one approach

one approach

You can live with the built-in dac if you have to. It's not great by any means, but a few cuts better than the dac's in most laptops. If you do that, take the audio from the headphone jack.

Much better to pick an external dac that you like. Either USB or Firewire can be good. I love my Metric Halo ULN-2, but that has a couple mic preamps most people won't need.

My signal path is:
file playback via Vox or Protools ---> DAC via FW or USB ---> line-level input on preamp ---> power amps ---> speakers

Once you have your dac set (internal or external) then put music files on the MBP and play them with the software of your choice. I use Vox software, but there are lots of others that do well.

For file formats, any lossless format should be fine: WAV, AIFF, or FLAC. I've not been able to hear a difference between WAV and FLAC, but with disc space so cheap now, pretty much anyone can afford enough disc to store WAV files, which gets you out of the data compression/decompression business. I use WAV rather than AIFF as it is the most widely used format and has no data compression. (AIFF can support some data compression, and it's Apple-centric, so I picked WAV just to keep everything simple.)

Organize your file folders so you can find stuff, and keep records of your purchases so you can re-download if needed, and of course keep multiple backups, preferably with one backup kept physically off-site.

WW
"Put on your high heeled sneakers. Baby, we''re goin'' out tonight.

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Follow Ups Full Thread

Topic - What written reference(s) do you use to set up your Mac(book Pro) for music only - Frihed89 00:49:02 07/23/16 (21)

RE: What written reference(s) do you use to set up your Mac(book Pro) for music only - Roseval 02:13:28 07/26/16 (0)

one approach - Bill Way 12:23:15 07/23/16 (1)

RE: one approach - Frihed89 14:08:09 07/23/16 (0)

RE: What written reference(s) do you use to set up your Mac(book Pro) for music only - AbeCollins 07:59:32 07/23/16 (17)

Thank you, Abe nt - Frihed89 11:33:19 07/23/16 (0)

Is there any problem with importing to ITunes using WAV instead of AIFF? - oldmkvi 09:29:51 07/23/16 (7)

I had a problem a long time ago when I used iTunes to convert WAV's to AIFF's - Chris from Lafayette 18:53:04 07/23/16 (3)

RE: I had a problem a long time ago when I used iTunes to convert WAV's to AIFF's - AbeCollins 23:45:25 07/23/16 (2)

RE: I had a problem a long time ago when I used iTunes to convert WAV's to AIFF's - Frihed89 15:17:01 07/24/16 (0)

Didn't have anything to do with CD's - source WAV was a download [nt] - Chris from Lafayette 09:01:49 07/24/16 (0)

RE: Is there any problem with importing to ITunes using WAV instead of AIFF? - AbeCollins 10:07:00 07/23/16 (2)

It works, but Ayre seemed adamant that AIFF was the way to go. - oldmkvi 14:07:34 07/23/16 (1)

RE: It works, but Ayre seemed adamant that AIFF was the way to go. - AbeCollins 16:03:17 07/23/16 (0)

This is a - fmak 09:10:45 07/23/16 (7)

RE: This is a - AbeCollins 09:36:30 07/23/16 (6)

For Music Only - fmak 23:59:24 07/23/16 (5)

What part of my comment.... - AbeCollins 14:25:57 07/24/16 (4)

As usual - fmak 23:04:22 07/25/16 (3)

You're too funny !! - AbeCollins 19:35:37 07/26/16 (2)

Since you can't - fmak 08:04:20 07/27/16 (1)

Are you embarrassed ? - AbeCollins 12:12:33 07/28/16 (0)

Follow Ups

one approach - Bill Way 12:23:15 07/23/16 (1)

RE: one approach - Frihed89 14:08:09 07/23/16 (0)

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