[fenixdown110]

Even before I came across head-fi, I fortunately bought a 4G iPod color with the Wolfson dac. I'm wondering if you can remove the DAC and swap it into a working amp dac. Or perhaps it can be used to make an external dac. I know it sounds like a waste of a perfectly good working iPod, but my friend has a broken 4G which I plan to cannibalize.

Even if the transplant works, I'm guessing the drivers would not work. Just a thought though.

 

[colonelkernel8]

Yeah, not going to happen. The DAC the iPod uses is not discrete, that is, it is on a chip with several other devices such as DSP and decoding hardware, so I don't think you will have much luck. You can do much better as far as DAC's go as well, as the DAC in the iPod is also designed to draw minimal current; the noise floor goes up a little.

On top of that, DAC's don't generally follow a standard pin out or package, so it won't be a drop in replacement for anything other than the same model of DAC.

 

[colonelkernel8]

Furthermore, if I am not mistaken, the chip that contains the DAC on an iPod is a BGA (ball grid array) chip which makes it more or less impossible to desolder for the average hobbyist (unless you have some fancy hot air soldering iron).

 

[fenixdown110]

Ok. Good to know. I figured is probably wasn't something easy to do. I guess I might just do the iMod instead then.