Airport Express to DAC - Cable Suggestion

Your only choice is optical as the USB port on the AE will not support audio. The jitter specs on the AE are not great but Bel Canto claims that the DAC 3 has excellent jitter rejection so this may not be a factor. Many will claim a glass cable is better than plastic so you may want to try that comparison even though it seems to me that if the DAC is as good as they claim in regards to jitter rejection that would also be a non factor.

Herman is right, the USB port on an Airport Express doesn't support audio but with a DAC that handles jitter well the optical output is great. I've been using a glass-fiber cable bought here from member Captnstarstripe that is reasonably priced and sounds very good.

I use Van Den Hul's Opticoupler toslink cable ($120) which can be purchased with a mini-plug which negates the need for a adaptor plug when connecting to the AE. After calling around to several Van Den Hul dealers, I found mine in stock at Eugene Hi-Fi ([email protected]) in Eugene Oregon. I have no affiliation with Eugene Hi Fi... just a satisfied customer... very friendly, knowledgeable and helpful over the phone.

install a jitter remover device between the AE and your dac. i do this in all of my setups and the sound is vastly improved. you can use a toslink cable from the AE to the jitter device, then use aes or coax to the dac depending on what is supported. i was never happy with the sound going straight into an external dac (didn't matter which dac i used), but inserting the jitter device made the dacs perform their best. garbage in, garbage out! the jitter device cleans up the signal before reaching the dac.

I run from an AE to a Bel Canto DAC2. I use a simple glass cable I bought from monoprice.com. For my application, this works fine. The Bel Canto is great at jitter reduction. Your DAC3 is generations ahead of my DAC2 in jitter reduction, so I assume it will be even better than my setup.

Rbstehno, what "jitter device" would you recommend?

depends on how much you want to spend. some companies to consider are: audio alchemy, monarchy, and genesis.