snip well, that's not something intrinsic to USB; IMHO you should be decrying cheap home electronics junk rather than USB specifically, perhaps with a proviso that much which is USB is fadish junk. Could be something out there which has a USB interface and is not junk. You are absolutely right, but there are some some lingering doubts remaining about USB for audio. Having said that, I'm listening right now on an EMU USB headphone amp/converter/recording interface that sounds awesome. It doesn't sound that different from a $3000 converter, it is small, easy to use, and has no power supply. And, miracle, it has an on-off switch, so when it is off it does not even pull 5 volts. But, it is sometimes a little buggy compared to my Firewire RME box. But hey, it rocks. [1]http://tinyurl.com/Usb-Emu Plug it in, and your computer sounds like a high end work station. Add a pair of Sennheiser HD580s with the 10 dollar cable from the HD600 and you can't be beat. Now if they only made a turntable..... There are basically two issues here, one of which is the USB interface and the other is the turntable. First, the USB interface is not ideal for audio. So even though it is possible to make a USB interface with reasonably good audio, and even though many of the problems with USB audio have been solved, manufacturers simply assume that the USB crowd wants ease of use over sound quality. And, similarly, the PCI Express interface, the MADI interfaces and so on are aimed at the high end crowd, or people who work professionally and want to avoid the mouse and the audio on the same bus. They want a dedicated bus for the audio. So as a general rule, and there are some (but few) exceptions, the USB interfaces for computer simply are not as good. The EMU ones are the best of the low end, but they have intermittent driver problems. An I have never seen anyone with an EMU USB interface. I use one as an external soundcard, for $99 it can't be beat because it includes a terrific headphone amplifier. But I would not record anything on it. So, rightly or wrongly, the USB devices use cheaper parts in the analog section of the electronics, because, and, again, there are exceptions, they won't be used by professional recording engineers. So USB gets a bad rap, but the USB is not blameless because they set up several standards at the same time which were very confusing, resulting in cheaper hardware being advertised as "high speed" when, in fact, it was not When posting this article, I surveyed all of the available USB Turntables by reputable manufacturers. These turntables broke down into two categories. There were a large number in the $99-$150 range, then there were a small number in the $450 and up range. Only one of the high end models looked like something I would use, the Pro-ject model [2]http://tinyurl.com/projectTT . There are some other nice ones as well, you can spend a lot of money on a turntable. In the lower end, the ones I recommended not to buy, a waste of money, these turntables all use cheap parts. There were no USB turntables on the market that I would recommend. So this is not a limitation of the USB interface, it is a limitation of cheap, USB turntables. But the quality is connected to the niche that USB created--cheap, simple, hassle free connectivity--a concept which for most people is a good thing. But if you want it to sound good, which is important, I think, USB turntables are out. And the USB interface is not blameless here, its unsuitability for audio, coupled with a long history of driver problems--due, in part to different implementations of the USB interface, has contributed to USB primarily occupying a budget niche. The sad thing here, and, not to be cynical, this is just greed on the part of the manufacturers, is that the parts for the AD stage--the Analog to Digital conversion, are just so cheap now. The manufacturers are saying, I'm making ten million units, and if I use really cheap parts, I can shave two dollars of each unit. That's 20 million dollars. That is why they sound, in a word, cheesy. And that's a shame, but that is the way it works. Equally annoying are the companies that say, I'll spend twenty dollars more on parts, and sell it for four hundred dollars more. Once you get into the $500 range, one has to ask, is it better to spend the money on a USB turntable or get a really good computer interface, such as the RME, and hook it up to a dedicated turntable. And here, I think that for many people, they would prefer a device that functioned as a superb sound card for all of their audio listening, instead of just LPs, and additionally allowed people to record themselves, again, with superb audio. And use to make videos as well. But, If I had money to burn, I'd buy a turntable with a dedicated interface. I love the convenience. And USB would be fine, though I would prefer firewire, MADI or PCIE. dt --
References 1. http://tinyurl.com/Usb-Emu 2. http://tinyurl.com/projectTT To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
