2. pc-audio
  3. 1292796953

Yet another Mac music Question

I have an imac >transparent USB>PS audio digital link III (Cullen mods)>pre-amp. Its sounds good, not great. Here are my questions. Note, I will be purchasing amarra in the next week or so (if that needs mentioning)

I went to the audio midi set up and under the USB out it will not offer a 24bit option. it offers 48K and 16bit as the highest option. Itunes will not read a 24bit flac file even with Fluke. What am I doing wrong?

I would like to set up an external HD to store my itunes library (via firewire). I need to transfer the files that are now on various other external drives in flac format. I need to convert to AAIF and store in the new main library drive. What is the most efficient way to convert the files and link with itunes?
jordanmj
4est
507 posts
 
My first guess is that the USB input is only good to 16/48k and the coax 12/192k.
4est
507 posts
 
oops meant coax 24/192k
rbstehno
916 posts
 
before buying amarra, check out pure music. i checked out both and went with pure music. i use max to rip my files into itunes then pure music reads them from itunes. also, when using an external drive for your music, be sure to get 2 drives so you can backup the 1st drive onto the 2nd drive using time machine. i use 2 firewire 2TB drives. i have pure music configured to read the song into memory before playing it. i just ordered the wyred 4 sound dac2 and it comes with a cd of drivers for the mac to get more hi rez outputs since the dac2 can accepts 24/192 input.
herman
1,974 posts
 
Their website doesn't address the issue so you probably need to contact them, but I'm pretty sure you can't do 24/192 on USB2 but you should be able to do 24/96 or 24/48. Are you sure you are looking at the PS audio settings and not the internal output?

I've tried Fluke also and it would not play FLAC files above 16/44.1

iTunes will not convert FLAC but there are a lot of free conversion programs, I've used both MAX and xAct with good success. I would try some and see which you like. I would also convert small batches at a time in case you lose power or the converter chokes on a file and locks up.

I second the vote for Pure Music, much cheaper and sounds great. Both will change Audio/Midi on the fly which is a huge plus if playing a mix of files.

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