win2000 is not even USB Class 1 compliant. Meaning it does not even support all the functionality required to reproduce audio.
I have had many reviewers use the same laptop Alan is using and said they could not even get 24/96 to operate. I even had one of these sent here and the USB port had error rates so high the output did not classify as MP3 quality.
Next Media Monkey... Alan come on it is a well known fact that Media Monkey is not even bit true.
Gang this is why I withdrew my Cosecant from this review. At the time Alan had never even used a computer for high end audio.
It just seems ashame from a magazine that totes Absolute Sound that they can't even get the basic needs of the computer right for this. Especially in an age were power cords are going for +$800 and he can't even spend that much for a decent computer to do the review with.
It would have been very easy and very appropriate to buy a maxed out Mini for about the same cost as the power cords he is using and merely dual boot the unit into Vista or OSX and have a stable platform and consistent for each operatiing system.
To the editors who I sent many emails before this train wreck occured and numerious afterwards.... I just throw up my hands.... what were you thinking????
Thanks
Gordon Rankin
Not here to plug my own products, just here because I believe in the technology and feel Absolute Sound did a total injustice to it.
Furthermore Taffel and perhaps even TAS have a beef to pick. There is no possibility IMHO, that Alan Taffel could write such an unscientific, biased article unless he was trying to boost sales for the "formerly mainstream" audio hardware manufacturers who support his rag. Have you seen a Wavelength or Ayre ad in TAS recently? No, TAS has refused to have an educated reviewer listen to and comment on asychronous USB Dacs. Notice how the Benchmark products which don't use Gordon Rankin's USB implementation, but are well reviewed nontheless, were panned by Taffel? He couldn't say they sounded good, it would blow the whole article to bits. (As if it could stand on its claims, anyhow). The fact is the newer, USB only DACs sound great. Many DACs that Taffel listened to, with SPDIF and USB inputs, sound poor through the USB inputs because they were placed as an afterthought. The ultimate responsibility here lies with Mr. Harley. This junk article should never have been printed. And to have Steven Stone print an article drooling on about the Music Streamer on the next page is more pathetic. Fact is, get your opinions at Computeraudiophile.com, Stereophile, your local dealer, audiosylum- anywhere but TAS.
Furthermore Taffel and perhaps even TAS have a beef to pick. There is no possibility IMHO, that Alan Taffel could write such an unscientific, biased article unless he was trying to boost sales for the "formerly mainstream" audio hardware manufacturers who support his rag. Have you seen a Wavelength or Ayre ad in TAS recently? No, TAS has refused to have an educated reviewer listen to and comment on asychronous USB Dacs. Notice how the Benchmark products which don't use Gordon Rankin's USB implementation, but are well reviewed nontheless, were panned by Taffel? He couldn't say they sounded good, it would blow the whole article to bits. (As if it could stand on its claims, anyhow). The fact is the newer, USB only DACs sound great. Many DACs that Taffel listened to, with SPDIF and USB inputs, sound poor through the USB inputs because they were placed as an afterthought. The ultimate responsibility here lies with Mr. Harley. This junk article should never have been printed. And to have Steven Stone print an article drooling on about the Music Streamer on the next page is more pathetic. Fact is, get your opinions at Computeraudiophile.com, Stereophile, your local dealer, audiosylum- anywhere but TAS.
I've spoken with several engineers who thoroughly understand USB and there should be nothing in USB, as a physical transport layer, that should affect audio quality. However, because I read this artical and tried a different setup with my system, I now know that for whatever reason, USB does affect quality. I have a PC running XP (in the basement with cable running through the floor so I don't hear the PC's fan and disc seeks) and iTunes. All of my CD are ripped to Apple lossless and I had been playing them via USB to a PS Audio DAC for the past two years. Before I purchased the PS Audio DAC I was using a CardDeluxe sound card. The PS Audio DAC via USB sounded so much better than the analog out of the CardDeluxe I kinda left it at that. I did do an experiment of plugging in a low end CD player (my good CD player was busted) to the DAC via coax, but the PC to USB to DAC sounded much, much better so I left it at that for the past two years. After reading this article I decide to try connecting the PS Audio DAC using a high end coax to the digital out of the CardDeluxe. OMG!! Night and Day. Immense improvement of clarity, soundstage, transients, frequency response...you name it...it all sounds better. Vocals, percussion, strings, everything. Its like I've never heard my CDs before.
I still don't understand why - USB physical layer? Window's USB audio-class driver? or what? But I sure do like it!!!
THANKS FOR WRITING THIS ARTICLE!
I've spoken with several engineers who thoroughly understand USB and there should be nothing in USB, as a physical transport layer, that should affect audio quality. However, because I read this artical and tried a different setup with my system, I now know that for whatever reason, USB does affect quality. I have a PC running XP (in the basement with cable running through the floor so I don't hear the PC's fan and disc seeks) and iTunes. All of my CD are ripped to Apple lossless and I had been playing them via USB to a PS Audio DAC for the past two years. Before I purchased the PS Audio DAC I was using a CardDeluxe sound card. The PS Audio DAC via USB sounded so much better than the analog out of the CardDeluxe I kinda left it at that. I did do an experiment of plugging in a low end CD player (my good CD player was busted) to the DAC via coax, but the PC to USB to DAC sounded much, much better so I left it at that for the past two years. After reading this article I decide to try connecting the PS Audio DAC using a high end coax to the digital out of the CardDeluxe. OMG!! Night and Day. Immense improvement of clarity, soundstage, transients, frequency response...you name it...it all sounds better. Vocals, percussion, strings, everything. Its like I've never heard my CDs before.
I still don't understand why - USB physical layer? Window's USB audio-class driver? or what? But I sure do like it!!!
THANKS FOR WRITING THIS ARTICLE!
Again, in computer to USB audio, quality depends on lots of factors in setup. If you got such a difference with the coax out of your sound card, then you probably needed some software or hardware tweaks to get comparable or better sound from USB. USB done right can sound as good or better than just about any soundcard output (even from COAX). But if you're happy with what you're doing now, that's all that matters for you.
I don't know your "engineer" acquaintances, but I'm willing to bet they have a computer and not a sound background. Computer people will tell you that there is nothing in USB that should affect sound. Audio people with USB experience will tell you that USB can sound great if you know how to use it and set it up for audio.
The problem with the above article is that the reviewer didn't know how to properly use USB for audio, and went on to conclude that "USB can't" give high level results.
I'm an oudiophile that is approaching the world of music on FLAC on hardrives and I'm reading as much as I can to get more info.
Well from all what I read in the previous comments we can assume that if on one hand the quality trhu SPDIF is a no brainer, on the other thru USB, unless the user has a solid foundation in informatic to implement all what it takes to have the USB the perform at it's best, the results are likely to be way below it's true potential and this is a serious issue that makes this technology not very user friendly so far. Is this correct?
It's not that simple. USB takes a little effort to learn the setup, but it's not rocket science.
See http://www.benchmarkmedia.com/wiki/index.php/Computer_Audio_Playback_-_S...
for the basics.
SPDIF is simple, but in many cases unless you have a pro level sound card like a Lynx, won't give sound at the level that properly setup USB will.
USB has some convenience factors in its favor also, once it is setup.
It's not that simple a dichotomy. USB takes a little effort to learn the setup, but it's not rocket science.
See http://www.benchmarkmedia.com/wiki/index.php/Computer_Audio_Playback_-_S...
for the basics - not hard to apply to any server.
SPDIF is simple, but in many cases (unless you have a pro level sound card like a Lynx), won't give sound at the level that properly setup USB will.
USB has some convenience factors in its favor also, once it is setup.