I am trying to connect my Macbook pro mid 2012 to the sprout. it connects good with bluetooth the turntable works great. but when i connect with USB cable it takes awhile to find the XMOS drive then disappears, and today does not appear at all. i tried all even bought an expensive usb cable from audioquest “cinnamon” any suggestions ? most of my music is digital some HF
thanks
I have the same problem.
This is my first day with the sprout… My Rega Planar 3 sounds great, as does bluetooth which works a treat with my iphone and ipad, Q Acoustics 3020s sound lovely along with the Velodyne Micro-vee sub connected via analog 3.5mm out. My Mac Mini connected by Audioquest forest usb cable however, it worked well for a few hours then just dropped out, not to be found in the sound preferences again (yet, if like the above issue sounds like it may drop in and out).
I am really enjoying this fun sounding amp. What do I do from here?
Great to hear you’re loving the Sprout! How are you liking the Q Acoustics 3020s?
Though USB is usually a very robust connection, and should work well with your Mac, there are a few limitations.
We always suggest you use a high quality cable, but for testing purposes, the shortest USB certified cable you can find is great.
Go ahead and try out a few different cables, and if this doesn’t work, email me directly at jamesh@psaudio.com and we can try to work this out together.
Hi James,
I’m having the exact problem. I have a Mac Mini and I’ve had no problem connected via USB for the past year. Last week the USB XOS option disappeared as an output under sound preferences. I’ve tested two cables but still have the problem. Note, I have no issues via turntable or bluetooth. Do you have any suggestions for me?
Thank you!
Best,
Nick
Welcome Nick, thanks for writing! I’m sure you’ve done the usual trouble shooting like power cycling both the computer and the Sprout. How long are the different cables you’ve tried? I don’t know why anything would have changed, but ideally, we want the cables to be less than 2M long.
Thank you, James. I really appreciate the quick feedback!
I have power cycled both the computer and Sprout. The two cables I’ve used are under 2m and I can use them on other devices (e.g. printer).
Please let me know if you’d have any additional suggestions.
If you’re able to, try hooking up a different computer and see if it can see the Sprout as an output. If it still can’t, then we may need you to send the Sprout in and have our guys take a look at it.
Hi James,
Thanks. I connected the Sprout to my wife’s Macbook and the XOS USB output automatically appears. Would you have any other troubleshooting tips?
Thank you.
Shoot, it’d almost be more helpful if it didn’t work. So essentially it seems specifically that Mac Mini is the one having trouble connecting?
Yep, that is correct. Note, I didn’t play anything on the MacBook but the XMOS USB option showed up.
You could test playing something like youtube really quick to make sure it works. And just to be sure, the Sprout doesn’t show up in the audio midi settings at all?
And if it won’t show on midi, you could take a look at your system report (Click the Apple on top left) and see if the dac appears as a device connected to the usb hub
Hi James,
Thanks. I have successfully tested the output on the MacBook using You Tube. On my Mac mini I check the Midi output and nothing shows there either.
At this point, it could be that the USB connection in the Mac mini has failed or is corrupt. I don’t have an explanation for why it would work perfectly on one Mac but not another.
Ok, bummer. Thank you anyway.
Very welcome! Please let us know if you find a fix and what the problem was.
Will do! Have a good one.
Hi James. I fixed the problem by updating to the latest version of Catalina. Very happy everything is working now. Thanks again for your assistance.
Great, thanks for keeping us posted! I’ll keep this fix in mind if another person has the same issue.