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Bypassing the internal DAC on an iPod?

post #1 of 11
12/8/05 at 11:58pm
Thread Starter 
I didn't think that it was possible to bypass the internal DAC on an iPod and route the digital signal into an external DAC, but Audio Advisor is now carrying the Monitor Audio i-Deck iPod player, which consists of a "deck" that the iPod mounts into and two speakers. It's not unlike similar (and usually less expensive) products by other manufacturers, except that "the i-deck simply bypasses the iPod's built-in DAC and uses its own superior DAC to produce enhanced audio output." How do they do that? Is there a digital output on the iPod dock connector?

http://www.audioadvisor.com/store/pr...p?sku=MONIDECK

I sure wish that someone made a dock that would allow the digital output of an iPod to be routed to an external DAC with a Toslink or SPDIF connection.
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post #2 of 11
12/9/05 at 3:03am
Vinnie has said earlier that it is possible, however the dac on the ipod does not send out it's signal using spdif, making it almost impossible for any tinkerer to make this sort of addition.
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post #3 of 11
12/9/05 at 4:17pm
betcha a dollar that the system linked to above is a very compact and primative computer that has its own dac, and gets the info via usb off of the i-pod.

there are several portable mp3 players with digital outputs available.
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post #4 of 11
12/13/05 at 3:29pm
uhm, if usb is the answer, the question remains: how?
there is no usb-out on the latest ipods or the dock, is there?
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post #5 of 11
12/13/05 at 3:51pm
You can play music from your ipod on the computer if you select manual update, maybe that's what he means? I seriously doubt that that's how it's done though
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post #6 of 11
12/13/05 at 3:55pm
It's firewire that was dropped on the new ipods, not usb.
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post #7 of 11
12/13/05 at 4:12pm
Right now it's just not fiscally feasible to do this. If there was a cheap and easy way to do this, tons of folks would swarm all over such a mod - because that would mean someone could rig up a digital out from an iPod, finally letting us use an external DAC. For now, using the internal DAC going to a proper analog line out via a Sik Din/TurboDock/PocketDock/iPod base dock is what we have.
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post #8 of 11
12/13/05 at 4:56pm
The i-deck basically does what the computer does when you hook up your ipod to the usb port and play the music through soundcard. The ipod serves as a external harddisk when you go this route. With sufficient programming knowledge and DIY skills I can imagine one could make a DAC/USB-host that can take the digital signal from ipod and bypass the internal DAC.

That said I doubt it's worth trying. Ipod is good as a portable music solution. To pair it with a portable amp is already on the borderline of headfi isanity; going through so much trouble to bypass the DAC is just too much. It'll be cool, but pointless.

Edit: Actually you can connect the ipod to you laptop and feed your favorite DAC with the digital out from a soundcard like Sonica USB, then play the ipod music from the computer. You can call it a $1500 ipod dock if you want,
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post #9 of 11
12/13/05 at 7:08pm
What i want to know, is when are apple finally going to give us SPDIF out on an iPod?

GJ
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post #10 of 11
12/13/05 at 7:28pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by raid517
What i want to know, is when are apple finally going to give us SPDIF out on an iPod?

GJ
I'd say probably never. Without market demand for it, there's no reason to add cost to manufacturing. Apple even got rid of the smart headphone jack in the video iPod and who knows what else to trim cost and size.

Until then, my H140 is safe.
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post #11 of 11
8/5/11 at 11:16pm

For all you guys looking for a cheap way to get a digital signal out of an iPod, I have a cheap solution. Check out the Sony SMPU10 USB Media Player on Amazon. It plays music from USB flash drives and external hard drives. I imagine it should work with an iPod, depending on how the file system is set up. For $29.98 used, it's worth a shot. :-)

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