Help! Home PC to Receiver 411 Options

[dmoss74]

Okay, my goals are simple (at least I think so), but they are causing much consternation here.

in a nutshell, i have many cds ripped to flac, as well as some other hd audio (24/96, plus multitchannel 24/96) files stored on my computer (PC). i got a new yamaha receiver that has some decent bb dacs on board, so all i'm trying to do is get the files from foobar, into the receiver.

this is proving way more daunting than i had hoped for. at this point, my options appear as such:

one of the logitech squeezebox device
getting a laptop that will have hdmi output on it, although i hear that hd audio and hdmi aren't exactly friendly.
getting one of the boxed "servers" that cater more to the tv crowd than audio folks.

any help would be appreciated. i can put a decent home recording sound card in the pc (echo mia, etc), but i'd like to avoid that.

i did see a device called an m2tech that has a usb to rca coax output, and is supposed to decode all the way to 192, so that looked interesting.

any help would be greatly appreciated. again, i'd like to use the native dacs and tone stack if possible, but will of course entertain other options. i'm trying to stay around 300 for the budget.

This post has been edited by dmoss74: Apr 28 2012, 05:21

[A_Man_Eating_Duc...]

It would be nice if you told us what the model number is for the Yamaha your using or what connections it has.

What outputs do you have available on your current PC? HDMI (on the video card or on motherboard), SPDIF, 3.5mm jack?

If you have a HDMI i would suggest use that and connect it to your amp, this way you can play your multichannel 24/96 FLACs.

This post has been edited by A_Man_Eating_Duck: Apr 28 2012, 13:40

[Apesbrain]

Just FYI, the Squeezebox Touch can do 24/96 out of the box (up to 24/192 with "Enhanced Digital Output" app), but I don't think any Squeezebox device does 24/96 multichannel. (Maybe DD/DTS multichannel?)

This post has been edited by Apesbrain: Apr 28 2012, 14:01

[dmoss74]

It would be nice if you told us what the model number is for the Yamaha your using or what connections it has.

What outputs do you have available on your current PC? HDMI (on the video card or on motherboard), SPDIF, 3.5mm jack?

If you have a HDMI i would suggest use that and connect it to your amp, this way you can play your multichannel 24/96 FLACs.

yamaha rx-v471. it has both optical and coax digital inputs, as well as a few hdmi inputs. the computer doesn't have any outputs other than standard 3.5 mm. i wanted to look for a usb to digital dongle type device. i found the one i mentioned. it might be he best way of doing his. i'd rather not use hdmi, since that requires the tv to be on. i'd rather use the computer and keyboard for controls.

i tried a western digital wd live last night, but it won't even find my music on my win 7 machine. it's going back this morning. i want a system that will use foobar, since i am used to it, ad am quite pleasedwith its capabilities.

[JimH]

You can get a video card that has HDMI out. The Nvidia 430, for example. The HDMI link will work for both audio and video.

Your TV won't have to be on in order to play audio.

The connection from the PC should go to the receiver and then a connection from the receiver to the TV.

To get multi channel output, you need to pass an unaltered signal to the receiver. This is sometimes called Bitstreaming.

You can use Windows Control Panel/Sounds to test the multi-channel capabilities. It must work there before it will work from any audio player.

[A_Man_Eating_Duc...]

i tried a western digital wd live last night, but it won't even find my music on my win 7 machine. it's going back this morning. i want a system that will use foobar, since i am used to it, ad am quite pleasedwith its capabilities.

If you having problems with your WD Live box try this

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1194088

This post has been edited by A_Man_Eating_Duck: Apr 29 2012, 04:08

[dmoss74]

i tried a western digital wd live last night, but it won't even find my music on my win 7 machine. it's going back this morning. i want a system that will use foobar, since i am used to it, ad am quite pleasedwith its capabilities.

If you having problems with your WD Live box try this

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1194088

yeah, i decided to return it after reading half of that thread last night. no thanks.