IPods and You

Does anyone have experience using the new Bridges and Falls line by Audioquest. I am interested in your impressions of the ipod to rca's out. If what they say is true it is my understanding that you can go direct from apple product to stereo without losing any sound quality and eliminate the need for a DAC. PLEASE ADVICE
 
Does anyone have experience using the new Bridges and Falls line by Audioquest...If what they say is true it is my understanding that you can go direct from apple product to stereo without losing any sound quality and eliminate the need for a DAC.

They have lied to you again.

The iPod stores music in digital form. You can choose to store losslessly, meaning that CD-quality digital streams are available in the iPod. Not perfect, but let's call it good enough... at the digital level.

The iPod sends the digital signal through its internal DAC (sometimes a Wolfson model, sometimes others), and then to the internal headphone amp. The audio quality is limited by the internal DAC and the internal amp, neither of which are awful, but neither of which are good.

The Audioquest cables grab that headphone output, and are claimed to do a better job of transmitting it to your preamp (or whatever), but there's nothing they can do to improve on whatever limited analog signal the iPod is sending out.

There are units that extract the digital stream from the iPod (and there are threads on them in this sub-forum). The Wadia 170i was the first, but there are many now (including the Wadia 171i). These allow you to use your own (hopefully better) DAC, and your own amplification. The Cambridge iD100 is a great unit, but priced similarly to the Wadia, while the Pure i20 is also flexible and cheaper. http://www.pure.com/products/product.asp?Product=VL-61429&Category=

There are now DACs that are part of cables, and they're cheap too, but they won't work with an iPod because the iPod doesn't have a USB port to supply the power along with the signal.
http://www.headstage.com/USB-DAC-Cable/USB-DAC-Cable-with-35mm-Mini-Plug-75cm-30::10134.html

If anyone has info on some new breakthrough product that changes the above, please post!
 
I recently purchased a Fostex HP-P1 portable DAC/head amp to use in conjunction with my classic ipod 160 gb. The Fostex is a made for apple product that not only extracts digital info from the ipod, bypassing its internal dac, it also has the capability to stream the digital out via spdif. I'm waiting for a cable so I can run it into my main system using the ipod as a server. will report back on sound quality but I imagine it will be stellar.
 
Does anyone have experience using the new Bridges and Falls line by Audioquest. I am interested in your impressions of the ipod to rca's out. If what they say is true it is my understanding that you can go direct from apple product to stereo without losing any sound quality and eliminate the need for a DAC. PLEASE ADVICE

I just read thru the AudioQuest site and they make no claims whatsoever about this cable improving the sound quality of the iPod. They only describe the limitations in cables and how their propriatory cable designs help overcome said limitations. In fact I never saw mention of the ipod in any of their descriptions of the Bridges and Falls line of analog line output cables. It seems that the misreading of the information once again leads to the name being dragged in the mud for untrue stories. :no:
 
I recently purchased a Fostex HP-P1 portable DAC/head amp to use in conjunction with my classic ipod 160 gb. The Fostex is a made for apple product that not only extracts digital info from the ipod, bypassing its internal dac, it also has the capability to stream the digital out via spdif. I'm waiting for a cable so I can run it into my main system using the ipod as a server. will report back on sound quality but I imagine it will be stellar.

Sounds like a great product. I would not want to use an iPod as a full-time music server (its hard drive is not suitable for that purpose) but for occasional use, it's fine.
 
Sounds like a great product. I would not want to use an iPod as a full-time music server (its hard drive is not suitable for that purpose) but for occasional use, it's fine.

Since I listen to vinyl about 50% of the time, it should be no problem. but I really see no diff between using the head amp/ipod with my cans and running files into my rega dac. Same difference for the ipod.
 
OK, am streaming wav and apple lossless from my fostex/ipod via audioquest vodka spdif cable into a rega dac, and I must say it sounds damned good. It's easy to a/b the same wav file and cd through my transport. The ipod has more extended highs and better bass than the same cd from a cd transport into the rega dac. Vinyl, however, is still king.
 
I've been using the same 30GB Ipod for years now.
Recently it's been put to use in my small homebrew tube powered bedroom system, as I do not have space for a CD player or FM tuner.


Steve
 
In the past year or so I've rented cars while traveling. Most recently a Chevy Cruze. Plug in the iPod via USB, access it through the car's stereo and I was good to go.
 
OK, am streaming wav and apple lossless from my fostex/ipod via audioquest vodka spdif cable into a rega dac, and I must say it sounds damned good. It's easy to a/b the same wav file and cd through my transport. The ipod has more extended highs and better bass than the same cd from a cd transport into the rega dac. Vinyl, however, is still king.

Friendly amendment:

Some tracks sound better on iPod, some on cd. Depends on the recording. Speaking of, just got a JETON direct to disc recording of Laurindo Almeida and Ray Brown. Gotta, say, I've NEVER heard a recording sound so good. That would be vinyl.
 
Pure I-20 Dock

I have had my 160 gig in my main system for a year or so running attached to a regular docking station. I decided to give the Pure I-20 a shot after listening to one I heard while at a guys house buying some tubes for my McIntosh 30's.

I will have to say that it is a very good investment for 100 bucks. It has the same DAC as the new Pro-ject docking station. I have it running thru the RCA's to my Yamaha C4 Pre-amp. I am going to pick up an optical cable and run it thru my Emotiva cd player an see it that makes any difference. This thing makes an Ipod with Lossless files as the source Rock...
 
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