Car Audio Central - Ultimate Car Audio Forum and Community

Companies like Zapco make independant DACs, theirs is a combined DAC and de-jitter processor. I believe it is a 1/2 DIN sized unit, it is designed to mount either in dash or on their rack system. That one isn't cheap, it retails close to $1000. That's just an example, there are many others, but I can't think of them off the top of my head. A google search could land you other examples I'm sure.

The F#1 Status processor isn't proprietary to the F#1 head unit, it has 3 analog inputs and 3 digital inputs, including optical and of course Ai-net control as an option. It contains it's own remote for controlling processing functions and can perform independant of the F#1 head.

Oh yeah, you can't use that F#1 processsor with anything but F#1 decks right? I mean you have to be able to "talk" to the thing to do the DSP or can you make adjustments at the processor itself?

I'm not even sure that Pioneer works with anything but Pioneer. It just seems like there could be an affordable solution out there that would eventually take line level stuff completely into the digital realm. Sure would make things simpler. No more noise, no more LOC's, and no more "CleanSweeps".

Wishful thinking I guess.

-Fishy

Yeah I know, Pioneer makes a pretty expensive processor as well.

http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/pna/p ... 84,00.html

I know nothing about any DAC-only units. How big are they? I wouldn't think a simple 2 channel DAC/preamp woud have to be housed in something all that large and i don't see how it would be all that expensive either. Its gotta be small so it doesn't unnecessarily complicate a typical install. I know I've just about run out of "stealthy" places to add any sizeable equipment in my Explorer.

-Fishy

Fishy, there are external DACs out there, and of course there are processors with DACs built in such as the extremely expensive F#1 Status processor (which is how Alpine justifies using the digital out on the head unit, and anyone with stuffed pockets) which contains the same K grade 96khz, 24 bit DACs used in the head unit, and retails for $4000. All processing remains in the digital realm until you reach the channel outputs. If you spend the cash on the F#1 head unit, you can justify the cost of the processor b/c for $1000 more (retail), it contains everything you'd ever want to do related to car audio drivers.

You the man kiki!

Stop it, you are making me drool.



Can you believe that thing has been sitting on my bedroom floor for over 2 weeks now?

My Explorer is sitting in the driveway completely gutted and sound deadened, no seats , no carpet, no nothin, hehe. I finally got the last piece of hardware from Knukonceptz and as soon as I can get hold of a 1" step bit I'll drill a new hole in the firewall for some 1/0 power wire and then be ready to rock and roll on the rest of the install.

This crap is taking me forever, lol. I tell you what. My appreciation of what the "professionals" do with installs has grown tremendously.

-Fishy

when it does become more common, staying digital will reduce heat and signal loss, it'll eliminate noise and lower noise floor as a result, and reduce cable runs etc..

Yeah, but to totally elimnate RCA's you'd need to have amps with DAC's. I don't know how practical that would be. Someone needs to design a really small external DAC that is easily mounted next to amps or maybe even plugs in "inline" with an analog amp's inputs. Something that plugged into a phantom power din(PPI/Orion) would be ideal.

H/u prices would drop dramatically and how "good" one was would simply depend on the quality/quantity of onboard DSP functions, but any old CD/DVD player with optical outs would sound great. Imagine the possibilties of going with a h/u that had zero analog circuitry; no preamp, let alone any Mosfet stuff. Talk about a dead head. And what if all factory decks came with a set of digital outs? How easy it would be to add aftermarket amps to a factory system then.

Somebody needs to be daring and get the ball rolling.

-Fishy

Fishy wrote:What about this one?

http://www.clarion.com/usa/products/sou ... Z9255.html

Its a dead-head with DSP functions that consist only of a 5 band PEQ, 4 way Xover, and 8 channel time alignment. It doesn't even have a removable faceplate.

:)

-Fishy

Stop it, you are making me drool.

lol, that's an exception in my book :)

in my case I'm using analog outs from the 7990. if you use the alpine F#1status signal processor and amplifiers, you keep a purely digital 6 channel data path for doing 5.1 AC3.. the stand alone processor takes the digital input and splits it out to a 6 channel amp or multiple amps or whatever without any phase shift or propagation issues associated with analog signal processing. personally I don't want video in a car so 2 channel is fine for me. I'm also not using Alpine's signal processing so I don't worry about the signal path staying digital.
On the other hand, some units like the Orion Concept 97.2 EQ do offer TOSlink input for optical data path.. but it's not a common feature at this point.

when it does become more common, staying digital will reduce heat and signal loss, it'll eliminate noise and lower noise floor as a result, and reduce cable runs etc.. basically you could run power, remote, and a single thin optical cable and have everything done till you wire the speakers. It's just a simpler, cleaner approach, but to be ideal, you need to keep everything digital from the CD pickup to the amplifiers..

Dayum, forgot about that.



-Fishy