Jitter is basically a noise. This noise is present only when signal is present so it shows just as loss of clarity. DVD players have good tracking and not necessarily bad jitter (cheap because of mass production). They often have very bad analog outputs since they are mainly designed for video (but they play MP3).
Toslink has about twice more jitter than coax. Try coax if it doesn't make ground loops (Toslink breaks them). Optimal length is about 1.5m. If you decide to build it yourself use all components (including RCA plugs) rated 75 ohm (signal reflects on characteristic impedance boundaries) for unbalanced type. Good shielding is very important.
If you system is very resolving then you might try better transport and better digital cable or jitter rejecting DAC (like Benchmark DAC1) instead. Every CD player or DAC suppresses jitter but some (asynchronous upsampling type like Benchmark) suppress much more.
I use cheap ($69) Sony DVD player or Airport Express with cheap homemade cable and cheap Toslink to Benchmark DAC1.
Toslink has about twice more jitter than coax. Try coax if it doesn't make ground loops (Toslink breaks them). Optimal length is about 1.5m. If you decide to build it yourself use all components (including RCA plugs) rated 75 ohm (signal reflects on characteristic impedance boundaries) for unbalanced type. Good shielding is very important.
If you system is very resolving then you might try better transport and better digital cable or jitter rejecting DAC (like Benchmark DAC1) instead. Every CD player or DAC suppresses jitter but some (asynchronous upsampling type like Benchmark) suppress much more.
I use cheap ($69) Sony DVD player or Airport Express with cheap homemade cable and cheap Toslink to Benchmark DAC1.