[goodsound]

Ok one problem solved, another discovered. This is getting more interesting.

Remember I mentioned that the card/driver boosts the spdif input +5db ? Well it is indeed as simple as setting the mixer input level to -5db. The reason I thought this is NOT working is because of the CDP! It is sending incorrect/different sample values!

Long story short, I think the CDP's CIRC is not up to the task. Basically if you rip a track v/s record the track via spdif from a cdp, then those two should be same but they are different in my case.

And when I do a digital(spdif) loopback record of the ripped wav file, the recorded wav file is indeed identical.

I had read somewhere that not all cdps perform CIRC in a proper way. Maybe this is a living example of that ? (another good reason to use 'computer-as-source') ?

 

[maarek99]

Have you enabled bit-matched recording in the drivers? X-fi has an option for it.

 

[goodsound]

actually its an Audigy 2 NX. I think the equivalent for this soundcard of what you are saying is enabling the "Digital Output only" checkbox in the Speaker Settings panel and also switching the spdif output sample rate to 44.1 (or whatever your source is) in the Device Control panel.
and yes I have done both.

 

[error401]

Try the kX Project drivers. They're far superiour to the Creative offering when it comes to sound quality and DSP control: http://kxproject.lugosoft.com/ and I think your card is supported.

Edit: Oops, I was wrong, this card isn't based on the emu10k1 or emu10k2 chip so isn't supported by the kX project. Too bad, the drivers are pretty great, even if the soundcards are sub-par.