HDMI DAC

[tommyv]

I have wondered why there are no DACs with HDMI audio inputs (except PS Audio's proprietary connection). This would be handy to send LPCM via HDMI to a high quality DAC so that we could use it for SACD, BD and the like. With SPDIF, we are unable to take advantage of these high resolution formats. The DAC would not have to do any decoding. At most if it could down mix multi-channel LPCM to 2ch that would be wonderful.

[jannick]

+1 for the idea. Has been brought up before (without much response from Emotiva). Big question is if it can be done for a cost thats significantly lower than a processor (SQ being equal for 2-channel and all).

emotivalounge.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=media&thread=7020&page=1

[tommyv]

Oh my bad for not searching first. I do not think the DAC would need to do the decoding though like mentioned in that thread. There are plenty of players that can do that and output LPCM. That would be less hardware in the DAC.

I guess another side point to this is I wish there was a way to enjoy SACD and even BD through a connection like AES/EBU. Something that many DACs already have.

[srb]

There are HDMI Audio De-Embedders like the Atlona AT-HD570 that can take an HDMI output from a Blu-ray player, separate the audio portion, and send it to a Toslink optical output.
www.atlona.com/Atlona-HDMI-1.3-Audio-De-Embedder-with-3D-Support.html

Steve

[jlafrenz]

While it is probably a great idea and there is a small market for it, there is not a MASS market for it. Anything that doesn't appeal to the masses will have a higher price tag. I am sure Emotiva could make one, but depending on the number they think they can or will have to sell versus the cost of the unit and licensing just may not be a smart business move.

[jannick]

Dec 30, 2010 19:32:05 GMT -5 srb said:

There are HDMI Audio De-Embedders like the Atlona AT-HD570 that can take an HDMI output from a Blu-ray player, separate the audio portion, and send it to a Toslink optical output.
www.atlona.com/Atlona-HDMI-1.3-Audio-De-Embedder-with-3D-Support.html

Steve

Do you know if this unit can send the DTS-HD and other high quality streams out on optical? It would surprise me if this is the case, since the unit is HDCP certified and this would defeat the protection of SACD content etc. Would love to be proved wrong, as AT-HD570 + XDA-1 would then be a sweet hdmi-enabled dac

[srb]

Dec 30, 2010 20:11:56 GMT -5 jannick said:

Do you know if this unit can send the DTS-HD and other high quality streams out on optical? It would surprise me if this is the case, since the unit is HDCP certified and this would defeat the protection of SACD content etc. Would love to be proved wrong, as AT-HD570 + XDA-1 would then be a sweet hdmi-enabled dac

I think you are right. It appears people are using it for extracting the audio from SACD and not Dolby TrueHD or DTS-HD Master Audio, which are only available as an HDMI pass-through. It also looks like there is DSD to PCM conversion when extracting from SACD.

There is a "better" model, AT-HD577 which also has coaxial output.
www.atlona.com/Atlona-HDMI-1.3-Audio-De-Embedder-with-3D-Support-and-2-x-1HDMI-switching.html

Anyway, here is some discussion on the subject:
www.computeraudiophile.com/content/SACD-audio-Oppo-Berkeley-Alpha-DAC

Steve