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Beware of SACD Transports -- they probably will not work with your favorite DAC

Hello, I just learned a painful lesson. I'm guessing that not many people will know this so I'm going to put it in here.

The audio on a SACD is encrypted.
If I were to purchase a SACD / CD player I have nothing to worry about. The Audio is un-encrypted inside the player.
However if I were to purchase a SACD / CD Transport made my brand Z, I would have to purchase a brand Z DAC???
Apparently Sony who owns the SACD format mandated that the audio on the SACD itself is encrypted and
the digital output from a SACD transport is ALSO encrypted. It looks like the actual un-encryption is done in the DAC.
There is no standard for doing the un-encryption so every manufacturer has their own proprietary way of doing this.
So I cant use a Esoteric SACD transport and an Auralic DAC which is what I tried to do?
londontk
londontk OP
2 posts
 
Can someone who knows more about this than I do confirm that this is correct?

Thanks

Tim
kalali's avatar
kalali
1,977 posts
 
My understanding was in order to playback SACD content using a transport you’ll need a DSD capable DAC. A PCM capable DAC can only process Redbook CD content.
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cleeds
5,943 posts
 
I think you are essentially corrrect - a digital out on an SACD player is rarer than hen's teeth. There are a few, though, including - I'm 99 percent sure - some early Sony Playstations.
big_greg
6,623 posts
 
I've done a bit of research on this and everything I've read indicates that you can't output SACD via optical (toslink or coax) but can via HDMI, so you'd need something like an Oppo with an HDMI output and a DAC with an HDMI input (not many out there).

Which transport and DAC do you have?  I'm not familiar with the Esoteric SACD players, but aren't they thousands of dollars?  The DAC in your transport may be as good or better than your Auralic, depending on which one you have.

I have a Marantz KI-Pearl SACD player and it sounds better through it's analog outputs than any digital source I'm passing through my Auralic Vega.
uberwaltz's avatar
uberwaltz
13,381 posts
 
It has always been my understanding that sacd can not be output over digital like toslink or spdif.
I use analog rca out to my DAC for SACD.
I think you can output over HDMI but how many dacs accept HDMI?
A home theater processor possibly.
I have my sacd player hooked up by both spdif and RCA so can play CD over digital if I want to but SACD goes over RCA.
Sure there is better solution but has worked for me so far.
Might have to try my daughter's PS3 on toslink see if it does SACD!
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