Will computer to DAC replace transports and cdp's?

The Burr Brown 1704-K chip uses left-Justified data which can be supported by the Off-Ramp I2S with some mods, however, the timing is unclear on how the data is multiplexed between the left and right channel chips. This could be a problem.

Steve N.

"there are problems transmitting separated Data and Clocks via single cable, especially in the case master clock is included."

What exactly are the problems? Seems to work perfectly and sounds significatnly better than any S/PDIF I have heard.

"The only "problem" with S/PDIF is the master clock recovery which is done from the Bitclock by multiplying it and PLL-ing it. This of course results in high jitter in the master clock. But since 44.1 (or multiples) sampling is of primary use with your application,"

Actually, it's not. I only use 24/96 and I'm doing systems with the Northstar transport that are 24/192. Both of these sound superior to 44.1.

"you can easily use one of the latest Crystal or AKM S/PDIF receivers and configure it in Master Mode with own master clock generator. In this case the master clock is on-board with the DIR and DAC and if precision external XO or TCXO is used you can have as low as 5-10pS (RMS) jitter. This will be free of the problems with the I2S cable."

This is still using a PLL to derive the clock. Seems like it will have more jitter than the simpler I2S interface.

Steve N.

Alex and Steve are both geniuses at what they do, I love reading their posts, keep going guys !

I can't read all the responses but the fact that there have been over 12,000 views!!! on this thread should go some way towards answering the question posed in the subject.

"Steve, I see, this explains it. However, please be aware that as good as it looks, there are problems transmitting separated Data and Clocks via single cable, especially in the case master clock is included."

I will not even pretend that I know how a audio DAC works internally. But to transmit a digital signal down COAX it has to be a digital streem. If you are transmiting Data and a Clock they must be muxed together into a single digital stream. The mear fact that muxing is involved means that a clock is involved in time slotting the various packets. If I am way off base here please correct me but I see no problem in sending both the Clock and Data in the same signal.

Which brings up a question for Steve and Alex for a mear 3-4 hundred dollars you can bring the clock out of a GPS receiver. Why is it that no one has tried integrating that clock into a DAC or Transport or both. It seems to me that this would eliminate alot of the clocking issues inherent in audio equipment. The fact that it is a stratum one clock IMHO is a huge advantage.

P.S.

I just picked up a MF XDAC V8 that has USB in this past saturday. I am outputing it to a MF X-CAN V3 for a headphone system. I may never listen to the main rig again. Ok that may be going a little far but with 60 hours on it it is sweet.