Stereophile: Bel Canto's USB Link 24/96

As more audiophiles start to view their computer systems as another audio source component, finding good sounding ways to bridge from the computer to the preamp becomes paramount.

Bel Canto's $495 USB Link 24/96 was developed to take the first step by grabbing the stream present at the computer's USB port and converting it to SPDIF for connection to the DAC of your choice. It handles up to 24 bits and 96kHz and outputs the data to a 75 ohm BNC connector (the box contains a Stereovox SV2 BNC/BNC cable with RCA adaptor so you can connect it to the DAC).

The company's John Stronczer says that "even web radio and MP3s sound clearer runnng through the USB LInk."

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Reader Comments

Posted Sat Jan10, 2009, 12:09 PM — By Stephen Vargs

I have this unit, works fantastic and sounds even better than that. Listening to 24bit 96khz FLAC files, wonderful!

Posted Sat Jan10, 2009, 4:49 PM — By jj

"even web radio and MP3s sound clearer running through the USB LInk." Clearer than what? Since this only converts one form of digital data to another, it's hard to believe this could sound very different from any other usb-soundcard offering digital out.

Posted Fri Jan30, 2009, 7:34 PM — By Stephen Varga

The USB link upsamples, which is part of the claim. I wouldn't listen to lossy mp3s on my main system with this, but the option is there, if you must. FLAC sounds excellent, as does WAV. I use this unit with Linux but it also works well with most all operating systems from my experiments.

Posted Fri Jun12, 2009, 8:54 PM — By TC

I have tried some of the less expensive converters and some of the very expensive ones with results that did not match prices. I am hoping to try this one soon and will report back as to how they compare. As of now I feel all, to some extent, raise the pitch of the music just enough to be annoying.

Posted Sun Mar14, 2010, 11:06 PM — By Alexi Peznakov

So let me get this straight...this converts some sort of digital audio datastream into another digital audio datastream. How does this exactly make the music sound better?

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