Making an Airport Express better?

[Codifus]

Recently I upgraded the PSU on my 7520, and while that change was an improvement, it also revealed my airport express for the highly jittery digital source that it is. I find it hard to give up the express because the convenience of accessing my entire music library from the iTunes interface which I am very comfortable with is hard to let go of.

Anyone have suggestions on how to improve upon it in a economical fashion?

So far I've come across these possibilities:

1. Get Empirical Audio's Pace car to re-clock the exrpesses output. Sounds very good and there a lots of very positive reviews about it. The device costs $1200. That's a wee bit more than I bargained for.

2. Replace my 7520 with the Benchmark DAC1 PRE? DAC1 has a well known jitter reduction (immune?) circuitry that would work well with my express. But at $1500, that is way out of my budget.


One thing I will try for the moment is to get an updated Airport Express. There are 2 Airport express models, and they look identical. The older one is the B/g model (A1084) which I have. The newer one is the N model (A1264). I've perused the web and found that the N model does have a better DAC within; capable of 24/96 as opposed to a maximum of 16/48 in my model. Apple firmware does not enable that capability, however.

My hunch and hope is that the N model handles jitter better than the B/G model.

If there are any other suggestions, please do tell.

Thanks.

CD

[DSJR]

I thought this whole jitter nonsense had been put to bed in the last 15 years as modern DACs lock-on to the data stream much better now. Are you sure it's not interference on the wireless network signal?????

[Codifus]

I thought this whole jitter nonsense had been put to bed in the last 15 years as modern DACs lock-on to the data stream much better now. Are you sure it's not interference on the wireless network signal?????

I use the wire

CD

[trailer]

You could always get a jitterbuster second hand somewhere. Theta, Monarchy, Trichord etc.

[Codifus]

You could always get a jitterbuster second hand somewhere. Theta, Monarchy, Trichord etc.

I googled jitterbuster and found this;

http://www.monarchyaudio.com/DIP4.htm


Then I noticed that you have an airport and the Monarchy DIP. So, how much of a difference did it make?


This is very encouraging. They're not that expensive and apparently address my issue exactly.

CD

[trailer]

There are two types of Monarchy DIP's. One that upsamples and one that doesn't.

The DIP basically does, although I may be wrong, the same as what Stan does in the DAC by re-clocking the data so in theory it shouldn't make any difference. Setting the DIP to upsampling mode made more of a difference to the sound giving it more clarity and definition. Again I don't know why. I'll plug it in again and try it now that I have the 7520 supercharged

I have tried the AppleTV streaming lossless into both DACs and it doesn't sound anywhere near as good as the CD5XS into them.

It might just be time for a change of source?

[Codifus]

There are two types of Monarchy DIP's. One that upsamples and one that doesn't.

The DIP basically does, although I may be wrong, the same as what Stan does in the DAC by re-clocking the data so in theory it shouldn't make any difference. Setting the DIP to upsampling mode made more of a difference to the sound giving it more clarity and definition. Again I don't know why. I'll plug it in again and try it now that I have the 7520 supercharged

I have tried the AppleTV streaming lossless into both DACs and it doesn't sound anywhere near as good as the CD5XS into them.

It might just be time for a change of source?

Were\are you running iTunes on Windows or from a Mac, and did you make sure to set everything for bit perfect output?



CD

[trailer]

Were\are you running iTunes on Windows or from a Mac, and did you make sure to set everything for bit perfect output?

I've tried streaming through a Windows iTunes, xbmc/boxee installed on the AppleTV and from the HD on the AppleTV itself. Not much difference if any at all that I could determine.

[Codifus]

I've tried streaming through a Windows iTunes, xbmc/boxee installed on the AppleTV and from the HD on the AppleTV itself. Not much difference if any at all that I could determine.

I'm a little comforted that you said that because iTunes on a Mac runs better. I've run iTunes on my WindowsXP machine and the Mac version always bettered it, even to the same airport express.

I hear that Itunes, and audio device drivers in general, have improved significantly in Windows Vista and of course, 7.

CD

[trailer]

Isn't that the beauty of hifi though? If there was one solution wouldn't everyone be using it? I've never ran a mac iTunes into my system so I can't say whether that was better or not from what I have heard.

I still think at the end of the day you could put the best signal you want into the AE/Atv and it will still come out less than perfect.