skullguise

SOTA "Moonbeam," aka Rambo Bose Kitty....great friend, one-time brief unofficial Head-Fi mascot thanks to Photochop. This guy peaked at around 32lbs, and when he passed away he was down to about 17lbs. Oddly, he died of Melanoma, apparently very rare in cats.... Pic a bit before he left us A few months later, we got Gryphon (L) and Tab....wonderful friends, too (but no SOTA)

Hey Nate, Have you tried MicroSeconds in Salem (Rt 28, across from Best Buy)? Prices are OK, not quite as good as Mail Order of course; but they can put together a decent system with focus on what you'd need, and put it together for you so you don't have to do it if you don't want. I'm sure tey'd do some testing on it too. FYI, haven't read the WHOLE thread, but I saw tkam's PDF quote. Very good system, but I'd spend a little more for an ATI 4850 based GPU; the others below just aren't as good.....overkill most of the time, but good for when you need the power.

First post on the site, and figures it has to be about friggin' cables! In my exprience, a slightly better than average cable (like the Belkin Gold) works well. I had bought a MisterX HPDAC (2 of them actually, I usedone at work). Used a basic simple shielded USB cable, and with low impedence phones, I got horrible distortion. Brought e one at work home, it also had distortion. Went back and forth with Marshall a couple times, then tried the Belkin Gold cord. No more distortion at all, with any phone..... I haven't been able to tell any other difference, but there you have it. FYI, the old USB cable is connecting external HDD to my PC now, and never had any data errors FWIW..... Now back to our regularly schedule snake oil discussion