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USB to SPDIF interfaces - how to evaluate?

I've been reading up on USB/SPDIF interfaces and having a hard time determining what are the right measurements to evaluate and what audibility threshold exists for these measurements.

The linked site from Audiophilleo has some interesting comparisons:

http://www.audiophilleo.com/comparison.aspx

The comparison highlights Phase jitter (in two different frequency bands) and period jitter. Should I be worried about both? Is period jitter below 5 picsoseconds (ps) really audible? Are there other specs that are even more important to the performance of the USB/SPDIF interface?

Why would additional power improve the performance of these interfaces, which is something that is observed regularly in listening evaluations?

Finally, is the price of this jitter reduction about to decline to a very low level as software and hardware experiences the performance improvements regularly seen in the IT industry? (So does this type of equipment fall outside of standard audio equipment economics?)
jult52

Showing 1 response by audioengr

audioengr
3,282 posts
 
Even though jitter is the #1 problem with digital audio, using specs to determine the best component is fraught with problems, particularly jitter specs. These measurements are not standardized, can be measured several different ways and there is still no correlation to audibility, not to mention the cheating and outright lying in the measurements.

You are much better off to read the reviews that are shootouts to narrow it down, and then purchase one to actually hear the effect in your system. Most of them have money-back guarantees. You can also read the major DAC reviewers reviews to see what converter they use to compare DACs with.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio
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