DAC for broadcast audio

admin_exported

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Aug 10, 2019
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Looking for some advice here. As the only member of a community group with any technical knowledge I have been appointed as unofficial station engineer for a small non profit radio station. They have all their music stored in wav format on an external hard drive on an XP computer. The pc has an M-Audio 2496 sound card and the audio output is fed from the rca outputs directly into their audio processor. I feel that an external DAC could improve on this. Any recommendations for a DAC?. Bearing in mind that the sound is for FM broadcast would the limitations of the medium wipe out any gains made by using a DAC? All suggestions welcome
 

fatboyslimfast

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Jan 10, 2008
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I'll be honest here and say that the M-Audio card is pretty good, and that you would probably have to go past the likes of Beresford to better it.

Also, whilst FM is capable of astonishing results (listen to a live Radio 3 broadcast on something like a Naim Nat01), the equipment available to smaller broadcasters isn't likely to exceed the quality of the sound card.

And even if it was, 99.9% of users will be listening on a receiver that isn't as good as it!

Apologies for the daft question, but the hard disk is backed up isn't it? Could be a real pain if it fails!
 

John Duncan

Well-known member
Agree with fatboy - especially with your inclusion of the phrase "directly into their audio processor" which, unless it's broadcast quality, is going to undo any improvement. FM is not a limitation per se, but the tuners your listeners use will be, most likely.
 
A

Anonymous

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To be fair the broadcast processor is professional gear - an orban optimod 8100 which is widely regarded as the best analogue on air processor. Old kit now but still respected and in use in many commercial stations too. You're probably right about the receivers that listeners use though - not much anyone can do about that.

Yes the hard drive is backed up to another hard drive - made sure of that
 

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