I was asked this question elsewhere. There is a view that the USB outputs from SBCs such as Raspberry Pi etc are inferior, noisy and inadequate for driving quality DACs. I dont share this view and decided to perform some tests and look at the output of my DAC1 and see if it is affected by different USB sources.
OK here are some measurements.
The SBCs are all running latest Volumio and Roon endpoint software. All playing via USB into my DAC1. I am playing a -60dB tone from Roon. If the PSU/SBC was causing USB noise problems you would expect to see it in the noise floor. Spot the difference.
Asus Tinker
RPi
Khadas Vim2
Intel Skull canyon NUC
Sony Laptop
Essentially no significant difference. Well designed DACs should not have a major issue with using SBCs, they work very well. Of course I cannot comment whether any particular DAC you might have will suffer problems, but I very much see this as a DAC design issue and NOT a "noisy computer USB" issue. DAC should be expected to work without issue with a huge variety of USB sources.
Oh just for reference this is the sort of thing that can go wrong if you have gnd loops. I artificially created the problem by using the same computer that the measurement system is connected to to drive my DAC1.
8kHz USB packet noise and a bunch of other spuria.
OK here are some measurements.
The SBCs are all running latest Volumio and Roon endpoint software. All playing via USB into my DAC1. I am playing a -60dB tone from Roon. If the PSU/SBC was causing USB noise problems you would expect to see it in the noise floor. Spot the difference.
Asus Tinker
RPi
Khadas Vim2
Intel Skull canyon NUC
Sony Laptop
Essentially no significant difference. Well designed DACs should not have a major issue with using SBCs, they work very well. Of course I cannot comment whether any particular DAC you might have will suffer problems, but I very much see this as a DAC design issue and NOT a "noisy computer USB" issue. DAC should be expected to work without issue with a huge variety of USB sources.
Oh just for reference this is the sort of thing that can go wrong if you have gnd loops. I artificially created the problem by using the same computer that the measurement system is connected to to drive my DAC1.
8kHz USB packet noise and a bunch of other spuria.