Coax or optical for long audio runs?
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- Опубліковано 30 кві 2020
- If you have a long run connecting a digital source to a headphone or other audio product, what's the best interconnection possible?
Have a question you want to ask Paul? Go to www.psaudio.com/ask-paul/ - Наука та технологія
Hamm's beer "From the land of sky-blue waters" originally made in Minnesota.
Ira Shapiro, right, it was made in St. Paul. By far my favorite beer as a teen. Growing up in Wisconsin, we had 18 year old “teen bars” and Hamm’s was always on tap. It was German style Pilsner, less hoppy and on the sweeter side than say Budweiser, Strohs and Pabst in the day. It still remains a favorite of mine when it can be found and very much the polar (bear) opposite of the boutique IPA’s currently in vogue.
Grew up in St. Paul in the 80's. Remember Hamms well.
I was thinking Wisconsin but now its coming back to me.
This is the best video lately because im sure we can all relate to this question, and it was an satisfying answer with enough reasons and details but not rambling or extra stuff. Please make more everyday audio stuff with definitive answers.
I like ramble and tangents. Shows intelligence...or is that only when I do it?
I was using 8 ohm coax in the 80's for my speaker cable. So so nice!
Learned something . Thank you 😊
Awesome VPI HW-40 turntable behind you!
The Olympia Brewing Company was a brewery in the northwest United States, located in ... It was Frank Kenney who proposed the slogan "It's the Water" to promote the brewery's flagship product.
The 96 kHz limitation is the gear *NOT* TosLink per se.
There are DACS and other gear that do accept 24/192 signal over TosLink.
The original Toslink standard was 48kHz/20bits, that's how it has been for decades; it has been extended to carry modern bitrates only fairly recently.
As far as I know, equipment that supports the extended Toslink standard is still quite rare.
No not a limitation but it's asking for trouble. TOSLINC is a very loose low quality fiber technology. It was never intended for above 44.1/48K. Unless you are using very good TOSLINC transceivers made for you, and no small audio product manufacture can afford that, you are stuck with the cheap loose tolerance consumer components.
Andy Delle what do you mean?
I've use them since they came out on consoles then on TVs and they *NEVER* failed me.
I had 2 HDMI cables fail in the last 5-6 years alone...and these were not cheap ones.
Not to mention the "handshake" problems.
@@SpaghettiKillah I mean the TOSLINC standard does not encompass 192/24. Yes it may and does often work at 192/24 but it's not guaranteed. For an end user, that's fine but it's another matter to market a product and claim it will work with TOSLINC at 192/24 unless you supply the transmitter, cable and receive where you have complete control of the chain..
@SpaghettiKillah this is also my finding, the TOSLINK standard can indeed carry 24/192,. Some electronics manufacturers use chips that will not work to such high bandwidth.
Hello. Love your videos. (My dream is owning some RS-V's, need a bigger house) Anyway, I used to use optical in my car installation for noise reasons, but now, it's only used from the TV to the pre-amp in Home Theater. I must move the equipment rack farther from the TV which requires about 40ft. or so of Toslink - no other digital format is output. I shop for the "Real Glass" cables which can be expensive. Downfalls are now, my Yamaha receiver mishandled the HDMI "ARC" so badly, that the Toslink was relied on. But now that I've switched back to Marantz pre-amp, things are much better. I'm now using a 50ft. "amplified" HDMI hybrid optical/digital cable which seems to work great. Another caution is, My Sony XBR-4 (old) TV did not convert HDMI's surround sound to Toslink through the TV's HDMI inputs, so if I used the TV for HDMI switching, data was lost. P.S. Don't bend Toslink too sharply, or too many times as optical filaments won't survive. And thanks for your insight!
Hahaha so Paul really did answer my question! Thanks Paul. Actually I'm using that very Focal amp as a trade in for a DirectSteam DAC. True facts. Btw that's Olympia Beer: "It's the water" - from an artesian well near downtown. They still make the beer, but not at that site anymore, so I'm not sure "it's still the water" at this point :-D
I remember their ads featuring the arteasians. I only remember the ad because of the joke that arose from it.
Q: How can you tell that Arteasians spend the winter in ladies bras?
A: Because sometimes you see them poke their little noses out.
i use coaxial connect and works great, not matter if the dvd is 2,1 the coaxial have 5.1 sound, love it
Where is your cd player Paul? Come on buddy, fill that place. Stay safe 👍
I started drinking PBR as a kid because of the way the can looked. Still my favorite beer is whatever is cheapest.
Over that length I would send it over some sort of wired network. You have 100 meter as the limit between nodes. Or XLR in the analog domain would do fine too.
I doubt that the user was looking for a MORE complicated solution than choosing between 2 cables.
TOSLINK cables are usually limited to 5 meters in length, with a technical maximum of 10 meters, for reliable transmission without the use of a signal booster or a repeater.
Monoprice sells 75' toslink..
That's may be the spec, but also, You Mileage May Vary. Depending on the quality of the LED driver and the optical cable, a slightly longer run may work just fine. Although the same can be said for a long Coax run. Both are consumer formats, and 40 feet is just outside what both those formats were designed for. They may work fine.... or not.
That's why I opted for gold plated balanced analogue xlr cables for my 25ft cable run. Analogue doesn't get ruined by jitter, which is the whole point of having high end DACs. Alternatively, the guy who asked the original question could do half and half with a DSP processor (i.e. an optical to coaxial converter) in the middle of the digital cable run so that he can have the advantages of optical (no noise - especially coming from source) and less jitter through coax near the end point.
@Simon A I've also heard others say the same thing. So obviously this varies in relation to how good the optic cable you have and how bright the red bulb is.
I've read that modern toslink can run up to 49ft without any issues. Which is which?
I don’t see the “ted smith signature dac” on your website. Is it going to be sold?
AES/EBU would be fine with this cable run. You could use sftp network cable. Spdif to AES converters are relatively cheap it is essentially a buffer amp. 192k no problem. DSD would be out of the question though.
In professional audio, ADAT uses 192 kHz 24 bit for two channel audio over toslink with no problem.
well, the cable can carry ADAT, but that's not TOSLINK. TOSLINK is a protocol too and maxes out at about stereo CD bandwidth. you can get more channels with Dolby or DTS encoding. the NAD person will be limited to this because that's all his equipment will be able to send over that cable. so, the question was how far? consumer specification is a puny 5meters for optical (it's not laser or glass fiber) and a surprisingly further but still kinda unimpressive 10meters for RCA connector metal cable. people seem to get more sometimes. that's rolling the dice. only the specification distance is really all you can rely on.
@@mobilemcsmarty1466 Well, you bring up a point as to wether the discussion is about a digital format or a specific type of optical fiber connectors and cables. In this instance the discussion is about the cables, which have long been used to carry both multi-channel audio in SP/DIF format (which has the bandwidth limitations being referred to) and four channel ADAT formats. The bandwidth limitation is not the cables but the format being transmitted. It would probably be possible to fabricate optical transmitters and receivers that sent data over a Toslink cable at tens of MHz frequencies.
Land of sky blue water was Hamm's beer in Minnesota.
"...except me."
Lol! That was great.
Also, the way you said "NAD"! Guess you can get away with that 'cause you know the guys personally. That was funny, though. : )
I run 4K video every day via coax. Good 1694a coax can do 6gbps accurately 350 meters. There is no real concern in signal loss using coax. What could conceivably be potential concern is introducing ground loops. Maybe. In a home, probably not. But there is more than ample bandwidth in coax for the job. And it is less expensive and more durable to boot.
If I want to play DSD files, what cables should I choose then for that length without any noise? Are there more quality and expensive cables for the consumer to buy just like a fiber?
coax is fine, hint, the internet didn’t always run on fiber 😉 Ethernet cables can run 100 meters on consumer hardware, miles with repeaters
@PS Audio 3:56, what are you talking about, audio IS NOTHING in terms of bandwidth and latency requirements compared to 4K video, not the other way around 🤦♀️
Wondered the same, but didn't want to be the first to call Paul on it :)
Exactly
Well coax in an audio context is likely to just be a plain RCA cable, not a beefy cable for TV or internet
@@ar_xiv, coaxial cable with RCA connectors is S/PDIF.
@@ar_xiv, coaxial cable for TV is RG59 or RG6/U.
What non-toslink cables do you use?
I am from an old school. I designed audio equipment. Reference quality for pro and lab applications. And, for long-range audio connexions, I would choose an analog differential transmission. Noise cancellation is almost absolute (because of the differential mode) and bandwidth can exceed hundreds of megahertz!
Indeed..... that is old school. That's like 1980's old school. What's wrong with WIFI for long distance ? Or Bluetooth ?
And they do. The first AES standard was and is 110ohms* over low capactiance twisted pair cables using XLR connectors. The impedance match issues with XLR connectors are irrelevant at 48K digital audio frequencies. However the more popular AES standard today is 1volt into 75ohms over coax cable. Cheaper cables and it's essentially an analog video signal bandwidth and level wise with no performance difference in normal applications.
*Actually the first AES-1982 standard was a 110ohm source impedance and a 250ohm sink impedance. The idea was to allow bridged connections popular in analog audio facilities. But many facilities used hub and spoke style bridged connections and that doesn't work well at video frequencies so the standard was modified, I think in 1985, for 110ohms source and sink.
Tuonotinkerer what is old school? differential signals are everywhere, USB, DP, HDMI etc.
@@FooBar89 "analog differential transmission" is oldskool. Like you said, everything is digital these days...
Or I mistunderstood the 'audio' and 'analog' bit !?
@@Tubetinkerer "analog differential transmission is oldskool." Not totally. I have yet to see a digital speaker other than a powered speaker with AES inputs. Balanced analog audio is still used in the entertainment although much less..
For your new ted Smith signature dac you mentioned your using optical to connect them. Something similar to the a t&t st fiber connection many dacs and transports used in the 90's? Thanks paul!
Yes, it's a new type of connector that comes with a terminating kit. Like the old AT and T Glass but much slicker. You can run as long a cable as you wish and self terminate its length.
I was using cheap optical cable, now i use coaxial chord streamway. And have problem with static that cause signal loss foor a blink
In my current setup I get 24/192 over optical TOSLINK. Tried it with QED glass fibre optical cable but also with the cheap one that my streamer came with and worked with both. I tried this on several devices and it is very much device dependent, indeed some work only up to 96khz.
The bandwidth issue isn't related to the physical cable, it is related to the digital format being transmitted. SP/DIF over Toslink is very much bandwidth limited. Other formats, e.g., ADAT, have much higher bandwidth transmission over identical cables.
Suggest you do your own research on the technical topics under discussion. My comments were correct but require some fundamental understanding of the issues to be comprehensible.
Any recommendations for a high end modern Toslink Mini cable that's 10m(32ft)? I'm struggling to find one online. I was told that you shouldn't go beyond 16ft for Toslink, but supposedly that only applies to OLD toslink. Modern has been said to go up to 49ft.
Didn't/doesn't Ed Meitner use glass fiber connectors between his CD/SACD transports and DACs?
Does USB or Coax have a bandwidth limit like TosLink?
What is that for turntable ?
"except me..." 🤣🤟🏻
IKR? XD
What's the TT in the back
Could you use XLR cable if the DAC has the input? Wouldn't that be the better wired solution for 40 ft runs?
XLR is analog e.g. the conversion from the digital source has already taken place. I doubt you would even find a dac with XLR inputs, some do have XLR outputs.
What’s funny about Pabst is that it’s been successfully marketed as a *very premium beer in some Asian countries for decades, even before it got trendy here in the 2000s. And I mean like ‘luxury drink’ pricey. ‘Pricier than liquor’-pricey.
I²S is my preferred digital connection. Unfortunately not all devices support it. Hopefully it will be the standard soon.
The days of my youth and Hams bear! Lol my best friends dad would stock Hams bear in the garage by the cases. Every week you would ask my buddy to take inventory. Well you know what would happen he would count it short every time. LOL many weekends with Hams beer..
I kinda doubt that guys headphone amp has a connection for it, but using a balanced audio cable would be another very good way to run a clear audio signal that far.
I do wonder if we can use optic fiber for long runs for audio? A new connection port new technology etc.
when i studied fibre optics back in the 70s....we were taught tht short, not bendy runs were essential
I looked up the spec for this and it falls under AES3. the coax is 75 ohm cable preferably with BNC connectors, the spec calls for up to 100m of cable. they also have an balanced cable spec using XLR 110 ohm twisted pair for up to 1000m. I think I would recommend using 50 feet of RG6 cable, rather than that crappy plastic fiber.
Is that equipment rack uneven or is it just me
TOSLINK can handle 125Mbps with JIS F05 connector between 20m, please check out TOTX1701A/TORX1071A, some audio chip can handle 384K bit SPDIF .
I would lightly disagree with using a 40 foot fiber for this application. Fiber is much more fragile than copper. 40 feet is well within the range of the SPDIF signal. Consider this, SPDIF is 600mv across 75ohms. AES-3, the professional unbalanced standard is 1 volt across 75ohms, only 400mv difference. And that can easily be run over 2000 feet on Belden 1855 which is a higher loss mini coax to boot! Where I work we routinely have 600 foot runs of AES-3. Many outside the field confuse TOSLINC with true communications fiber such as used in IT and Telecommunications systems. There is a world of difference, and cost. TOSLINC is a cheap limited bandwidth technology intended to run 10 feet or less connecting a CD player to a DAC/preamp. And telecommunications facilities today still use copper where practical reserving fiber for where it is really needed due to the costs which includes installation. Fiber is also considerably less reliable than copper. The laser modules (SFP's) have a much higher MTBF than a copper cable driver chip.
fibre optic cables hate being bent even more thn long runs
Any recommendations for a high end modern Toslink Mini cable that's 10m(32ft)? I'm struggling to find one online. I was told that you shouldn't go beyond 16ft for Toslink, but supposedly that only applies to OLD toslink. Modern has been said to go up to 49ft.
Nothing was mentioned about why to ditch the COAX. If you use anything digital then you'll be using a different DAC than when you're using analog. Your choice of DAC is a very important one, so then you have to find out which of your DAC's is the best. My laptop for instance outputs complete crap audio, but both my iPhone and iPad do good.
I was under the impression that in terms of optical/Toslink, anything over 5m (15ft) was subject to all kinds of degredation, signal loss etc.
Doesn't seem to be the case for 'modern' high end Toslink/Optical. They can run up to 49ft. I'm just struggling to find a 10m(32ft) toslink mini cable. Most of them seem to max out at 25ft.
I'd go with Bluetooth 1.0
Coaxial is 10BASE2. It needs resistores at the ends because the pulses gets reflecteds. Its bette rto use 10BASE T. They use repeaters ands regenerators. The Regenrators bebuilds and retimes the signals. ALm,ost all my stuff is youtube vidoes. I have the best Lo-FI money cant buy. Tnaks youe amnd thumbbs ups!
“... it’s a little plastic thing!”
Paul is now officially responsible for all my smile lines...along with PBR (professional bull riding). Is Colorado in the west?
Yup.
Make mine Killian's! [chuckle!]
We used to use PBR for target practice.
As the target, or the 'aiming enhancement'? XD
@@HareDeLune As the target. JD for enhancement.
@@L.Scott_Music
There ya go! XD
There was also Schaffer's Beer which was even worse to drink and cheaper but still exploded when you hit them.
Use Cat5 or Cat6 wire and a SPDIF Coaxial Balun Set
you didn't mention if coax overcomes those bandwidth limitations in typical lengths for beyond CD quality that you discourage toslink.
Pabst Blue Ribbon became popular after Blue Velvet, with Frank's response to an offer of some other domestic product. He responded: "F*** that sh**, I [want] a Pabst Blue Ribbon"
But now I want to know the brands of BEER that Paul recommends :P
I don’t think Paul drinks beer, he looks more like the Rosé wine type to me.
Hamms
What about HDMI over fiber?
Different and much higher quality fiber technology. Those devices use true SM or MM telecommunications fiber.
Man, I love it when it he talks about Beer. Or man stuff. Now this is why I like PS audio. The DUde is cool!
The Dude abides.
So wether or not he is full of crap is of little concern to you then :)
Oly was "it's the water". It was so bad you could barely drink it even if you were already drunk. I did find it to be the best beer to add to my sauteed mushrooms at the last minute of cooking. Hamms was better but still awfull. Their ad mocking the Raineer beer motorcycle ad was epic however!
40 feet is nothing. As a network engineer and cabler we run Cat5e Ethernet cable 100m (330ft) with no signal loss, after 100m (200m back and forth), we advise switching to fibre. Over 250m (820ft) you start to see packet loss. Ethernet is no different, in signal transmission to ethernet cable.
If you want advice on cabling and signal loss, ask a Cabler or network engineer, not an audiophile. I have a fluke tester that cost ~$5k to test signal quality, amongst other things. You can either trust Fluke, or some old guys ear.
S/PDIF co-axial spec. at a max. length of 10 meters, Toslink specs. max. at 10 meters. Get a S/PDIF to AES 3(aka AES/EBU) and you're got to go at a max. spec. length of 100 meters. You also won't be capped at 96 khz like you would with Toslink.
Any recommendations for a high end modern 10m(32ft) toslink Mini cable. I'm struggling to find one online.
@@NeonPizzas Full disclosure: not an audiophile. Instead, I'm a recording engineer and recovered studio tech from the 90's. If you really need 10 meters, then I suggest you use a toslink to coaxial converter. Then, you can grab the RG-59 Manufacturer of your choice!
I really don't trust toslink at that length.
@@carterwilliamhumphrey3373 Thanks for the response! So far, so good with the 30ft Toslink(mini) cable paired with my LG C1 OLED TV and to my DAC. Is it true that there's zero audio degradation with digital like Optical & USB 2.0 at longer lengths? Somebody told me that there should be zero difference in audio quality, and that if a cable is in fact too long there may be potential popping, drop outs or the cable not working period.
Also, my DAC doesn't have a Coaxial port, nor do any of my consoles. So i'm not entirely sure how a converter would work. Audio latency might be a thing too. :P
@@NeonPizzas I'm glad it's working out.
Now, as to the possible degradation: (This is where someone will no doubt, come out swinging at me) Since it's a digital connection, it won't degrade like an analog audio voltage over length of cable. Yes, you could get dropouts, which will be obvious if it happens. Yes, you could have jitter, though I'm not nearly as familiar with potential jitter issues in an optical connection vs. copper. Most modern digital audio equipment has a jitter reduction circuit on input so jitter in general doesn't seem to be as much of an issue as it used to be.
I would think a 30 meter Toslink cable's latency would be measured in nanoseconds, if even that. However, I did read up on 5.1 and DTS and the optical out of TV has terrible latency at the port.
Regarding Toslink to coaxial, you would have to convert from coaxial back to Toslink at your input since there's only the Toslink jack.
Honey, while you were out, the doctor from the Gyna Colleges called and said to tell you the Pabst beer is OK. I didn't know you liked beer?
Hi Paul:)
I would like to ask You one newbee question :)
Is it good combination:
B&W 800 Signature speakers, paired with Lamm M1.2. Reference monoblocks?
Thank You for your kind answer 😊😊
Beer. "The nectar of nitwits" - Comic Book Guy..
Optical! Or IR-based wireless headphones. Just kidding. :)
why on earth the hi-fi industry hasn't fully embraced HDMI is beyond me.
Optical HDMI in the home can't be beat.
Optical. As ling as you get a signal, it will not have any degradation whatsoever. Plus you have a galvanic separation. You might need an interim amplifier to augment signal strength but as long as the light can be received it will suffice.
And there is absolut no scientifically proven advantage of high resolution as DSD and the alike for consumers. Neither theoretically nor in blind testing.
You do understand that audiophilia isn't about science, it is about emotion. I enjoy Paul's videos but come on! As a gentleman of a certain age, as am I, it is highly unlikely that he can hear any audio frequencies over about 9 KHz, if that.
Now I am really confused!
This video has bern brought to you via Fiber Optical,,
And The Beer is on its way via Horseback..
Clydesdales?
@@HansDelbruck53 yeap, This Bud For You! 🍺
For this long a run, use 75ohm RG6 coaxial cable. You can get them with RCA terminations. Also, RG59 coax is thinner gauge, so go with RG6. Toslink has measured jitter issues.
Hi David, and everyone. Long lengths of 75 ohm cable will develop capacitance over distance. Cable capacitance makes a huge difference at higher impedance. To verify the sound difference is easy: Measure the capacitance of your RG6 or similar cable with any standard capacitance meter (say 40 feet worth of cable.) Now get a fixed capacitor of the same value of capacitance you measured in your coax run, and bridge it across your audio input jack with a standard short run of coax, (say 2 feet or so.) Note the high frequency attenuation. The reason 75 Ohm coax can be used for long runs in the cable industry is the driving 75 Ohm impedance source. At a low drive impedance (75 Ohms,) this cable capacitance affect is greatly reduced. This is why for long runs of audio cable, a low impedance XLR system is used. The low driving impedance of the XLR system counteracts cable capacitance. Most standard RCA cables are very short to keep this capacitive affect low, as the system that surrounds RCA cables can have an impedance of up to (or beyond) 100K Ohms. A long 75 Ohm cable between two 100K Ohm connections is like "Pinching a garden hose" electrically. The sound result is very noticeable.... Even by normal human ears :^)
@@MrCarlsonsLab Big fan of your channel. For the EE' here, AES or SPDIF at 48K/24bits requires a -3db bandwidth of 6mhz. The actual serial bit rate is 3.072mbs, again at 48K/24. A favorable fallout of this is that we can use old analog video distribution amplifiers and switchers to handle AES audio today.
@@MrCarlsonsLab
RG-6A is 21pF/ft. Using it for a 40 ft. audio line would require a driving impedance below 4600 ohms in order to keep loss at 20KHz below 1dB. Most audio line outputs are better than that. I'm not sure what you meant by "two 100K Ohm connections" as there are no audio line outputs that I'm aware of, with such high impedance.
But was the question about sending audio down coax, or a digital signal like S/PDIF? If the latter, line drivers for S/PDIF or AES3 are compatible with 75 ohm cable, so RG-6 or even RG-59 should be fine for this distance.
Regarding RCA patch cables, I've found wide variation in capacitance. Most of my 6' cables are under 130pF total, but I have two that are around 500pF and they have surprisingly low Z0, around 32-35 ohms. Until I tested them, I wasn't even aware that coax cable stock was made with such low characteristic impedance.
@@marianneoelund2940 Hi Marianne. You sound very knowledgeable. This may help a little more: *To obtain maximum power transfer, and low VSWR, this requires impedance matching between devices.* This includes the cable impedance. If you are interested, I have video's that talk about the speed of electricity in a cable, slowed down by the cables dielectric properties, this effect is known as "Velocity Factor." Yes, the coax cables center conductor insulation is very important. Audio companies much of the time don't follow this rule, which many don't realize, this is the benefit of understanding RF circuitry. Most audio cables are low impedance, (and somewhat all over the map as well) this is why the runs need to be kept short. Here is an example from Paul's latest video, it appears he has a good knowledge of this: ua-cam.com/video/Ae9UBIHViFE/v-deo.html
Take care!
@@MrCarlsonsLab
Yes, the most dramatic demonstration I've witnessed of impedance mismatching was while setting up a demo at Boeing, of a vector-driven display unit made by another division of my company. Initially, the graphics looked horrible, illegible, distorted characters, poor positioning, etc. Then the Boeing engineer I was working with, thought of adding a 75 ohm terminator at the inputs - and Voila! the graphics suddenly looked perfect. To this day I have no idea why the display unit didn't have its own internal terminators.
I've been checking my audio cables recently and was surprised at how much they vary in capacitance. For the highest-C cables, I set up my scope and sig gen to check Z0 and was quite amazed at how low it was. My sig gen is fast enough to let me see Z0 of a cable as short as 10' or so (to test 6' cables I couple two in series). I can also use that setup to find faults in long wiring runs.
I looked at the video you referenced. It's amusing to watch Paul try to understand why subjective sound quality can be at odds with technical expectation, which seems to be a common occurrence at PS Audio. I suppose it makes a good point that there are certain types of distortion (often found in tube equipment) which can be added to make the sound more pleasing to the ear. Perfect accuracy can be relatively boring.
Iron City or Carling black lable
It's a long way to walk to change a CD though
Are high end toslink cables like wireworld sonically superior to the stock included cables?
The difference between high end and budget Toslink cables is in the connectors and cable jackets. Otherwise, the fiber itself either works or not in sending the data.
Try convincing Scuzz Twittly that PBR sucks. Haha!
Light travels 7 times around the world in one second. Bandwidth limited?
Well cable not necessary an issue yes your lose some output that doesn't mean it's a problem, but if it's good cable like pure silver cable probably very little loss if any, just make sure it's double shielded. Or if it's balanced use balance.
All he needs is a Optical Audio Distribution Amplifier
But that device converts the optical input to electrical (copper) , then back to TOSLINC fiber. So why not just use copper to start with which has considerably longer distance capability than TOSLINC fiber in the first place. There is not "optical amplifier" that works on just light, at least not even close to a consumer price point.
Andy Delle I’ve seen them on eBay or amazon never mind a 40ft run is nothing for optical run. If needed he could get a humbuck
@@edg5367 Yes, but internally the amplifier core is electronic, not optical. But in any case the generally work fine.
40 feets?? Better consider wireless, WIFI or Bluetooth 5.1
or you could use Cat5 (or Cat6) wire and a SPDIF Coaxial Balun Set
optical needs a short(ish) run....more important the cable must be straight
5 meters seems to be the limit. I tried using my 15ft toslink cable connected to a 15ft toslink extension cable, but eventually I ended up getting drop outs.
This video is brought to you through fiber optic cables.
Indeed, every other optical cable than Toslink. Because Toslink only supports .mp3 apparantly...... 🤗✌
@@Tubetinkerer All the music I listen to is streamed to my house and my house is optically connected with an optical modem in my garage giving me effective 500Mbps in/out. No audiophile snake oil involved to get every Tidal file bit perfect from the master source right to my DAC :-)
@@ThinkingBetter Dang, your soundstage must be "ubertransparant, huge and detailed".
You do use goldplated antennae for wireless streaming, yes ?
@@ThinkingBetter Thane you. Youy are the honest frends. I dont go to Best BUY NO MORES because all of them are HUGE HUG ELIEARS and they sell REPACKAGES GRADE F factory defective GARBAGE which falls apart or stop sworking. The LCD monitor was 30 percent off becuase IT DID NOT WORK and the help line at LG were huge liears THEY TOLD ME I NEEDED AN UPGRADED VIDEO CARD. THEYARE LIEARS! thenkes you,a nd thumbs ups!
@@Tubetinkerer Definitely, the radio waves will bounce off frequently and cause audio jitter unless you use gold plating on your Wi-Fi antennas. Ideally you use solid 24 carat gold antennas. But of course, even better will be audiophile ethernet cabled that deliver the best 0s and 1s possible for audio LOL...so much ridiculous snake oil in audio.
Bear Whiz Beer "It's in the Water!"
"That's why it's yellow."
@Fat Rat Vintage Firesign Theatre from the daze of my youth, wish I could remember important stuff half this well. But "[t]hats's shoes for industry, Charlie." ;-)
@Fat Rat Good story from WWII. Veterinarians were quite common in the ranks, and more approachable than doctors, so when the troops wanted their local beer analyzed, they gave a sample to the vet, who sent it in for analysis. The results came back: Your mule has diabetes...
Paul....so now a second video you have done about optical and you're still wrong! 96 kHz is NOT the limit of optical transmission. Way back a couple of decades, that might have been true.....Today, Optical can and does pass 192 kHz.
And lets talk about the Toshlink.....not all optical cable is equal....Glass Optical is still king, and I go one step better... Borosilicate glass. Right now I'm listening to a track with 192 kHz sample rate via Borosilicate Glass Optical....
I have a THX AAA 788 hp amp and the LED screen is showing Optical input & 192 kHz sample rate.....I am not sure that a plastic optical will pass 192 kHz. If I could uplink a picture of the THX amp screen with this comment, you would see the truth.
Can you provide a website for the borosilicate glass?
The confusion about this topic is due to Toslink being both a digital format (SP/DIF over optical fiber) and a physical cable format. The Toslink format is very bandwidth limited. The cables themselves can carry orders of magnitude more bandwidth. For example, they are also commonly used to carry eight channels of 48 KHz digital audio in the ADAT format.
Light travels at 186,000 miles per second, 40 feet don't make any difference.
At that point, you're better off selling the equipment off and getting something with AES.
The TOSLink Optical system functions best when your equipment is close by max 3 feet. The reason being that the quality of TOS Link cables for home use are HUGELY different from the consumer version of fiber optics, Besides the Under Sea Inter Continent (Internet and Telecom) cables use powered repeaters which get their supply from the CoAx copper cables that are layered with the Fibre Optic cable. Rolling long cables more than 10 - 15 feet is not recommended even for HDMI. If you do need transmit Digital Audio data over a long distance 30-40 feet or more between rooms, use an Ethernet Cable instead. HDMI can be converted to Ethernet CAT 6 and vice-versa. This should do the trick. Do not use the CoAx SPDIF or TOSLink cables more than 3 - 4 Feet Max.
Technically you are right, but in regard to digital audio totally irrelevant. Ta.
So you're saying opting for a 32 foot(10m) Toslink mini cable from lets say a DAC and straight to a toslink OLED TV port is a bad idea? I've read that 'modern' toslink can go up to 49ft. Meanwhile others say 15 and sometimes 32
The only benefits I'm aware of are breaking existing or potential ground loops, eliminating the effects of Johnson Noise caused by resistance, heat and protecting any other low voltage circuits from inductance caused by the conductors.
Wrong information. Toslink is NOT limited to 96khz on most equipment these days.
Not only is PBR not good beer, it's not an acronym (as Paul said); it's an initialism.
Merrimack-Webster: What is the difference between the words acronym and initialism?
Acronym is a fairly recent word, dating from the 1940s, although acronyms existed long before we gave them that name. The term was preceded in English by the word initialism, meaning an abbreviation formed from the initial letters of a phrase, and which has been in use since the late 19th century.
Some people feel strongly that acronym should only be used for terms like NATO, which is pronounced as a single word, and that initialism should be used if the individual letters are all pronounced distinctly, as with FBI. Our research shows that acronym is commonly used to refer to both types of abbreviations.
@@helensudhoff562 That’s right. There’s a clear distinction between acronym and initialism. I think many folks realize the difference, but it’s a bit disconcerting that so many others seem to consider any initialism an acronym. When I was in the military, our favorite acronym was SNAFU. We often used SOB to describe an incompetent officer, but SOB is an interesting initialism in that, although it spells a word, you wouldn’t pronounce it as an acronym and call someone a sob. It is quite common, however, to refer to an unpleasant man as an S O B.
@@HansDelbruck53 , the point is, the distinction between the two terms is not universally established. That was the point of the last sentence of the Webster’s definition.
@@helensudhoff562 Some remarks simply don't call for explication.
@@HansDelbruck53 , I am happy to have enlightened you, as nobody would laughingly make an argument contrary to Webster’s, unless one finds an alternate definition in the Oxford English Dictionary.
Just say no to optical
I am sorry that Paul uses these question to spread esoteric myths and confusion. The answer is mostly more simple.
And of course, you're not going to share your little nuggets of wisdom, are you? Just going to slam Paul like some half-baked dweeb. : P
Streams and streams of snake oil to bathe our love of Hi-Fi in 🙂
It's well known that snake oil prefers hollow optical tubing for smooth transfer. Besides the skin effect does not apply to snake oil. That's why Paul didn't even mention it, I suppose. ;-)
@Fat Rat Errr.... sorry, you were saying ? 😋✌
@Fat Rat Ey... that is our point, not yours.... tssssk..
Copper to copper is great. And like Paul’s says we are watching UA-cam an it’s all Fibre optic but I don’t mind saying I watched this vid on a smart phone via a WiFi assisted cell network so I’m sure there is fibre as part of me watching it but I really need more in my diet than on high lol
Nothing travels faster than the 'SPEED OF LIGHT' not even 'GOD'.
And what is your point exactly? The question was which is better, not faster.
But the light signal does not travel through the fiber at the speed of light. It travels at 60-80% light speed, same as electrical energy through metal wire. It's called the "Velocity of Propagation" law. Only in a pure vacuum does electrical or optical energy, which are essentially the same thing, EM radiation, travel at the speed of light.
A quick google search gives you the answer!!
Optical has too low light and you can only have a maximum of about 5 meters in length.
Digital coax is MUCH better for long lengths!
one problem is that everything in a computer is connecting to GND. so everything you connect to your computer will get
220v 230v 240v 110v GND
skrotkalle skrotkalle if you don’t filter maybe, these so called “hi end” audio companies can’t do ground isolation or signal isolation? they shouldn’t be in the business then
@@FooBar89 everything inside a computer is connected to the main power GND. If you measure with a multimeter you will see that it is correct.
If you connect anything from your computer to your audio equipment, it becomes like connecting the power GND directly to the audio line input!
skrotkalle skrotkalle why does it become connected? do you understand that I’m talking about design and engineering? I don’t care how you’re equipment is doing it, but what can be done; second, prove to me that is a problem
@@FooBar89 There are many amplifiers that do not have audio signal GND connected to power GND even if the box is connected to 230v power GND. There is probably a reason for that.
If you connect to your computer you get GND loop and if you are unlucky you can get noise.
skrotkalle skrotkalle ground loops can be removed, and the signal can be galvanically isolated; how expensive is your equipment, why isn’t doing that? we are talking about $10 of components here