I am soooo enjoying MC17 as my front end for my music only system. The tagging capabilities has allowed me to fine tune all my art work and multiple CD sets and wierd names. Now EVERY ONE OF MY CD's are properly tagged.....that's 100%! I'm also loving the COVER VIEW over the THEATER VIEW for the touchscreen. So many options and settings that I wake up in the morning and head over to my system just to play and learn....love it. I feel like a kid all over again! I do have some questions that I haven't been able to find answers to on the internet.
First, here is a pic of my music only system. It is a stereo only system that consists of a McIntosh C-39 preamp, McIntosh MC-7270 power amplifier, 1 pair of Carver AL-III ribbon speakers, a Panasonic CF-29 laptop running MC17 (all my music is on a NAS upstairs), and controlled by the ELO 20" touch monitor. I also have a small wireless mouse.
Now I have the questions. Currently I have a Soundblaster external LIVE USB soundcard that connects to the laptop's USB port for the DAC and then straight to the C-39 analog CD1 input ( the laptop and Soundblaster sit behind the cabinet and is out of view ). Obviously this is the weak link and is being upgraded. I just ordered an Emotiva XDA-1 DAC from the Emotiva website. It will arrive in a few days and will be a big improvement in sound quality. Now I know the XDA-1 is not assynchronous USB and if I connect it to the laptops USB port only 16/44 will be the only rates I can pass to it, and all my 24/96, and higher music will not be able to pass thru it. This is not good. The only way for the XDA-1 to play back the high res material is thru the COAX or SPDIF inputs, not the USB. Now my temporary Soundblaster will play back all my music up to 24/96 just fine, but obviously the DAC's are inferior to the XDA-1. What I need to get is a USB to COAX/SPDIF re-clocker. These, as you may already know, will re-clock the signal and allow the passing of up to 24/192 into the XDA-1. That purchase will have to be made next month for obvious reasons. But my question is about the Soundblaster....... can it act as a re-clocker? It has USB input connection and COAX and SPDIF outputs, as well as the analog outputs. If I leave the Soundblaster connected to my laptop and use the COAX output to connect to the XDA-1 digital input, would this arrangement allow me to listen to the hi-res material? Actually, I know it will pass the hi-res material because that's how it was connected to a reciever before, but I guess what I'm asking is what is the drawback of using the Soundblaster as a re-clocker? Does it even re-clock or just pass the info? Does anyone know how, if any, the music can suffer by using this instead of a re-clocker?
Jimmy