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Good external Soundcard for iMac ?

NordmoleX

NordmoleX

macrumors member
Original poster
Hi,
just wondering if any of you knows a good external Soundcard for the use with an iMac. I recently switched from PC to Mac, and with that I lost quite a good sound from my Asus Soundcard there, in combination with a 5.1 Boxset, that sound was really something.

And I am not saying that the iMac does have too bad sound, but if you're used to what I had, the iMac sound just doesnt do it. I know there are many external soundcards out there, but most have bad reviews and seem to sound really bad. Not to mention that those are usually reviewed on Windows, so I dont even know if they work good or at all on Mac.

I wonder if someone here maybe also got the same problem that I have with the Sound, and already found a good solution. Not to mention that I dont always want to listen via Headphones, but mostly speakers. If someone here has good experience with an external soundcard that is a mix of A) affordable and b) sounds really good and c) is working on Mac, please let me know.

I am surprised about the sound on the iMac, which is not bad at all, for a all-in-one in any case. But still, if you had the b00msound rocking, you cant go back to the sound of the iMac speakers. 😉
 
The Mac's audio capabilities are pretty much "built into it".

If all you're looking to do is hook up speakers, I can think of a couple of ways to go:

1. Get USB-connectible speakers, and utilize digital/audio out via USB.

2. Get a USB-digital audio converter (DAC). They come in all kinds with prices from reasonable to astronomical.
 
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The Cambridge device looks like it can connect via either:
- USB connection
or
- digital/optical (from headphone port)
 
Ok, so I need that, attach it to USB, and a speaker set that I can use. For my PC i had an older 5.1 Logitech Speaker set which was fine, and a very nice Asus Soundcard. I simply miss that sound. You think I can do that with this Dac ?

Is that correct, there is no headphone possible on that thing ?
 
Definitely a USB sound device and I'd be looking for one with a USB cable long enough as to not put stress on the USB port. You can find devices with just a 3.5mm stereo jack in/out or others with separate L/R input/output jacks. Some have stereo output jacks and an additional headphone jack. The one matreya just posted above fits that description.
 
From what I can read in the reviews on german Amazon, it seems like its a good device, the Behringer, but hard to setup. I suppose there is no real driver for this thing for Mac, at best an ASIO driver, correct ? From what I read there, and thats not about Mac, it seems that thing sounds quite good but not easy to get there. Is that correct ?
 
On the US Amazon site the reviews from searches of "MacBook" or "iMac" are mostly 5 stars. No drivers are required for it to work with the Mac.
 
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