AudioCircle
Audio/Video Gear and Systems => Home Theater and Video => Topic started by: SFDude on 21 May 2019, 03:29 am
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I have a Samsung LED TV and the combo analog/digital output is connected via an optical cable to my Comet DAC's optical/TOSLink input.
The TV digital out is a 1/8" jack (similar to the older Macbook Pros audio out jack). Bought a relatively cheaper optical fiber cable to try and see if it works.
I know the analog output works. I have a 1/8" jack to RCA L/R analog out cable that I connected to the Comet's analog inputs and it works. There's a lot of buzz/hum (ground loop hum) so I opted to try the digital out capability. This doesn't work. TOSLink from my CD player to the Comet works so it isn't the Comet at all.
Searching the interwebs only offered the suggestion of making sure the output was PCM instead of bitstream. Both output signal settings on the TV doesn't work.
Does anyone have any experience with audio outputs from TVs? Or should I give up?
-dave
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Do you have the option of a digital out from your cable or Satellite box?
That might be an option
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The optical out signal with any Toslink fiber can be seen at the end of the interconnect as a red light. So if you plug in the connector to the TV.. and have it supposedly sending the signal... Can you SEE the red light at the other end of the cord? IF not, then there IS NO SIGNAL being sent.
Are you certain it is a optical output??? on the TV?
If you DO have a signal, the red light... Then I would bet your TV is not making a PCM compatible output.
Sadly there are all sorts of digital outputs, many surround, most of them incompatible with two channel DACs.
One other possible solution (IF you have a signal... the red light) from the TV, is to use a cheap receiver just to convert the surround signal from the TV digital to one you can use. Some receives can take in a surround digital signal. and output a TWO CHANNEL PCM signal.
If it is not two channel.. it still is not going to work with a stereo DAC.
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You must go into the setup menu of the Samsung TV and set this output to PCM rather than the default Dolby Digital. Then the DAC will work.
Once that is working consider a reclocker in the Toslink cable like the Synchro-Mesh. There is very high jitter from Smart TV's and cable boxes. This will improve dialogue intelligibility and clarity.
Steve N.
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Some TV models will only output optical digital audio in the same format as the source.
If this is the case with your TV, a Dolby multichannel program source (the majority of TV program sources) might also be output as multichannel which your DAC cannot decode.
Having the option to select PCM output instead of Bitstream doesn't guarantee that it will perform a downmix conversion to 2-channel PCM.
What is the model of your TV?
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Thanks for the suggestions everyone!
So to close this thread, I found out that the 1/8” audio out jack actually isn’t a combo analog/optical out. My Samsung TV came with this silly AnyConnect HDMI box that lets you connect multiple inputs into the TV. It actually has a standard TOslink out. So I dug up an older cable, plugged into the Comet DAC and... glorious sound!
I had lost my manual awhile back and didn’t think about looking it up on the internet. Old age is getting to me.
Oh and the PCM output setting was real useful. Bitstream does nothing.
Thanks everyone!
-dave
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Isn't trying to get digital from a TV have less quality then getting if straight from the convertor box?
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Isn't trying to get digital from a TV have less quality then getting if straight from the convertor box?
Some of us get 'over the air' TV. and not cable.... I get close to fifty channels over the air... Over the air TV has changed since the old days... :thumb:
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Some of us get 'over the air' TV. and not cable.... I get close to fifty channels over the air... Over the air TV has changed since the old days... :thumb:
Understandable. You do what you have to do.
This was more on people who had some type of digital converter box.
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Isn't trying to get digital from a TV have less quality then getting if straight from the convertor box?
The TV toslink out is just a digital "thru" output. Passes-on whatever comes in on HDMI.
You need to get the sound signal from the TV for streaming content which is tuned in by the TV, not the cable converter.