A question about digital music players (may or may not be portable), please see the details...

Asked by boxing (1051

) October 15th, 2008

Say, you rip your favorite song from your favorite CD into your computer, using any of the lossless formats, then transfer this file into your digital music player. Now if you want to play the song in a high end home audio system, what connection in between, or what equipment in between, or what digital music player, can make sure the sound quality will be as good as from the CD? Without the use of the computer, of course, and for the same logic, without any wireless streaming device. For example, maybe an ipod dock with optical audio output?

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6 Answers

The iPod and iPod speakers have surprisingly good sound quality.

PIXEL (1233

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It depends on the inputs on your receiver, but an iPod dock, or even just a mini headphone jack to ??? converter would work for less than the dock would probably cost.

fireside (12366

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I read somewhere that the D/A converter in the iPod is probably not good enough or the output signal is not made for optical output quality anyway. Audio signal from headphone jack is simply no good. Is there a CD player that can play lossless digital files? That might help.

boxing (1051

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For an iPod you’re limited to analog outputs-headphone (speaker) level from the headphone jack, or line level via the dock (requires a dock converter). Line level presents less distortion and higher fidelity when connecting to external equipment.

No optical, and no digital out.

sndfreQ (11739

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