SPIDF - any real world uses?

[ottokbre]

anyone actually use this I/O for anything?
or is this really some sort of pro-sumer sorta thing?

[markpar]

I use it to connect the audio out from my DirecTV receiver to my stereo receiver.

-mark

[DeafinONEear]

I always use it when I am putting CD tracks onto the computer for editing. Yes, some rip directly from the CD drive using a ripper, but ripper create data gaps and are totally inaccurate for getting CD's in. If you're doing any sort of post work from pre-recorded material, I suggest that you go in using SPDIF or optical (though I don't have any optical-output CD plaers 'round here, do you?)

Oh, and I transfer all my DAT's using SPDIF.... though I guess DAT was intended to be consumer in the first place, huh?

[@?,*???&?]

I've been using it alot recently dumping tracks into Pro Tools from Roland VS1680s and Roland VS1880s.

Used to use the connection alot in the studio too for digital dat cloning. Always an option when one doesn't have an AES/EBU connect.

[meblumen]

I could be wrong, but I think if your running CubaseSX you could use the SPIDF for the system link option.

[markpar]

I also use it to transfer DAT to CD and to go from Finalizer to CD.

-mark

[ottokbre]

demmit! thats why I post dem kinds-o-quest-shunz! yall be using everything!

i ask 'cus i'm looking at this laptop that has a SPDIF built in to it's split-base, the Dell X200. thought that was pretty kuul.

[Professor]

Ooh, with a SPDIF out built right onto your computer you can actually pull DTS encoded tracks right off a CD or DVD onto your computer and fire them out the SPDIF port to an AV receiver and do surround sound presentations, etc. DTS tracks look just like CDA or WAV files just as long as you don't change or manipulate or compress them at all.

Of course if you're not doing surround stuff yet, you can also use the SPDIF for any other two-track digital I/O for the computer. Set it up with an Apogee Mini-Me preamp with its digital out and you have a two track location recorder. Also SPDIF is better than Toslink optical because the wired connection avoids the problems of converting to and from light - less data loss.

Looks like you have to get that machine now.

-Jeremy

[friendlybunny]

yeah... you could also plug a digital mixer right into the spdif and have several channels interface directly with the computer.

very cool...

[ottokbre]

really? so you can use it as for multiple channel I/O? Not just stereo?

[TapeOpHillary]

also to be noted...
when doing a digital dub from CD to CD, your start IDs may not come through if you're dubbing via AES. they'll only be distinction between tracks if the segues are a few seconds and your recording deck is on auto ID.
the IDs are included in the SPDIF signal...

hillary

[apropos of nothing]

SPDIF is only stereo.

[ottokbre]

sounds useful for mix downs

[apropos of nothing]

...If you have a mixer that has SPDIF out.

I use it for recording tracks out of my sampler (venerable Kurzweil K2000), and for grabbing stuff off of DAT.

[cassembler]

Hell yeah!

SPDIF, while unbalanced, can work quite well as a stereo transfer. And, like Hillary said, AES doesn't carry ID's (last I checked).

Problem is you have to use short, quality cable runs....

Finding a coax SPDIF cable longer than 10 feet isn't fun (and I never found one, BTW)

IIRC (and I'm likely dead wrong), there's also an optical SPDIF (a la lightpipe), but it only carries two channels as well... Mostly consumer users, yes?