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Inferior sound from USB external drive?

A while ago, I repurposed an old Dell XP desktop as a music server. Added a Juli@ card for SPDIF coax out and installed JRiver. Trimmed down processes running on the PC. Sound was fine, and I was satisfied for my relatively modest system. BUT the old PC had a tiny HDD. No big deal, I added an external 1TB drive and created my library there blissfully ripping CDs

Soon, I was no longer satisfied. There was a glare/fog I just could not overcome. So, I either spun discs or used my laptop, which was better - but not great.

I tried one last time this weekend. I experimented with moving some files to the internal HDD. Eureka! A/B testing PC vs CD, no difference. Laptop with junked up operating system came in third. I am adding an internal drive to the PC - a bit convoluted with an adapter adding a SATA drive to an IDE board.

So, in my specific example, the external drive via USB degraded sound quality. Who knows why - maybe related to the age of the PC - but it did.

Go figure

(System = Marantz SA8004-> HH Scott 355-> DIY PP6B4G-> DIY JBL based horns)

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Topic - Inferior sound from USB external drive? - bean 09:12:07 10/20/14 (39)
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