2. digital
  3. 1102197907

DSD from a Server to dCS Delius via Firewire?

I've been looking at the dCS Delius, which has firewire as an option and is DSD compatible. Since I'm in the process of ripping all of my CDs to hard drive (again, last time to make mp3s, this time to make wavs). I started wondering... If you have a firewire out, could you run firewire from the computer to the Delius and theoretically get jitter-free playback?

I realize there isn't (or at least I don't know of any) software to upsample 16/44.1 to DSD on a WinXP box, but some bright bulb will do that eventually, right? Is there enough processing firepower in a generic (or even higher end) WinXP box to do that kind of upsampling? You know, kind of a software dCS Purcell?

On that note, but on a more practical theme, any dCS Delius owners able to comment on whether you can run firewire from a music server directly into the Delius? Is the firewire port DSD only? I'm guessing the firewire version of the Purcell is a firewire output only to connect to the Delius?
edesilva
4 responses Add your response
osgorth
109 posts
 
I'm waking up this old thread because I have basically the same question.. Has anything happened in this area since 2004? :)

My MBL DAC has a firewire input for DSD. It would be really neat if somehow I could upsample CD data on my computer and feed DSD into the DAC.. Is this possible nowadays?

I'm pretty sure I could do it statically (e.g. convert files and store them as DSD on hard drives) but what I would really want is something like the Foobar upsampler filter that does it in realtime.
jareko
5 posts
 
The DSD stream is always in encoded format, so you cannot mix equipment from different manufactures. Another misunderstanding is firewire port. Physically this is the same port in PC and DAC, but on a computer it is used for another purpose than on dacs. So, summing things up, it is not possible to connect ANY dac equipped with firewire port to any PC based server with firewire port no matter what you do.

I suggest going out from your PC with digital PCM signal thru AES (the best) to the dac. You can also use wordclock feature if you use Lynx or similar card, which will make jitter lower. Also, you can use upsampler (like dCS Purcell 2nd generation, or Paganini or Scarlatti) and upsample from PCM to DSD format and then route this via firewire cable to dCS DAC (Delius, Elgar Plus, Paganini or Scarlatti). This is the best for the moment in my opinion.
bigamp
219 posts
 
Weiss Minerva DAC firewire port takes 24/192 PCM from a PC.
bigamp
219 posts
 
To clarify, the Weiss takes PCM via firewire, but not DSD. My point was that there are some DACs that can receive certain signals via firewire.

I agree, the Delius can't receive DSD from a PC via its firewire port -- the Delius port is strictly used between two DCS components and only for the DCS proprietary encrypted signal.

I did a little digging around 6 months back on how to get a DSD signal out of a PC and into a DAC. At that time, the only solution I came up with was using a Merging card in the PC that outputs DSD, along with sofware that supports DSD such as ProTools software. You will also need a DAC that can receive a DSD input, such as an SDIF-3 or RAW DSD input. The EmmLabs DCC2 and Danish Audio Denmark AX24 DACs can receive these signals.

Please note that this is just what I came up with through a little online research, so you would need to vet this out.
Log in to respond
More to discover
80x80
Bricasti Design M1 SERIES II
80x80
Berkeley Audio Design Alpha DAC Reference Series 3
80x80
Krell VANGUARD Universal DAC