Cheap DAC for original Raspberry Pi Model B - Black Hifi DAC

Hi,

I have an old RP model B (the 512Mb one with the 34 pins in 2 headers) like this one. I am looking for DAC to fit it it, I just want to improve the sound quality a little without spending a fortune and make use of the old Rpi- I already have a RPi 3 / DAC+ for my “proper” system. The old Pi runs Volumio OK, if a little sluggish, but the headphone jack is pretty bad, even to my non hifi-buff ears.

I am probably going to have to solder on an 8 pin header on the Model B to fit a DAC as per the original HifiBerry instructions, which is fine, but I don’t think HifiBerry still sell the DAC which fitted this header.

The only one I can currently find for sale is this Black Hifi DAC on ebay - looks suspiciously cheap., has anyone tried one?

OK, just for anyone else with a crazy-old RP Model B like me, it works!

I soldered on the 8 pin header, attached the el-cheapo DAC (seems to be based on a respectable PCM5102A) and it works OK. It also runs Volumio using the generic I2S DAC setting, slowly . Streaming MP3 and Radio works great - FLAC’s are not playing well but I suspect thats the crappy old wifi dingle not being fast enough to stream at a high enough rate.

Sound quality - seems OK, hard to say as I don’t have anything apart from headphones and a “normal” mini-hifi - certainly better than the RPi headphone out …

So I got my RP Model B off the junk pile, spent £11 on the daughter board and I’m happy.

Signing off…

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