Straight to Speaker

Audio Gear Talk RoPieee
1

A beginner question…

Is there a way to connect my Raspberry Pi straight to a speaker (via USB or 3.5 jack) without using a external DAC?

I have tried but I am not getting any sound.

Tx

2

In short no. Ropiee only outputs via digital outs or analogue via a DAC/amp hat. The audio out of the pi is dire you would not want it.

4

Thanks,

Any cheap/portable DAC to recommend?

I want to replace some of the Chromecasts I have (moving out of Google for privacy) with Raspberries Pi

5

It’s in the Ropieee section.

1 Like
6

HifiBerry are good value, IandQ Audio get love on here as do Allo, the latter are more expensive. I have several HifiBerry products and they have been very good an reliable unlile the one Allo product I had.

7

How about to powered speakers that include a DAC?

8

Yes that is why I am confused. I want to connect it to an active speaker which hence has already a dac.

9

A small detail left out of the original post.

1 Like
10

Model name?

11

Sorry, yes they do have usb in. I tried with that and could not make them work. Same with the 3.5 jack

12

Raspberry Pi with RoonBridge → USB → active speaker should work fine.

If you want optical out, you need to add a hat like this one to your Raspberry Pi.

If you have an active speaker, you definitely don’t want another DAC in the chain — to avoid unnecessary DA/AD/DA conversions.

13

It is a bit old, Aurstream S300.

It also has Airplay but wanted to use room directly via bridge.

I used the ropieee distribution but maybe I should use a standard distributor with Roon bridge directly.

14

Tx, shouldn’t this work with ropieee or better a normal RPi distro and bridge on top?

15

I think you’re out of luck regarding USB. This input is designed for connecting an iPhone or iPod only.

If you have a Raspberry Pi you could use a DragonFly Black (£69) with a 3.5mm lead to the S300. Otherwise a DAC hat is needed.

Stick with Ropieee.

16

Thanks!

I will have a look to that option.

1 Like
17

You need a DAC with a line out. That can be achieved with a HAT or via a USB DAC with the required line output. As stated above USB is not an option

18

DragonFly DAC is a good cheap option, but there are many other USB DAC combos on the likes of eBay and amazon or drop.com too