Date: Mon, 4 Jun 2001 17:20:41 +0300 (EET DST) From: Jari Kirma <kirma@cs.hut.fi> To: <freebsd-multimedia@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: S/PDIF output? Message-ID: <Pine.GSO.4.30.0106041656090.8755-100000@hutcs.cs.hut.fi>
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Cameron Grant wrote: > > >as the driver author, no. i only have a 4dwave dx, and have been informed > > >that the nx does not work correctly. > > > > Ok. What other sound cards offer S/PDIF digital out, and are known to > > work in FreeBSD? > none. the emu10k1, ymf744 and cs4630 cards have spdif out but it is not > supported yet. i've only recently bought a device with spdif input > (logitech xtrusio dsr100 speakers, highly recommended) and simply > haven't had the time to investigate it yet. it is probable that it will > be supported on the emu10k1 in -current at some point after the next > round of major changes. i don't believe any of the other cards in my > collection have both spdif output and documentation on how to enable it. If commercial driver can be considered an option, I believe there are quite many cards with proper S/PDIF interfaces usable under FreeBSD. Most of them are quite expensive, but AFAIR, there's no properly implemented S/PDIF in any of the standard "consumer" cards. Of course, commercial OSS driver costs money, and usually for those fancy cards, some extra. I don't think this is really that much a problem, but other issues might. With current OSS, you're bound to FreeBSD 4.3, and SMP is not supported. Also, sound part of linux emulation does not work because commercial OSS replaces whole sound subsystem. Generic mixer tools probably don't work for fancier cards, either, so one is bound to use ossmix/ossxmix bundled with the drivers. On positive side, drivers seem to work quite nicely (at least for my configuration), and support all the connectors. My current configuration has Midiman/M-Audio Audiophile 2496 card, that is in more expensive SB Live price range, but properly implemented for audiophile use. The card is built around Envy24 chipset which can be found from a bit cheaper EWX 24/96 card, also supported by commercial OSS, AFAIK. The card has very good analog interfaces (I haven't managed to hear any hiss with my configuration, dynamic range should be at least 90 dB), and S/PDIF interfaces are implemented properly, being bit-exact and non-resampling unlike, it seems, all the consumer cards. Card can be locked to external S/PDIF clock, too. And, if someone really cares, it can do up to 96 kHz, with four channels in (2 analog, 2 digital) both in and out, at 24 bit resolution. It's unlikely that those extra 8 bits are audible, though, because connectors are unbalanced RCAs. But it's nice anyway. The card is supported by ALSA drivers in Linux, and specs for all the chips used can be found easily and look quite useful. Biggest problem with FreeBSD is probably the strange multi-track DMA format used by Envy24 that interleaves 12 channels in one stream. This seems quite incompatible with current FreeBSD drivers... Sound card product page is at <http://www.midiman.com/m-audio/html/products/audiophile.htm>; and review of roughly equivalent (more channels and balanced connectors are main difference) Midiman card can be found from <http://www.pcavtech.com/soundcards/delta-66/index.htm>. -kirma To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-multimedia" in the body of the message
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