Preamps: Analog or S/PDIF Out?

[DarkFriend]

I'm looking at the mAudio Firewire 410 which allows for S/PDIF stereo input. When considering a new preamp, what are the advantages of getting one with a digital S/PDIF output?

 

[scrubs]

Well, the SPDIF on the preamp means that it has an integrated Analog-to-Digital (A/D) converter and will, thus bypass the converter on your soundcard. If the converter in your pre is better than the converter in your soundcard, SPDIF is the way to go.

 

[Robert D]

What Scrubs said......

Additionally, if you had, say, a Delta 66 which has 4 analog ins and S/PDIF for the other 2 ins, and you have 4 channels of analog out pres already, you could record a 5th track at the same time if you had a pre with S/PDIF out. So it can be a way to gain more simultanious recording tracks.

 

[TragikRemix]

s/pdif = two more channels!! yay!

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

Of course you do have to have something to receive the S/PDIF output on the other side. Having a S/PDIF out is meaningless if you don't have a S/PDIF in somewhere else to accept it.

It's certainly nice to use the on-board converters instead of a Soundblaster if you want to record to your computer, but you'd need to either get an interface card in your computer to accept the S/PDIF, or you'd need another external device with S/PDIF in and either USB or Firewire out to go to similar ports on your computer.

G.

 

[Robert D]

And, keep in mind that the two S/PDIF channels share the same physical connection, which is a single conductor plus ground (75 ohm cable), so you can't split it. S/PDIF is set up to carry left channel, right channel, and clock on that one conductor. So while it does give you two more channels, they aren't two discreet channels that you can connect to two different sources. You need to use a 2 channel preamp with S/PDIF out to use both S/PDIF channels. To the best of my knowledge, there's no S/PDIF equivalant of a MIDI merger.

 

[jho1986]

actually i believe that if spidf does have merger capabilities meaning that you can have two seperate channels going through one spidf cable. Not sure what the max is though.

 

[CoolCat]

yeah, I'll never use it but my EMU 1820 SPDIF can do 2 channels each.(1820 has 2)

it says for DAT's or what ever...24 bit/ 44.1, 48.96,192 options.

 

[TragikRemix]

i figured i would use spdif for a stereo input.

 

[Robert D]

actually i believe that if spidf does have merger capabilities meaning that you can have two seperate channels going through one spidf cable. Not sure what the max is though.

Yes, that's true that it can carry two channels, but since they are digitally encoded onto one wire, along with clock, they have to be encoded at the same time. So you can't take two mono preamps with S/PDIF outs and get them into one S/PDIF soundcard input.

 

[fraserhutch]

The other thing is that when you are having mutilple AD/DAs you start running into perhaps needing word clock sync support. Not an issue if all your ad/da is in one unit.

 

[dementedchord]

????

gee... he joins in 2001 ... 97th post... no rep points.... asks for newbie advice about a specific product not even compared too???

i guess he's a gear pimp....

"show him what he's won johnny...."

 

[DarkFriend]

dementedchord - that supposed to be some kind of jab? I've been away from the "scene" for 3+ years raising children and just now getting back into recording (if that's cool with you). Rep Power wasn't even around then, and honestly I have no idea what it is.