Very Computer

I want to know what I can do with the digital audio port on the Indigo2.
I surged the tech pubs for some info but can`t find a thing !
Does somebody know a location with some info ?
Is it possible to convert an AC3 optical minidisc/cd signal with some home made
hardware to that digital port, or can I even use the coax signal on the
minidisc to connect it with the digital port ?
I need both directions, but one would be nice to :)

Joost Runsink

JR a crit :

Quote:

> I want to know what I can do with the digital audio port on the Indigo2.
> I surged the tech pubs for some info but can`t find a thing !
> Does somebody know a location with some info ?
> Is it possible to convert an AC3 optical minidisc/cd signal with some home made
> hardware to that digital port, or can I even use the coax signal on the
> minidisc to connect it with the digital port ?
> I need both directions, but one would be nice to :)

> Joost Runsink

Digital Input is standard SPDIF with non standard connector (IE minijack
instead of RCA). You can connect your minidisc digital RCA output to it,
or get an optical/RCA converter (quite cheap, Fostex does some).

--
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Emmanuel Florac                 | Kreode technologies
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

     I've connected both digital I/O ports of a Sony DVD player to an Octane
and have had some success.  The Octane has both optical and coax digital and I
was thinking it had another one just like the Indigo2, but I'm not sure at the
moment.  I've only used the optical and coax digital for input to the Octane.
 I've mainly worked with the optical input.  I can only get stereo output from
the DVD player to work into the Octane.  The player has other modes, but I
only get digital noise in those modes.  The optical I/O on the Octane is
suppose to do something like 8 I/O channels, but I can't get that to do
anything with the limited hardware I've got.
     I've opened up support calls to SGI trying to get documentation on both
the audio and video hardware/software I/O capabilities, but no one at SGI
seems to know much about them.  Based on the support cases I've opened up, it
sounds like most of SGI's multimedia people have left the company.  SGI has
all this great multimedia hardware and software, but no one seems to know
anything about it and like a lot of other things, there is basically no
documentation on it.
     I plan on contacting Sony to try and find out the technical specs. on
their digital outputs, but I don't know how successful that will be.  These
groups come from completely different perspectives and trying to find common
terminology between Sony and SGI seems to be a bit of a problem.  Add in
marketing types to the equation and things get hopeless.  :-)
     Good luck.  You'll need it.

--

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"Brent L. Bates" a crit :

Quote:

>      I've connected both digital I/O ports of a Sony DVD player to an Octane
> and have had some success.  The Octane has both optical and coax digital and I
> was thinking it had another one just like the Indigo2, but I'm not sure at the
> moment.  I've only used the optical and coax digital for input to the Octane.
>  I've mainly worked with the optical input.  I can only get stereo output from
> the DVD player to work into the Octane.  The player has other modes, but I
> only get digital noise in those modes.  The optical I/O on the Octane is
> suppose to do something like 8 I/O channels, but I can't get that to do
> anything with the limited hardware I've got.

This mode is named ADAT link. You can use it with most professional
audio devices like multitracks recorders (Alesis ADAT for instance),
some high-end Synths too (Kurzweil K2600), most digital audio mixers
(Yamaha O2R, O3D).

--
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Emmanuel Florac                 | Kreode technologies
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hi Brent, the Octane has coaxial AES/EBU(andSPDIF) and ADAT optical i/o
(which aparently also accepts a 2-channel spdif 'toslink' protocol
from your DVD player.)

The reason the DolbyDigital and DTS out-modes on your DVD player do not
work
is because both are compressed consumer-level crappy quality hacks at
getting
6 channels (same kind of compression as in mp3 files.) and the Octane
doesn't
know how to uncompress them in realtime, hence the garbled noise.

Instead, octane uses ADAT 8-channel protocol for 8 uncompressed I/O of
44.1khz
(16-24bit) PCM audio.  An Alies ADAT recorder will talk straight to the
Octane
in 8channel mode, as will any Tascam (or otherwise) DA-38 or DA-88
8-channel
digital recorder.  DA-88 is *the* standard in the post-production market
for storeing and editing film scores on.

I know a little about SGI's video I/O hardware, etc. There's not
terribly
much to it, and it all makes perfect sense when you consider than these
machnes are $20k+ profesional tools and not a pc with a buzzz card.
(EG: Octane video is dual-channel CCIR601 serial component digital
*only*,
which means you must hook it up to at least an A500 pro digibeta deck,
which is a $40,000 VCR...)

--
  Every Man Dies, not every man really Lives
                -Mel Gibson, "Braveheart"

  Ben Cannon
  Cartsys -- http://www.veryComputer.com/
--

Quote:> Instead, octane uses ADAT 8-channel protocol for 8 uncompressed I/O of
> 44.1khz
> (16-24bit) PCM audio.  An Alies ADAT recorder will talk straight to the
> Octane
> in 8channel mode, as will any Tascam (or otherwise) DA-38 or DA-88
> 8-channel
> digital recorder.  DA-88 is *the* standard in the post-production market
> for storeing and editing film scores on.

Hiya,

A quick correction, Tascam's gear uses TDIF (25pin d-type), not ADAT Lightpipe to
communicate it's 8 channel information. You have to buy a convertor box to use the 2
different standards together.

FYI I've just picked up an original Alesis ADAT with only 400 hours use for 400 UK
pounds. It's got 16 jack sockets on the back and will happily do 8 channel AD and DA
conversion at 16bit (newer ones will do 20bit)

In response to the original question, the Indigo2 uses a 3.5mm jack socket for its
S/PDIF in and out, the tip is output and the ring is input. You should be able to
get a 3.5mm jack to 2x phono lead from most electronics places and you can plug
straight into  the COAX input or output of your MD. If you need to convert from
Optical, you can get the Fostex COP-1 very cheaply.

Cheers,

Gavin.

--
Remove the obvious anti-spam (.naespam) measure to reply.

Gavin Saxby

Central Test Engineering
Sun Microsystems Scotland BV