Forum menu
Clearing out my shed and finally got round to rigging up an old AV receiver, speakers and CD deck.
Sounds fine for what it is. The gear is tatty and pretty much worthless, doubt I would get £20 for the whole set up on ebay.
Looking at connecting an old laptop to save messing about with CD's.
There are some really cheap USB DAC's on Ebay.
Anyone tried this one [url= http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/MUSE-USB-DAC-PCM2704-Sound-Card-Optical-Coaxial-Decoder-USB-to-S-PDIF-Converter-/321145887991?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item4ac5c95cf7 ]Musc USB DAC for £19?[/url]
messing about with a laptop sounds like more hassle than cds if anything.
i went with an old mp3 player connected to mains and 3.5mm jack to componants and plugged it in where the tape deck should go.
its quite simply - push on and push go a second later.
I did something similar in my garage. I got an amp and speakers and used a coax to headphone cable and just plugged my phone in. All my music is on there or obviously anything on the Internet. I've since bought a third Apple Airport Express (used, £35) and hooked it up to that so I can use AirPlay. It works brilliantly.
Just search for USB soundcard, expect to spend about £5.
Another £3 on a 3.5mm to 2 phono cable and off you go.
As above I'd use a source other than a laptop mind... (i'd use an old phone, then I could do spotify etc too)
Behringer UFO202 is your friend, especially if you can find one on eBay for a couple of quid...
One possible advantage of using a laptop is being able to access the hive mind while in the cave.
Provided there's network access, of course.
I use an ASUS Xonar U1, I was lucky enough to buy last of stock at local Currys/PC World for £10; http://www.asus.com/uk/Sound_Cards_and_DigitaltoAnalog_Converters/Xonar_U1_Audio_Station/
I plug it into the RCA inputs on my active monitors using a 3.5mm adaptor, and it massively improved the sound - not just louder, but clearer and with more detail. See if you can get one, i'm pretty sure it'll be better than those really cheap dongles.
This is a laptop without a 3.5mm sound jack?
Because plugging lead into there with 4mm hi fi connect on the other end would seem to be the answer
Does the set-up warrant a USB DAC? If so I would be looking at a Fiio one.
Does the set-up warrant a USB DAC?
Probably not! If the £20 DAC could make a noticeable difference over the headphone jack then it would be worth to me.
It's an old Onkyo AV receiver and a pair of TDL floorstanders and it makes quite a decent sound when I tried it with a decent USB DAC I have. Certainly better than using the headphone jack on the laptop.
Just wanted to leave everything set up and plugged in.
Well if you can get that Asus U1 i'd recommend it, very happy with mine, but you may struggte to find one now.