2.1 System Help | Stereophile.com

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Submitted By: Cpyder

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Joined: Jul 13 2009

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2.1 System Help

Posted: July 14, 2009 - 11:49am

Please help me out and tell me if this setup would work. My goal is to have a very nice sounding 2 channel setup mainly for listening to music, but also an occasional movie. (In the future, I want full 7.1 to be an option, which is why I didn't choose a stereo receiver.)

I'm planning on connecting my laptop, using a Turtle Beach Audio Advantage Micro sound card, to a Marantz SR4003 receiver which pushes two Polk Lsi9 bookshelves.

I wish to connect the sound card to the receiver with a toslink cable. Would the Audio Advantage Card allow the receiver to convert the signal to analog? At all costs, I don't want my laptop to use its DAC.

Thanks for your help!

Turtle Beach Audio Advantage Micro
(http://www.turtlebeach.com/products/micro/home.aspx

Marantz SR4003
(http://us.marantz.com/Products/2513.asp

Polk Lsi9s
http://www.polkaudio.com/homeaudio/lsi/index.php?s=lsi9

One last question: Is a digital signal a digital signal, or are there varying degrees of quality? I mean a 1 is a 1 and a 0 is a 0, so...

Submitted By: RGibran

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Location: Dallas, TX

Joined: Oct 11 2005

Posts:

Re: 2.1 System Help

Posted: July 14, 2009 - 12:24pm

Welcome to the forum!

The M-Audio Transit has been used, tested, and generally recommended by Stereophiles editor as being perhaps the most economical yet great sounding way to connect your puter to Hi-Fi.

The Turtle Beach at less than half the price of the above may be the new giant killer and will serve your needs.

Submitted By: Cpyder

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Joined: Jul 13 2009

Posts:

Re: 2.1 System Help

Posted: July 14, 2009 - 12:43pm

And since I'm sending a digital signal to the receiver, it should sound similar (exact?) to a good CD player connected?

Submitted By: RGibran

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Location: Dallas, TX

Joined: Oct 11 2005

Posts:

Re: 2.1 System Help

Posted: July 14, 2009 - 1:04pm

EXACT?

Ha Ha HA! This is Audiophilia! There are no exacts!

Seriously, a nasty thing called jitter can get into the digital signal during transmission and muck things up.

Can you hear it? I don't know, you will have to try.

Generally speaking, if the CD player was connected digitally to the reciever so that the recievers dacs were doing the processing (both connections equal) then yes the sound should be approx. the same.

There are variables and your mileage may vary.