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Imac to my dac- sounds awful?

Guys- be gentle, I'm a new Mac user. Got a new Imac 24 today with the 2.8 Ghz processor, 500 GB Hard drive. Beautiful to look at, so far I love the Leopard OS (I'm a lifetime Windows user ).

Imported some cd's into ITunes, and set it up per the advice on the Wavelength site- i.e. Import Apple lossless, set my preferences in sound to USB dac.

Plugged in my Glow Audio Amp1, which is new and has a built in 16 bit Dac and headphone output.

Sounds like crap- it sounded much better on my windows XP rig running ASIO 4All. I'm hearing some distortion and intermittent dropouts that occur at random.

I KNOW it's me- where can I get educated on how to address this?

Thanks much!

Any ideas where to steer me?
danlib1

Showing 1 response by lupinthe3rd

lupinthe3rd
47 posts
 
I assume you're using the toslink optical output on the iMac? Check to be sure you're actually importing the songs using the codec you've selected (apple lossless). Maybe something as simple as dirty CD's?

I have a 2005 Powerbook G4 and playing Apple Lossless (or even 256k / 320k MP3's) across wireless to my Airport Express, (which is attached using toslink optical to my DAC) sounds marvelous! My ears can't tell the difference between that and playing the actual CD.

FWIW My DAC is the Stello DA-100, CD Player is a Theta Miles, Amp is a Cary SLI-80 and speakers are Taylo Reference from Tyler Acoustics.
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