Pretty expensive, those Unicorn darts. British and Dutch pubs indeed are best places to look for them.
Did some reading/browsing today. Jitter everywhere, almost everything unwanted in digital is called jitter it seems, a bit like ADHD diagnosis for difficult kids these days. So it must be jitter, if that increases or decreases output level. If not it still is
One type of jitter I read was audible easiest in low frequencies, with bitstreamish dac. Could it be I prefered distortion? Reclocking, source/destination, bad sources bettered by destination clock. Hardly anything on using whatever cable you like, it won't make a difference though. Hints like, with a good cable..//good pratice not to exceed 2 meters coax RCA because off... things like that.
Can SY define "very" as in likely not very repeatable measurement, I feel that is likely to vary
Did some reading/browsing today. Jitter everywhere, almost everything unwanted in digital is called jitter it seems, a bit like ADHD diagnosis for difficult kids these days. So it must be jitter, if that increases or decreases output level. If not it still is
One type of jitter I read was audible easiest in low frequencies, with bitstreamish dac. Could it be I prefered distortion? Reclocking, source/destination, bad sources bettered by destination clock. Hardly anything on using whatever cable you like, it won't make a difference though. Hints like, with a good cable..//good pratice not to exceed 2 meters coax RCA because off... things like that.Can SY define "very" as in likely not very repeatable measurement, I feel that is likely to vary
That may be because you can divide the world into two groups:irribeo said:
1. those who understand transmission lines, digital audio etc. know that any decent cable will do, so they don't need to be repeatedly told;
2. those who don't understand transmission lines, digital audio etc. won't accept that any decent cable will do, so they share their misconceptions with each other at great length.
Yes. Precision, accuracy, and reliability/repeatability at least a decade better than the phenomenon you're trying to measure.
Implicit is that the analyst is aware of the principle error sources of his method (including unsuitability, if the measurement is using an inappropriate tool) and can determine their effect on the measurement.
Pretty expensive, those Unicorn darts. British and Dutch pubs indeed are best places to look for them.
Did some reading/browsing today. Jitter everywhere, almost everything unwanted in digital is called jitter it seems, a bit like ADHD diagnosis for difficult kids these days. So it must be jitter, if that increases or decreases output level. If not it still is
Can SY define "very" as in likely not very repeatable measurement, I feel that is likely to vary
All these things can be measured, and using measurements is the ONLY way to determine what is happening to the digital signal transmission. It has ben pointed out earlier on this thread that with the other data embedded in the transmission there is no direct correlation between data transmitted and the analogue output.
If jitter is your concern, then eye diagrams will show any deviation, with the actual eye closing up. Though personally I wonder whether the Pico-seconds some talk about is a bit extreme, these same people also seem to be the ones that replace a perfectly good clock for a "super" clock on the end of 62 of wire.
Luckily SPDIF is a slow digital interface, so the average audiophile can play without totally buggering up the interface, but digital does require measurements (scope, network analyser etc) to determine what is going on.
Some basics on transmission lines and signal integrity:
http://www.altera.co.uk/literature/wp/wp_sgnlntgry.pdf
Babbling quantum(still don't know what quantum information is yet do u... you have google) ad hominem attacks, snow jobbing digital infallibility, dismissal and utter ignorance is all you are going to get out of the rest of this thread because the digital infallibility computer weenies think all that matters is what they say matters..... but that does not encompass the whole of electric design, physics, or the real world.......
Actually some of us who are saying that 'good enough is good enough' have years of analogue, digital and mixed signal design experience in things a great deal faster and more critical then spdif (Which is about the second easiest serial digital interface to implement, the easiest being midi). Audio interfaces are **EASY**, digital ones doubly so.
Now I dont think anybody is saying that designing an interface that shows up difference in wire is particularly tough, just that such an interface is BROKEN by definition (And plenty of gear is broken).
Now a multi gigabit serdes driving a few feet of cable with good reliability and while passing EMC and ESD tests, that separates the men from the boys, as (in the analogue domain) does 125dB blocking dynamic range, both of which are far more challenging to pull off then anything involved in audio (20 - 20K, meh, it is all nearly DC!).
Also, some of us have actually studied QM, you know as in written exams in the subject, and I for one am still waiting for something from the advocates of magic wire that is not quantum babble (Which like quantum tomfoolery everywhere would have better legs if y'all could settle on ONE story).
Regards, Dan.
Now I dont think anybody is saying that designing an interface that shows up difference in wire is particularly tough, just that such an interface is BROKEN by definition (And plenty of gear is broken).
Now a multi gigabit serdes driving a few feet of cable with good reliability and while passing EMC and ESD tests, that separates the men from the boys, as (in the analogue domain) does 125dB blocking dynamic range, both of which are far more challenging to pull off then anything involved in audio (20 - 20K, meh, it is all nearly DC!).
Also, some of us have actually studied QM, you know as in written exams in the subject, and I for one am still waiting for something from the advocates of magic wire that is not quantum babble (Which like quantum tomfoolery everywhere would have better legs if y'all could settle on ONE story).
Regards, Dan.
Like most politicians, some audio people latch on to whatever they can easily change rather than what actually matters and might actually solve the (alleged) problem. So a DIYer can't redesign the SPDIF receiver as he doesn't understand logic design, PLL design etc. - he doesn't even understand the basics of transmission lines! However he can change a cable, and he might even be able to swap an RCA for a BNC, so he makes a big fuss about what he can change and pours scorn on those who know it is all just window dressing.
I am not a computer weenie (16+ stone and 6 foot, you would need a big hot dog bun, more a PCB Bratwurst
), I work in the real world of electronics, doing PCB design for a lot of cutting edge projects, so face every day the problems of digital signal transmission, and also analogue layout. I use signal integrity verification software to help make sure the layouts are going to work as expected. The real world of design, including audio does not encompass such voodoo as you seem to subscribe to.How else but using known electrical practices and digital engineering are you going to design a digital interface.
And how would silver cable improve the transmission of a digital signal, this is one question that remains unanswered.
In the modern world, ignorance is deemed by some to be wiser than knowledge. Strangely, they still prefer properly trained doctors/accountants/lawyers/civil engineers rather than the postmodern equivalent. Would you drive across a bridge designed by a postmodernist - who believes that stress calculations are so last century?
devices governed by and designed with the aid of the ignorant objective methods, form the very heart of every build they make, yet apparently the designers of said devices are only fooled into thinking they know how they actually work. it takes a true visionary to disregard these foolish notions of function and form, to leverage their use for real non-delusional ends.
Hey qusp,
Watch it! I resembled that comment. Ouch!
DF96 - I had the same thoughts. It hit me one day that I all that I ever did was just swapping and creating all my cables. All this energy poured into cable swapping. Why? It was just about the only thing I knew how to do besides squeeze big filter caps into my equipment.
Watch it! I resembled that comment. Ouch!
DF96 - I had the same thoughts. It hit me one day that I all that I ever did was just swapping and creating all my cables. All this energy poured into cable swapping. Why? It was just about the only thing I knew how to do besides squeeze big filter caps into my equipment.
The music signal on the S/PDIF is coded in the stream of 1's and 0's, NOT in the level.
The level can vary all over the place, and it is the receiver that gets all those 1's and 0's and send them on to the DAC or whatever.
So the level of the signal on the S/PDIF has zilch to do with the music signal level. Therefor, a different music level due to different S/PDIF cables is a physical impossibility (though not a perception impossibility).
jan
I am not a computer weenie (16+ stone and 6 foot, you would need a big hot dog bun, more a PCB Bratwurst
How else but using known electrical practices and digital engineering are you going to design a digital interface.
And how would silver cable improve the transmission of a digital signal, this is one question that remains unanswered.
Silver improves the transmission of a digital signal carrying the data of credit card payment from the sucker's card to the barker's bank account.
Silver improves the transmission of a digital signal carrying the data of credit card payment from the sucker's card to the barker's bank account.
Yeah, that's Hi-End banking for you
jan
Really everything comes down to opportunity, COST, everyone knows this. And you can transmit a digital signal on any conductor if you lower the frequency and use more conductors, but for me this seems like its the lazy way out. I tend to like things that have quality to their design. We have the knowledge so why not just do quality work?This should be the goal to improve the quality forever.... I believe that wires and cables are made as cheap as they possibly can be just because all anyone cares about is does it work and lowering production time to make more money, instead of taking the time to do things right and figure out the proper process to make something the right way(if I can google it then how come few are doing it...........). Now am I talking about 40,000 dollar interconnects or something equally ridiculous? No, I would never buy that and to be honest I probably wouldn't be willing to pay much more than 100(for a long run which would be considered very cheap in the interconnect world). I would rather make it myself or source a high quality version closer to production cost(asian market?). Still I find it hard to subscribe to the cheap as dirt monoprice/newegg religion either. Of course, I would use this cabling and wiring on analog transmission first before I ever spent it on a digital connection unless I was getting to around 600mhz which many cables inside the PC case are now at or above that frequency. Yes reflections are important to cable design but I am taking that for granted that the cable is constructed correctly and looking at a level of perfection deeper than just the tailoring of the cable which at this point is old technology(as is everything that has been discussed in this thread.... including my new fangled whacky doo ideas about crystal geometry(almost 30 years now)). Why do pots and pans made in china get loose within the first year of use? Why have cheese copper wire drawn at an extremely high rate in an oxygen atmosphere cracking the outside causing scattering in the skin effect and grain transitions? The technology wasn't even developed for audio it was developed for electronic component miniaturization. So if you only had the money to buy one cable maybe the digital one would take a backseat to another, but us techs we can't stop tinkering and tweaking and eventually we will work out a way to get to them all..........
Brian you know there are many links how you can make a fortune selling the gold plated foils from off your graphics card pci fingers. Just rip out your gpu cut off the bottom and soak it for a few days and you can be rich. The reason why they put those on your gpu is to make it cost 400 dollars so you would feel important when you bought it like you were a big tough guy slapping everyone in the face with your big bourgeois power. Silver wire is the same scam don't be fooled its not about the functional properties of silver that's just marketing hype...... It's all about the historical pricing of silver and how its shiny to monkey eyes causing monoprice weenies to start crying then you win like King Kong.
Brian you know there are many links how you can make a fortune selling the gold plated foils from off your graphics card pci fingers. Just rip out your gpu cut off the bottom and soak it for a few days and you can be rich. The reason why they put those on your gpu is to make it cost 400 dollars so you would feel important when you bought it like you were a big tough guy slapping everyone in the face with your big bourgeois power. Silver wire is the same scam don't be fooled its not about the functional properties of silver that's just marketing hype...... It's all about the historical pricing of silver and how its shiny to monkey eyes causing monoprice weenies to start crying then you win like King Kong.
Not sure if it's been mentioned already, but a couple of years ago a Greek audio e-mag lab-tested 30 commercial SPDIF cables:
http://www.avmentor.gr - Group_test_spdif_coaxial_cables_2011
The procedure they followed is detailed in page 2.
[The link above is Google translated so cannot guarantee it'll be readable, but you can always check the images (eye patterns etc.) which are kinda self-explanatory]
http://www.avmentor.gr - Group_test_spdif_coaxial_cables_2011
The procedure they followed is detailed in page 2.
[The link above is Google translated so cannot guarantee it'll be readable, but you can always check the images (eye patterns etc.) which are kinda self-explanatory]
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