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Re-discovered Satellite Radio..

About a year ago, I had purchased Sirius SR-H550 home tuner and 3 year Satellite subscription. It sat there for a year, because I did not like the sound from it.
Recently, I was re-arranging my audio gear and connected the output of SR-H550 to the Apogee Mini-dac via optical cable.
Boy what a difference!
I love it, fount a station that plays my kind of music(Channel 4 Easy listening). Now I am listening to the Satellite at home all the time.
Granted, it is not CD, but it is clean and warm(Thanks to Apogee mini-dac to Balanced out to Mark Levinson).

Now my search has begun for a real DAC with balance out. Any suggestions?

Thanks
banter
9 responses Add your response
nglazer
846 posts
 
Thanks, Avguygeorge. I will look into it.

Neal
avguygeorge
2,300 posts
 
Most satellite boxes have a toslinc. I had a Panasonic sat. box,it only had a toslinc.---I also had a Sony sat. box. On that, I had Theta install a cox board and it was swell. Most cable boxes have a coax and with those you can change the output format to 2ch digital./ instead of dd 5.1. (in the menu)
nglazer
846 posts
 
Avguygeorge,

I thought the coax (digital) outputs on satellite boxes outputs on analog, not digital, so a DAC should have no effect on sound quality? Am I wrong, or does it depend on the box?

Neal
avguygeorge
2,300 posts
 
Well one advantage with TWC boxes you can change the audio to "2ch",in the menu. Along with a great dac and a great cable;great near-cd is possible. I have an old Sony Sat box,converted, to have a coax---same quality as cable. If you spend; the quality is there. Believe me!!
My dac: Audiomeca Enkainthus,cable: Concierto Violin, silver.---Like tweeking; sometimes money works.
dunkmeister
52 posts
 
Similar to your experience with Sirius, I discovered with XM that a moderately priced DAC make a big difference in the sound quality. Having said that I think that you will find significant additional sound quality improvements hard to come by as the quality of the satellite signal becomes limiting. I did find that one moderately priced DAC (the Channel Island DAC-1) was a better match than another (the Aragon D2A2) but beyond an admittedly subjective matching I didn't find much sonic improvement no matter which DAC I tried.
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artizen65
273 posts
 
I have never tried satalite in the house. I do have Sirius in the Truck and although I am happy with it, It cant compete with CD in the Truck. Therefore I am hesitant about putting it in the house. I don't mind changing CD's when needed. As far as stations 14 Classic Vinyl, 15 Classic Rewind, 19 Buzzsaw.
brianmgrarcom
1,317 posts
 
I am another that enjoys satellite music a lot. Like Dlr I get it through my DISH receiver; I have (long) interconnects running from the back of the DISH receiver to my preamp. Obviously the quality isn't top notch, still nice though, but I am down the hall when listening anyway. I have acquired new music due to the fact that I can play music that you simply can't get via the tuner where I am at, at least during the day.
dlr
201 posts
 
A similar thing happened to me. We moved so I had the Dish people run a line to my home office. It costs me an extra $6 a month and is well worth it. You are right about the quality of analog outputs. Barely FM quality. Now I am looking for a decent DAC. Tube would be preferred but not necessary. By the way, the "standards" station is great, so is the 50/60's, and "jams" when they have the Dead on. good luck. Dan
unclejeff
1,313 posts
 
If you like Satellite Radio I suggest you also investigate streaming audio with a decent DAC. Slimdevices squeezebox is a really wonderful unit for streaming audio and access to you computer's music files. I really think Satellite Radio is for cars; Home audio can do better.
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