Would be very nice, if some experienced guys can help with these questions:
1)Does someone knows a good USB Spdif output with really low jitter for a x86 PC?
2)Does the HiFace2 is the best or is there a better alternative in terms of analytical sound and jitter?
3)Are there negatives effects if you are using a Usb spfif output and a usb harddisk on a x86 Pc with 2 Usb connectors which are not separated compared to separated connectors?
4)Should you better always use an active Ub Hub for the Usb Spdif and Harddrive?
First, sorry for not addressing the questions directly but as I do not have first hand experience in the area of your questions, it would be guessing from my side.
Is there a specific reason you would like to stick to feeding your DAC/amp (what is your setup?) through SPDIF (coaxial I assume and not Optical)?
Reason for asking, a PC is quite well able to feed a good async USB slave signal to a DAC that can act as a Master. You ‘just’ need to clean the USB signal from the noisy PC interface. Benefit of such a setup would be the Master DAC is responsible for the clock signals instead of the SPDIF output.
My setup is a Laptop with 2 Usb connectors (I think not separated) and I have active loudspeakers with 24-96 Dac and coaxial/optical Spdif In, active Usb Hub and a 2.5 " harddisk.
Hmm… usually I would recommend going for coaxial spdif but in your situation optical spdif might be the better choice.
tour latop has a lot of noisy (especially on the powerlines) components and busses. You can create galvanic isolation between your equipment and your active speakers by using optical spdif. Coaxial would transfer that noise and it hard to clean such noisy environments.
your dac has 24-96 as max which is the same max as optical spdif. Coaxial can go 24-192 but your dac can not.
Important note: make sure you feed your active speakers from a different (cleaner) powergroup than the rest of your equipment. And check grounding and polarity of the active speaker assuming it has a ground.
