gideonMorrison

Optical > optical cable > M-audio co2 > coax cable > Sugden AU51 dac > rca to xlr plugs > level pilot > xlr cables > Yamaha hs80m. heavenly!

I will reply a bit later, but need to know whether this Sugden dac is better sonically than a Dacmagic...? Anyone?

Thank you for the extensive reply, Eloise. It's a bit much to suck up for a newbie like myself. All these cables and converters... :-) So the analogue output on the dac is in fact rca out? In chronological order it would be > PC toslink > toslink cable > m-audio co2 > coax cable > dac input > rca > level pilot > adaptors > XLR to speakers? edit: aren't those adaptors different, one 'looks' male ;-) edit: I don't get the last part from the level pilot to the speakers... Which gender cables do I need and where to get them, I reckon soldering is not the only option? The sound would be unbalanced right?

Did you take a look at the picture I included, because there is no spdif input on the dac? Or do I need to take a toslink cable from the spdif output of the pc to a toslink > rca converter and then to the dac input? I'm so lost... Also, can the TC level pilot bypass the volume of the active speaker monitors at all? Can someone explain in detail, since I have no idea whether I should or should not get a pre-amp. I rather go with the passive volume dial, as it is more practical.

My new pc, which will arrive in a day or two, has a spdif output. The thing is that I will be getting these http://maudio.be/images/maudioshopbx8adeluxep2.jpg and they both have a volume dial, so no pre-amp right? The amp is already built in, so why double amp the signal from the dac? However, it's not very practical to manually control volume from the back. What cables do I need; from my pc it would be a toslink cable to my dac? And then from the analogue output from the dac an imbalanced rca to xlr/trs? I'm looking for the best and easiest way here, preferably without a pre-amp. I'm new to this, as you may have noticed ;-) All info is welcome.

Hi guys, I'm wondering if I can use this DAC (pics in attachments) to hook it up to my pc. I am not tech savvy at all, and I reckon the lot of you are ;-). I was/am looking at a Dacmagic, but since I have this one (and its possibly better) I wonder if I can hook it up somehow to my pc to hook it up to speakers. The speakers I am going to buy have balanced xlr/trs. Do I need a pre-amp for volume control? So basically I'd like to know if I can connect this DAC through digital input with spdif from pc, to my active speaker monitors (have amps inside) and HOW to do it. Cheers, Gideon