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is this digital or analog ?

post #1 of 6
5/21/12 at 7:51pm
Thread Starter 
so I just bought a asus xonar essence st sound card.

there's 2 dacs on this sound card.
for d/a its a burrbrown chip

for a/d its a Cirrus chip


I plan to use this sound card with a audioquest vdm-5 coaxial to my denon 3808ci .


so my question is, when I use analog l/r will the burrbrown chip be used or the Cirrus?

I would like to use the burrbrown dac to my avr.


thank you
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post #2 of 6
5/21/12 at 8:13pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by joejack11 View Post

so my question is, when I use analog l/r will the burrbrown chip be used or the Cirrus?

Hi JoeJack,

For analog output, it would be the TI Burr-Brown chip.

But then you would need two of those ridiculously-priced cables for left and right. You are better off using S/PDIF to pipe l/r digital to your AVR, and use the Denon's DAC (which you may need to use anyway). Neither the Cirrus nor the Burr-Brown chips will be used if you connect with digital S/PDIF. Also, for S/PDIF, that audioquest cable will be no better than a $5 Monoprice cable.
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post #3 of 6
5/21/12 at 8:23pm
Thread Starter 
5 dollars was what I paid for that audioquest cable to begin with

and Aw man. if that's the case any recommended interconnects ?
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post #4 of 6
5/21/12 at 9:16pm
Hi JoeJack,
Quote:
Originally Posted by joejack11 View Post

5 dollars was what I paid for that audioquest cable to begin with

Now that's a deal! It is an extremely nice cable for that price.

Quote:


and Aw man. if that's the case any recommended interconnects ?

I'm not sure if you're talking about interconnecting with analog or digital. But both the AVR and the sound-card are high enough quality that you can't go wrong either way.

If the Denon has a "pure-analog" or "analog pass-through" mode, then you could use the analog connections and try to take advantage of the sound-card's analog output, but I'm not sure that particular Denon has a pure-analog feature. And you would also be bypassing some great Denon features like Audyssey. To use any of the Denon's DSP features, it would need to re-digitize the analog audio, which would be an undesirable step.

I would suggest simply using that AudioQuest cable to hook-up digitally with coaxial S/PDIF. The Denon has a lot of processing features you could take advantage of, and it would be best to give it the original digital audio-stream to work with. The 3808ci uses the PCM1791A, which is also a Burr-Brown DAC chip. The sound-card uses the PCM1792A, which is slightly better, but the difference is likely inaudible.
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post #5 of 6
5/22/12 at 2:22am
Thread Starter 
Thanks alot Mark!

And yes, thats why i Always go to every thift store, whichever city im in. Thrift store is my first.

I walked in, found the electronics section, saw a POS samsung bluray player so i went eh, and to my right. " audioquest ".. i was like wait what.... 5 dollars?

It was even in its original packaging

Anyway, by Interconnecting i was referring to using a red and white RCA cable to plug the sound card into the Denon receiver.


and gee whiz, theres some rca cables going upwards for 2k+ ...

so anyway , sounds like i cant lose
BurrBrown from sound card, BurrBrown with Denon.


I will just try out the red white RCA cables for a week, and try it with my audioquest coaxial for a week.

Lets see what i think sounds best.


Also i been reading up , expensive audio cables are just snake oil.

Anyway, i was going to go to MonoPrice to buy some RCA interconnect cables.

Unless you have some you recommend?

and no i wont pay alot for them hehehe
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post #6 of 6
5/22/12 at 4:17am
Quote:
Originally Posted by joejack11 View Post

so I just bought a asus xonar essence st sound card.

there's 2 dacs on this sound card.
for d/a its a burrbrown chip

for a/d its a Cirrus chip


I plan to use this sound card with a audioquest vdm-5 coaxial to my denon 3808ci .


so my question is, when I use analog l/r will the burrbrown chip be used or the Cirrus?

I would like to use the burrbrown dac to my avr.

Just to reinforce what has already been said, your best bet from the standpoint of both operational flexibility and sound quality is usually to completely avoid the converters in your computer and ship its digital output to a digital input on your AVR.

While converters in on-board audio interfaces and add-on cards has improved greatly over the years and there are now many fine ones, the converters in dedicated audio equipment such as digital players and AVRs has generally been better. Usually the highest function and cleanest path though the AVR starts with a digital input.

It is a good general rule of thumb to keep the music in the digital domain as close to the speaker as is reasonably possible.
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