AaronB

Or do you need for me to tell you what happiness is and how it feels?

Seems to me some people need to get laid around these parts. Buy what makes you happy!

Chris, as usual you da man! Yeah, I'm 86ing the whole ONT box thing for now. Save money, and like you said, Verizon and/or Sprint is gonna want to do their own thing I'm sure, if and when they get here. Just gonna go with regular gigabit ethernet. I called my contractor but all I got was his voicemail, so when he calls me back, gonna get all this straightened out. Thanks again man, you rock! And joel/joel thanks for the compliments! Now I'm blushing! Keep on keepin on my man!

Thanks again! Maybe you can at least help me in my contracting mess. Without getting into gory detail, I was basically going to hardwire my home for 10/100 ethernet for all the obvious reasons. Did some surfing around and was almost considering doing a DIY thing. Doesn't seem that difficult. Fast Forward. In hearing that FIOS could possibly be coming to our area soon (eastern NC) and after discussing this with my future ex-wife, I decided to go with a contractor and get it professionally done. Again for all the obvious reasons. Everything will be clean and tidy and professionally done. 3400 square foot house. 3 bedrooms, great room, kitchen, garage, den, and game room where my stereo is located. 1 outlet each for den & garage. 2 outlets each for all the bedrooms and kitchen. 3 outlets each for game room and great room. Total of 16 outlets. 16 outlet switch. PERFECT. Or so I thought.......... Contractor told me hardwire wise not including switch plates and wiring was modem-Firewall-switch-UPS. I knew this already. Running Cat6 cable. I'm thinking gigabit not knowing about the internals of FIOS and since it's not in our area yet, who cares? Gave me a estimate of $1750 out the door. Two 6 hour days. Not bad I said. Future proofing the house. Let's do this. Fast Forward. I mention FIOS to the contractor, That's all it took for my pants to come down around my ankles. Those 4 little letters. I basically explained to him I was future proofing the house and I'm sure I'll go with FIOS when and if it gets here. Enter whatever a OTN box is. Something fibery on the outside of my house. I've googled it and yet to still come up with a clear cut answer. Something about a switch box for the fiber from the street to communicate with the cat6 in the house. He said I could pay for the proprietary FIOS one when it gets here, or he could install one (according to him I could now have a choice between Sprint and/or FIOS whenever Sprint gets here) (They are supposedly on the way too with their EMBARQ stuff). Now we're up to $5200 for this stuff and FIOS and/or Embarq could still probably be 3 years out for all this stuff for all I know. And he can't start yet because he has to check with the city for something. He actually told me what it was, but I just stood there in a daze and can't remember actually what it was. My future ex-wife says to just do it and get it over with. Adds resale value to the house she says. Does this sound right? Verizon can't seem to tell me anything. And since I can't seem to find a good definitive website explaining this, I guess there's no turning back. Can you shed any light on this? Thanks for all the help again you can offer. God this website rocks. I've made it my home page now. Gonna start drinking heavily, I swear it.

Alright guys, I now think I'm officially straightened out here. I can't praise you guys enough for taking the time to help the chumps out there like me. Chris, may the wind always be at your back, and all your children grow up to be doctors. You need to post a P.O. Box so we can send you a box of See's candies to show our gratitude. Steve N. and Gordon, Empirical Audio and Wavelength will definitely be #1 on the short list when I go to buy new gear. Viva la Wavelength and Empirical!!!! Shout it from the rafters!!! joel/joel, I just love you man. Thanks again gang! I'm now gonna go pick a fight with my contractor and play with my new ReadyNAS Pro until my head explodes and I slip into a 2 week long comma from confusion. Have a great weekend!

Thanks guys, I really do appreciate your help. I mean I really do. I started down this road about a year ago, and after the whole computer audio education, no one warned me about bud-light drinking, overcharging, contractors that you bring in to hardwire your home gigabyte ethernet. So if I seem a little edge, please forgive me. My nerves are shot. I'm already $5k into this, with no end in site. Even though he hasn't said anything more about money, which I'll refuse to pay, but now he's saying he's gotta attach some box to the outside of my house. Arghh! Anyways, back to my original question, thanks for any help you guys can give. Just trying to get my knowledge straightened out here. Thanks.

Can Chris or Gordon or someone who knows about this please help me and correct me? I thought I knew what I was talking about, but it looks like I was wrong. I was under the assumption that USB 1.1, CANNOT support 24/96. I can't seem to find it, but I could have swore I read somewhere that even though technically it is capable at enumeration, that the bandwidth "reservations" part of the protocol due to the CPU won't allow it. I've heard the rumors that 24/96 USB 1.1 DACS while technically capable of it, actually can't go no higher 44.1 due to the CPU's protocol. Please help me understand this, so I can quit looking like an idiot, and stop misleading people. I'm so confused now that I'm getting ready to get "Elvis" on my Imac and put a 44 slug through that thing. UPDATE: I know someone's gonna say it, yes I use a Imac and yes I use firewire, and I shouldn't be concerned with USB 1.1, but I just dropped a %$#@! of loot on gear and am trying to get a working grasp of this whole computer audio thing.

Hey Martin, since the P-3 has a MM, you should be able to run it directly to the AVI's without the need for your phono-pre. Now how successfully, or it's performance, I wouldn't be able to tell you because I have yet to hear the AVI's. But I hear they are great speakers.

Hey Martin! Maybe someone will chime in whose had experience with the AVI's for I have not. But I think it's going to boil down to what type of cartridge you are using on your P-3. Moving Magnet or Moving Coil? A moving magnet or high output moving coil should be fine. A low-output moving coil is probably gonna need a dedicated step-up. You didn't mention what type of pre-amp your using. A dedicated phono pre-amp? Or a regular pre-amp with a phono-stage? Again, I might be wrong, but I doubt the AVI's pre will be able to handle a low-output cartridge. Will have to search out someone with experience with the AVI's to know. Hope this helps.

Duh, I'm such an idiot. I got off on a rant and don't think I answered one of your questions. 1) Do we rip to media monkey? What file type? Yes! MediaMonkey for PC's, Itunes for MAC's. Personally 24/96, but whatever works for you! 2) Is a sound card necessary if we are going to a DAC anyway? Is it important in the final sound? See Chris's answer! 3) Quantify the jumps in sound quality from DAC's from the $250 Devilsound, to the Benchmark, to the Bryston, to the Berkeley. Huge leaps in $$$. See my above answer! 4) Where does money spent pay the biggest dividends? Definitely MORE music!! But other than that I'd have to say IMO front end!

Hey, "notbald"! I was exactly where you are at a year ago. Maybe I can help shed some light and give a hand. With me, it was that I had my "audiophile grade" system in my living room, and my computer in another bedroom. With me buying more and more music from amazon/itunes/ and the live music archives, I wanted to get my music from my computer to my "audiophile" system. I knew stereos (somewhat), and I knew computers, but was absolutely clueless when it came to dac's, music servers, streamers, jitter, music software, etc.. Not knowing your current education, this is what helped me the most: #1 Understanding what "digital audio" is. (As in bit rate, upsampling, and the like.) http://www.indiana.edu/~emusic/etext/digital_audio/chapter5_digital.shtml http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_audio http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_bit_depth http://www.mlssa.com/pdf/Upsampling-theory-rev-2.pdf http://www.dcsltd.co.uk/page/myths #2 Understanding the different formats/codecs. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_file_format http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_format http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codec http://www.tweakheadz.com/16_vs_24_bit_audio.htm **Now in my personal journey, I had an understanding of how digital audio works. And I was at the point that I had to make a choice of what "rate" worked best for me. While this is an extremely subjective matter, and everyone's ears may hear differently, just trust what sounds best to you and go with it. You can google and read for weeks flaming arguments on this subject, but just go with what you like. After hearing multiple systems, I decided my target and goal would be 24/96. Anything more, and my ears just couldn't tell a difference. Less and I could start to tell. But hey, that's just me. Everyone will have an opinion. Also, at this point in my journey, you'll have to decide what software works best you. It's pretty common knowledge that Itunes works best with Macs, and MediaMonkey works best with PC's. I personally use FOOBAR but that's because it was the first one I got my hands on and got acquainted with. I didn't want to take the time to learn another piece of software. Stick with Itunes/MediaMonkey and you should be fine. At this point, you'll have to decide what interface/source you'll want to use. Do you want to go the server route? Streamer route? MAC Mini route? Only you can answer this question. But to keep it as simplistic and short as possible, I would agree with others and say that if I had to do it all over again, I would go the MAC mini/Ipod touch route. But hey this is subjective too. Just listen to your ears and keep an eye on your wallet! Our little journey now brings us to the subjects of DAC'S. Like Chris said, it's impossible to say what sounds good to you. The difference between the cheap and expensive DAC's is just like every other piece of gear you have. Build quality, exclusiveness, internal parts, the companies adverstising budget, etc, etc.... Some sound platicky and overprocessed, others sound muddled and grainy, some have volume controls where you can bypass a pre, etc, etc. Just pay attention to your connectors on the back. (What I mean by this is why download 24/192 when USB 1.1 only supports 16/44?) Just research and pay attention to what your buying! **Sorry to write a novel, but I hope all this helps and gives you some starting points. The websites I offered are just meant to help and are by no means definitive. Just like everything else, it's all subjective, but hey it's a fun journey, and the results are GREAT!! Have fun!!! Shoot me a line, if I can help more!

Has anyone heard the Citypulse DA-2.03e? I know on paper it looks good, but haven't seen or heard one yet.

Hey Paul was surfing around and ran across these today. http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Cambridge-Audio-S30-standmount-hifi-speakers-Oak-finish_W0QQitemZ290286971270QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_AudioVideoElectronics_HomeAudioHiFi_HiFiSpeakers?hash=item290286971270&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=72:1300|66:2|65:12|39:1|240:1318

Maybe way over budget, but I heard these speakers are out of this world. From what I hear, this is a GREAT price. http://www.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?spkrmoni&1235748276

Sorry Paul, I didn't take into consideration you location in the UK. The BG's would probably be expensive and/or hard to get. And to add another one to the mix, I completely forgot about the JBL L830's. Bi-wireable and are 90 db. I know here in the US you can get them for $350 new, but I haven't looked around for used. Hope this helps.