Originally Posted by
montesquieu
I used a HifiBerry Digi+ board in mine, output to an Audio Note DAC.
The Mac into a proper, self-powered USB interface sounded better.
There are no limitations at all in using a laptop into a streaming device via USB (they run off DC after all) the issue is the quality of the USB interface. (Including the ones in many supposedly 'usb' DACs.)
Using Audio Out via headphone jack is a different matter of course which is where PC laptops in particular acquired their bad reputation - Macs are better of course as their sound capabilities have always been streets ahead, PCs have generally required additional hardware to match what Macs do OOTB.