Let's talk about digital transports for a bit.

Most of us I'm sure remember those days when the only way to get digital data to an outboard DAC was through a CD transport. Although we can still resort to a CD reader, I suspect that many of us here have gone mostly into the computer audio realm with data on hard drives or flash/SSD devices. Thankfully gone are the days when the data being read off the CD could be inaccurate and interpolation may be needed in realtime, or be susceptible to mechanical failures of CD drive mechanisms (though hard drive failures and need for backups present another challenge).

I have shown that bit-perfect data can be transferred and played back without any concern off a USB asynchronous interface (eg. the various Mac and Windows software players and laptops). While I have the Squeezebox Receiver still on hand, let us have a look at the effect of using different transport devices with S/PDIF interfaces objectively.

THE MOST INTERESTING thing about Herzog and De Meuron’s newly opened concert hall, the Elbphilharmonie, isn’t its wave-like facade, which rises above the city of Hamburg, Germany. It’s not the gently curved elevator at the base of the lobby that deposits you into the belly of the Swiss architects’ alien landscape. And it’s not the Escher-esque stairways that guide you from one floor to the next.