[BobSaysHi]

Howdy,
 
I am thinking of building a y1 and I was wondering if my sound would be negatively effected by the spdif out of my motherboard. I realize the sound difference would be slight, if noticeable at all. I was just wondering if it would be there at all, and if there was anything cheap I could do to improve my spdif in the future. Like maybe changing the caps or something.
 
Thanks in advance.

 

[TheKisho]

It should be fine as-is.  I've always used the optical and coax out of my computers from the motherboard ports and have them sound spectacular.  They blow away the analog out ports on anything I've ever heard (onboard and sound card) [IMO].  There is probably a bit of jitter but I don't have an oscilloscope to check.  I suspect the jitter if any would be caused by a noisy power supply, and/or a low quality audio chip and/or timing circuit.  I'd would not worry about it (to most if not all you'll never notice the difference between audio with a bit of jitter and audio with no jitter at all).  It's a much bigger difference going from analog motherboard audio to digital audio.

 

[BobSaysHi]

Good to hear. I didn't think there would be quality issues, but I just wanted to check.

 

[leeperry]

 

Originally Posted by BobSaysHi /img/forum/go_quote.gif
 
 
I was wondering if my sound would be negatively effected by the spdif out of my motherboard.

 
There's only one way to find out...but many ppl use proper transports for a good reason. It's a good guess that even a Musiland 01USD will sound better than your mobo chip(realtek?).
 
if it's coax, it won't be galvanically isolated, it's mandatory off a computer source.

 

[BobSaysHi]

Sigh, always something to buy. 

 I have toslink and coax on my mobo.
 
What exactly does a Musiland 01 do? 
 
What is galvanic isolation? I did a google search, but came up with nothing that useful.
 
Also, from the mobo's website. It has a lot of jargon I'm not familiar with...
 
http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/ASUS-M4A79XTD-EVO-Motherboard/825/3
 
"Audio is generated by the chipset using a VIA VT1708S codec, which is good but not professional-grade component, providing 7.1 audio with 24-bit resolution, 100 dB signal-to-noise ratio for the outputs, 95 dB signal-to-noise ratio for the analog inputs and 192 KHz sampling rate for both the outputs and inputs. If you want to work professionally converting and editing audio from an analog source (e.g., converting VHS tapes, LPs, etc to digital format) we highly recommend you to pick a motherboard with a codec with at least 100 dB signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) for its analog inputs (ADC).
 
This motherboard comes with an on-board optical SPDIF output, and coaxial SPDIF output is supported thru an SPDIF out header present on the motherboard. If you want to use this output you will need to buy an I/O bracket containing it, as this motherboard doesn’t come with one."

 

[leeperry]

A galvanically isolated connection ensures that the dirty computer ground doesn't make it to your DAC. Toslink provides it by default, but usually mobo chips don't bother providing it over coax.
 
The musiland 01 USD has more or less accurate clocking(likely more accurate than your mobo chip anyway), and provides galvanic isolation over coax(both RCA and BNC). I think it's the cheapest "serious" transport you can get, you can also pair it w/ an ADUM4160 USB isolation dongle if you wanna get an even higher SQ. Basically, the sooner you isolate your computer dirty ground from your audio gear the better the SQ will be in the end.

 

[jiiteepee]

Is it only 48/96kHz output through S/PDIF like it is in ASUS P7P55D board (VIA VT1828S HD codec) ? --> resampling needed for generic audio material.
 
jiitee

 

[BobSaysHi]

My mobo came with a program called VIA HD Audio Deck and it says sampling goes all the way to 192 kHz / 24 bit.

 

[jiiteepee]

Quote:

My mobo came with a program called VIA HD Audio Deck and it says sampling goes all the way to 192 kHz / 24 bit.

Do you mean digital (S/PDIF optical or coaxial) path or just A/D and D/A converters?
They say the digital I/O is max 24-bit/96kHz ... on VIA product pages.
 
jiitee

 

[QRomo]

 
Quote:

A galvanically isolated connection ensures that the dirty computer ground doesn't make it to your DAC. Toslink provides it by default, but usually mobo chips don't bother providing it over coax.

The mobo might not, but the γ1's coax input is transformer coupled, so it should be isolated from whatever source it's connected to. This of course assumes you use an external power supply and not USB for power.
 
As a side note, aren't most DAC's transformer coupled? I always assumed so since it just makes sense and is a small additional cost, but since you made a point of warning BobSaysHi I guess that's not the case.

 

[BobSaysHi]

Quote:

They say the digital I/O is max 24-bit/96kHz ... on VIA product pages.

 
I have the front panel disconnected, so ignore the headphone option.