Best practice to connect laptop hardwired to my Atom

A USB C to USB cable, probably an Audioquest or something similar

I would use cables from a proper audiophile manufacturer other than generic, that way you get to use the Naim Dac rather than the lower grade Apple Dac

A USB connection won’t work, you need to use SPDIF. That would require either a Mac with an optical out, or a USB to SPDIF converter.

The Naim website gives the USB as an audio input

Any recommendations on USB to SPDIF?

Sorry, I’ve never needed to use one, but I know some forum members have in the past, so maybe someone with experience will be able to make some suggestions.

@Ian2001 are you suggesting USB from laptop to USB on the atom? And this would use the DAC within the Naim? Sorry for the newbie questions here I’m learning as we go with all this

The USB ports are for attaching a hard drive, they won’t work from the USB output on a computer.

That’s what I thought

Hi @Timwright , welcome to the forum.

I have a mid 2012 MacBook Pro. The headphone out doubles as an optical out. So as an experiment I tried using an optical cable from the MacBook to one of the optical inputs on my Atom and it worked first time. Apple eventually dropped optical out (stupidly IMO) from their laptops but I’m fairly sure it was later than 2013 so it should work with yours.

I was so surprised it worked straight off that I tried playing a well recorded file from the Qobuz app on the laptop and was also surprised how good it sounded. OK, I was using a high quality optical cable, which might have made a difference but you needn’t fear that SQ will be rubbish. You need a cable with the right terminations (toslink to mini-toslink) but they’re widely available in a range of lengths and might be just what you need.

Roger

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