deepmukherjee Posted April 6, 2006 Share Posted April 6, 2006 Hello ! I was wondering which one is the better option to connect my DVD player to my AV Receiver. Any sugestions? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldtimer Posted April 6, 2006 Share Posted April 6, 2006 Either one is good. If you have to make a long run or sharp bends, then go with coax. Sometimes the choice is dictated by the particular set up you want and how the receiver is set up to handle it. On my bro-in-laws receiver, you have to go with coax to get the dvd video out to function with the dvd sound. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
capo72 Posted April 6, 2006 Share Posted April 6, 2006 Here is my take. The digital signal is just a tiny electrical signal traveling through the metal traces on the circut boards in side your source. Digital coax is a metal cable, where as optical is plastic, or glass. In order to use optical the tiny electrical signal has to be converted to light in a tiny little converter about the size of a sugar cube. Then after it travels through the optical cable it has to get converted back to an electrical signal again. So my opinion is why go from English to French back to English again, when you can go English, English, English with digital coax. Also the durability issues need to be considered as mentioned before. I don't think there is any noticeable difference in quality of signal transfer, it just comes down to cost, durability, and Rf issues. Oh yeah, I think those Toslink connectors suck compared to RCA. Did I make any sense? These are purely my opinions, so feel free to disagree. Jeremy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blazemaster Posted April 6, 2006 Share Posted April 6, 2006 makes perfect sense capo72. But let me ask you this, how do you guys feel about spending more on a more on a more expensive coax cable? So comparing lower quality vs. higher quality coax cable.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RAD Posted April 6, 2006 Share Posted April 6, 2006 Blazemaster, I think you will find if you stay away from the really cheap generic cables there will not be a noticable difference in the other cables. I would recommend the entry level cable of any good manufacturer like Monster Cable. Spending more for the "better" cables is probably not worth it in my opinion, for what ever that is worth! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JJkizak Posted April 6, 2006 Share Posted April 6, 2006 Well the more expensive stuff has directional arrows printed on it. My "Un-golden ears" can't tell the difference between any of them except volume. JJK Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sivadselim Posted April 6, 2006 Share Posted April 6, 2006 But let me ask you this, how do you guys feel about spending more on a more on a more expensive coax cable?Well, that depends upon how much $$$ difference you're talking about and what it is you are "supposedly" getting from the more expensive cable. Generally speaking, any 75ohm coax cable that passes the signal successfully will work. The spare yellow composite video cables that most of us have lying around work perfectly. What you want to get when you buy a "better" cable is better-quality connectors, durability etc.. And perhaps better-quality shielding, although this is useless if you have no interference (as is usually the case) with a cheaper cable, in the first place. (If you had a really bad interference problem, you'd probably be considering switching to an optical connection, anyway.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
capo72 Posted April 6, 2006 Share Posted April 6, 2006 I agree with sivadselim. Coax is coax. It will all pass the signal the same. Quad shield coax will help with interference, but if interference is a problem, you should go to optical anyway. I think the only advantage to paying more for a digital coax cable is to get high quality RCA fittings. If you are ambitious you can make your own. Buy some good quality RCA fittings and some quad shield coax and get busy. I make my own subwoofer cables that way. I've never owned any real high end cables, so i don't know if i'm missing anything, or not. My ears are happy, and so is my wallet. Jeremy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteelerFan Posted April 6, 2006 Share Posted April 6, 2006 My vote would be to go with the coax. I don't think there is really any difference in sound quality between the two, but the coax connection will be more durable if you tend to trade out equipment regularly like HT fans are prone to do.[] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chops Posted April 6, 2006 Share Posted April 6, 2006 Since I have 4 digital sources, and only have two TosLink ICs and two coax ICs, I'm using the TosLink on my Pioneer DVD player (movies only) and the cable box, and using the coax on my Sony DVD player (music only) and Windows server which is in my bedroom about 35 feet away. Honestly, I don't know why I chose to use Tos on just the video sources and coax on the audio only sources. I guess it just happened to turn out that way. [8-|] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheSoundBroker Posted April 6, 2006 Share Posted April 6, 2006 You are of course assuming that the spare yellow cables actually *are* 75 ohms...most of the time they are not and this can cause issues. Shielding is also a good idea. There also are circumstances where a toslink can be a better choice...particularly in higher noise environment setups (digital amps for example) and longer runs. In that case, I use a GLASS toslink cable which is noticably better than the cheaper plastic cables and in many cases better than coax. Thing to do is try it out and see if you hear a difference in your system. But let me ask you this, how do you guys feel about spending more on a more on a more expensive coax cable?Well, that depends upon how much $$$ difference you're talking about and what it is you are "supposedly" getting from the more expensive cable.Generally speaking, any 75ohm coax cable that passes the signal successfully will work. The spare yellow composite video cables that most of us have lying around work perfectly. What you want to get when you buy a "better" cable is better-quality connectors, durability etc.. And perhaps better-quality shielding, although this is useless if you have no interference (as is usually the case) with a cheaper cable, in the first place. (If you had a really bad interference problem, you'd probably be considering switching to an optical connection, anyway.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
j-malotky Posted April 7, 2006 Share Posted April 7, 2006 Go COAX. It is basically a raw SPDIF connection and has been the standard for a long time. The English to French to English is kind of true. What really happens is on your DVD player the SPDIF is converted to TOSLNK then transmitted over the optical cable and your receiver which converts TOSLINK back to SPDIF for digital processing. So where is the problem??? The problem is that the TOSLINK standard is too vague and allows for the Manufactures to interpet the translation. The only time I would ever run TOSLINK is when you have the same name brand components on each end of the optical cable. JM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
boomer9911 Posted April 7, 2006 Share Posted April 7, 2006 DigCoax most definitely.....I wouldn't have spent my money on serious cables(KimberCable Digital) if I didn't believe coax was better than optical IMO...weak link.... cables DO make a difference, even speaker cables...I even use PS Audio mini-lab power cords.....INTERCONNECTS do make a difference.....[] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sivadselim Posted April 7, 2006 Share Posted April 7, 2006 You are of course assuming that the spare yellow cables actually *are* 75 ohms...most of the time they are not and this can cause issues.If it's specifically a video cable, it IS 75ohm. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheSoundBroker Posted April 7, 2006 Share Posted April 7, 2006 You are of course assuming that the spare yellow cables actually *are* 75 ohms...most of the time they are not and this can cause issues.If it's specifically a video cable, it IS 75ohm. Don't be so sure! Many of the cheapie yellow cables have piss poor terminations and wiring that is way out of spec. I've seen installs where this was causing issues with digital lock on a setup with tight tolerances. We changed to a dedicated coax and bang...problem solved. Also...the cable may be 75 ohm...but RCA connectors often aren't and this gives you an out of spec connection which some gear is far more sensitive to than others. As for Toslink...I find that the problems with Toslink aren't necessarily the standard, but the cable used and poor connections at the amp. The cheapie plastic toslink cables can cause all sorts of issues, particularly when the cable is built incorrectly (the cable must be cut at exactly 90 degrees and the cable and most importantly the end must be absolutely clear...which is often NOT the case with plastic toslink cables. I was big time anti-toslink until David Salz over at Wireworld convinced me to try their Supernova Glass Toslink. It definitely changed my mind in the Toslink vs Coax arguement. I've probably convinced 100+ sceptics since then just by having them try one out. Hint...they all kept the Glass Toslink. Here is an interesting article on Toslink which goes into detail as to why the glass Toslink cables DO sound good. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Badboy Posted April 7, 2006 Share Posted April 7, 2006 Hello ! I was wondering which one is the better option to connect my DVD player to my AV Receiver. Any sugestions? In this application I would go optical, thats just my opinion though. Nice to see several FL people in here too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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