I had some trouble getting the USB to work on Ubuntu.

In the end it turned out that the combination of Pulse Audio and ALSA was the culprit

After removing Pulse the DAC was working fine

http://thewelltemperedcomputer.com/Linux/USBAudio.htm

Okay, Elias. Let's see how this works for you. Disclaimer: I'm not a linux guru, so anyone who can expand or correct this is more than welcome to do so. OTOH, if it helps a few others try this type of system out, then great.

If you can, with your regular system, rip a CD to wav or flac files; MP3 files are not always supported right away on linux systems, because it's proprietary, and that is not politically correct. :)

Get your boot CD. Go to ubuntu.org and download the desktop installation disk image (.iso file). They also recommend a simple Windows program you can use to burn a CD from that file after you download it.

The resulting CD will be "bootable." That is, it can run a system on its own, rather than the OS on the hard drive. The trick is to tell the machine to boot from the CD rather than the hard drive. As your machine starts up, before Windows starts, choose the option that takes you to the boot menu (F12 on many computers). Different computers will have various paths to that command, but once there, choose CD Drive or Optical drive.

It'll take a few minutes, because enough code has to be copied from the CD to RAM for everything to run. It will stop to ask a couple questions; which language you wish to use and whether to install ubuntu or run it from the CD.

Press Enter, twice. Linux will then run on its own without making any changes to your computer. You can do anything and you'll break nothing.

Eventually, you'll have a desktop. Now you can make things happen. This is for ubuntu 8.04 - other types may be very similar. With the DAC1 USB connected:

Choose System, Preferences, Sound

From the Sound Playback list (under Music and Movies), choose Texas Instruments Benchmark 1.0 USB Audio (OSS) - be sure to choose the one ending in OSS; ALSA may not work

Close the dialog box

Choose Places and observe the menu entries. It was my experience that the hard drive showed up in this menu. It could be called anything; mine was HP_Pavilion, so now you know my hardware. No letters here; it shows the drive label. Whatever, navigate to a folder that has some compatable music files. Elias will probably have wavs.

Double-click a music file. Totem Movie Player will launch, and you should hear tunes on the DAC1. If not, check the volum controls (one on the app, another on the task bar) or go back to the Sound Preferences box and make sure the correct option is listed. You might also have to restart the player.

From here, Elias, I think you can play test signals to see if you're are getting anything more than 44.1/16 out of the interface.

Our friend from the Well-tempered Computer got his sys to work with ALSA, which I guess is kind of the ASIO of the linux world. I have not been able to make it work on my system. Maybe he, or somebody else, can help us out. If OSS doesn't work for high-rez, than maybe ALSA will.

I hope this is clear enough to get you going. IMO, the linux apps are generally just a little too limited in features compared to Winamp or Foobar. For instance, Rhythmbox is great, but it doesn't support more than one music library directory.

But, installed on the hard disk, the thing starts up fast, turns off fast, launchs apps fast, downloads updates (like mp3 support) and e-mail fast - - you get the picture.

Please let me know how it goes. I like my DAC1 very much. And my MPS-420.

Best wishes, Carl 

Thanks so much for this!

-e