Crackling over digital

[RC231]

I recently purchased a dayton wba31 to use as a spotify source into my B&K st202 receiver over optical digital. I am getting a crackling or clicking sound that is present whenever the input is selected. I have tried 2 optical cables, 2 digital inputs and 2 usb power supplies with no improvement. I asked for a warranty replacement and the second unit is making the same sound. Any thoughts on what to try? These units are well reviewed with no reports of this issue so I am at a loss.

 

[RC231]

Hooked a different dac into the chain today and it does not make the crackling/clicking sound. I prefer the sound of the dac in my receiver to the external one I have but don't know how to get rid of this, anything to try?
Debating just returning the streamers and finding something else the top candidate would be a martin logan unison unless there is a cheap easy way to set up a raspberry pi with a digital out and spotify connect.

 

[AnalogSteph]

Crackling / clicking may indicate that input sample rate is too far out of spec for the SPDIF receiver to sync to. Try another output of known-accurate clock or a sample rate from another "family" (48k vs. 44.1k). The Dayton may be using a receiver with VCXOs (e.g. AK4114) rather than a plain CMOS VCO, which is good news in terms of jitter but may be fairly restrictive in terms of sample rate deviation.

 

[RC231]

The receiver is fine with the signal from my TV or the amazon fire TV box this is meant to replace as it is no longer reliable with spotify so the clock rate error seems feasible, I wonder if the dayton is outputting at 48k instead of 44.1 that the old receiver is designed for but don't know how to check.