Get those amps plugged in with digital :D

[Zirax]

I have an ageing Philips surround sound system (LX-300) for use on my main pc (about 4-500 when new). Now I also have a Cambridge audio DAB500 receiver. For years these were hooked up by analogue connectors. The audio sounded deadened/muffled and the sub has never kicked as much as I hoped. I put it down to the amp/speakers not being that expensive.

I was moving some bits around today and realised that my units can connect digitally. I don't have a spare optical cable, so I am using a phono digital connection. Simply bloody hell !! The whole system has come alive. The music has sooo so much more top and low end, there is just so much more content. I think i'll be hooking up my pc with optical outputs now (driver issue previously).

So if anyone has an amp knocking around, do switch over as the difference could be a lot more than you think. This unit will also act as a good receiver so in the future I could connect up a power amp with better speakers.

[SidewinderINC]

My Amp doesn't have digital in or out :cries:

But having said that, my gutiars and cabs don't have digital in or out either ;D


I need to get a good set of separates, wish I could afford some.

[Zirax]

Head over to avforums and have a look around the for sale sections and the general separates sections. The prices that those guys let top end components go for is just plain nuts! Twice today I have nearly brought setups :D

[SidewinderINC]

Cheers for the advice, I'll do that when I get my place sorted :D

[Nutcase]

You're welcome to try an optical cable if you like? Got a couple of them lying around doing nowt until I get around to sorting my minidisk player.

Most of the time I run analogue to my amp, but then the decoder with my soundcard is better than the one in my amp - and it's also the only way to listen to DVD-A.

[Flibster]

I've done both.
Optical for DVD's and other things that I can use optical for properly
As it's an X-Fi I've got it plugged in through with 6 cables for everthing else. :D Gaming mostly.

[LeperousDust]

Head over to avforums and have a look around the for sale sections and the general separates sections. The prices that those guys let top end components go for is just plain nuts! Twice today I have nearly brought setups :D

Where were you bringing them :p Sorry i just can't help it :o
On a sensible note everytime i go there i have to hold back buying second hand stuff, since i don't actually have anything decent, its awful but i use my laptop for everything, at least that way i have the same (****e) audio/video here and at uni :D For half the price kinda too...

[Mondo]

Are we talking about Digital Radio ?

[LeperousDust]

I think we're talking about interconnects between anything really, digital being better basically... Or as good as very top end (read: silly expensive) anologue.

[Mondo]

But If the amp is analogue (which mine is) or even if its Digital, by using a optical cable form the CD player to the amp all you are doing is instead of using the DAC in the CD player, you are now using the DAC in the amp. So the CD player basically turned into a transport and the quality of the music is down to the quality of the DAC in the Amp.

Sound eventually goes to analog in the end anyway, so I don't know how much improvement (if any) if we are talking about CD -> amp, that is if you have a good CD player in the first place obviously.

[Dr. Z]

Digital is NOT better than analogue (over short distances). Providing your signal path is clean and at the correct impedances a truly analogue chain will outperform digital.

Plug in a turntable and play a fresh record with a good needle and you shall see!

To summarise:

Your CDP has a really terrible DAC / is generally crap or
Your analogue interconnects are broken or
Your amp had crap solder joints between the preamp board and the phonos on the back or
Its a placebo

Up to you to decide which :)

[LeperousDust]

Oh, i just assumed cheap digital was better than cheap analogue? Tbh i wouldn't know the first thing about any of this, i use PC speakers out of lack of money they do me OK atm...

[Nutcase]

To a certain extent it's all about conversions - each time you convert to/from digital/analogue you lose info. Lots of other things too.

As I said above, I'm running analogue most of the time :) When its on a coax connection, can't really tell much difference tbh.

[Dr. Z]

Yeah, pretty much. You dont actually lose anything converting to digital to analogue - quite the opposite. You get more out than you put in!

Ever wonder why they withdrew CD when it first came out?

[LeperousDust]

Withdrew, i didn't even know about this?

[Dr. Z]

Yeah, when the red book standard was first published all those years ago it was a 14-bit standard. Philips came up with a PHENOMINAL 14-bit DAC when Sony were struggling to make a decent sounding 8-bit DAC. Sony agreed on the 14-bit standard and let Philips go into production of the 14-bit system before withdrawing support for the standard and announcing their new (and not quite as good) 16-bit chip. Philips didn't have anywhere near the budget to argue or release a seperate standard so out came 16-bit CD :)

Ever wondered why CD had a sample rate of 44100Hz? Makes sense to have it around 44KHz (Nyquist limit giving you the full spectrum of audible sound plus a little bit for safety) but exactly 44100? Again down to Sony. They wanted Betamax to win the format war and so they made the CD standard able to fit exactly on the video track of a Betamax tape, allowing recording studios to put tracks digitally onto relatively cheap media to take to be mastered.

Unfortunately for Sony, you could use their own PCM encoders to put the same onto VHS tape (just about) but they did their very best to scupper the competition!

[Zirax]

Interesting points there DRZ. There is a very clear and definite improvement. The source is a DAB radio going to my amp. So I presume that the Cambridge audio had a crap conversion to analogue outputs to connect to the amp. When I have time I will play with this a bit more.

[William]

I got to listen to a Vivaldi record today on a Linn LP12 hooked up to a pair of Mackie HR824s.

Was ridiculously good; the whole argument is so subjective though and mainly the most important factor is how much the hi-fi buff spent in order to convince himself he was getting somthing better.

What I will say is that some of Bang & Olufsen's stuff is witchcraft, blasphemy, a slur on science and heathenism, i'm not sure how it works.