Audiopraise VanityPro Review (HDMI Audio Extractor)

[Thomas Pfenning]

I had been looking at this box to solve my audio problems with the Xbox Series X. The video quality on an LG Oled screen for Bluray, Netflix, HBO Max, etc. is much better from the Xbox than what I can get out of my Windows PC.

However, the Xbox does no longer have a digital sound output and you are relegated to extract the audio from HDMI. The optical out fromt he LD display has an audio interruption every few seconds. I bought a couple of these cheap HDMI Audio extractors and one doe snot work at all and the second one also introduces interruptions.

I wonder whether this is a solution to achieve best picture quality and hires digital audio out. So here are my two questions. Has anyone tried this with an Xbox Series X and does it extract hires audio out of a Bluray or is everything downsampled?

 

[egradyh]

And this matters why?

Because my Berkeley DAC won't accept DSD so I have to convert it to PCM. Ultrasonic noise is a problem with DSD conversion above 24/88, unless it's filtered. With the VanityPro's filters I'm getting 24/176 for the first time from DSD.

Be



Riiiiight.

You'll notice Amir did not include a ('subjective') listening report on this one.

Your tone would be different if you have heard what I have. Which you haven't.

 

[aj625]

You actu

In the example above it's converting to 176kHz SR PCM. For heaven's sake, what is the worry? Above 22kHz is mostly noise anyway, and inaudible.
But DSD can certainly be 'captured' off of SACDs by certain SACD players using certain software, nowadays.

You actually get only 24bit 88.2khz from sacds not 176.4khz from certain players. Dsd to pcm conversion depends too much on the filter used for removing ultrasonic noise of dsd while converting from dsd64 to pcm. This filter in these universal player is just about ok. Most sacds are sourced are pcm anyway ( some even from cd quality pcm ) so there is not much point in sacd/dsd to pcm conversion again through these players.

 

[egradyh]

You actu

You get actually get only 24bit 88.2khz from sacds not 176.4khz from certain players. Dsd to pcm conversion depends too much on the filter used for removing ultrasonic noise of dsd while converting from dsd64 to pcm. This filter in these universal player is just about ok. Most sacds are sourced are pcm anyway ( some even from cd quality pcm ) so there is not much point in sacd/dsd to pcm conversion again through these players.

I agree that DSD conversion in universal players is ok at best. But one of my points is you can send DSD from a player, like my Oppo, as DSD and let the VP do the PCM conversion. With the ultrasonic noise filtered and at higher sampling rate than 24/88.

Your comment about SACD's not being pure DSD, in the vast majority of cases, is true. To be honest I don't believe anyone could hear any difference between PCM at 24/192 and DSD64 anyway. What I can say is SACD sounds much better in my system when I send DSD from my Oppo and use the VP to convert it to PCM at 24/176, than it did by letting the Oppo convert it to PCM at 24/88 and sending that to my GeerFAB Dbob. As my DAC, a Berkeley Alpha 3, won't accept DSD I have to convert it to PCM. As I'm an old school physical media person I'm looking for the best quality I can get from CD, SACD and Blu Ray audio. How the VP shakes out with computer audio I'll let others address.

The VP is designed to make HDMI audio feasible in a high end two channel audio system. It is the first product, to my knowledge, with that stated purpose. I acknowledge that my situation is somewhat unique, but the VP has checked all my boxes.

One last comment. I'm getting dropouts with high rez sources only, not from CD's. My DAC doesn't have the chip which is known to have dropouts with the VP. They're baffled by what is causing the problem, but they've been kind enough to work with me to find a solution. Hopefully they will as the last thing I want is to give up what it does.

 

[aj625]

Mojo 2 is released.

 

[jam]

So is SACD/DSD in AVRs officially DoP (DSD over PCM) out the HDMI?

I may have missed it but I haven't seen anyone directly answering your question.

If I understand you correctly, you're asking about which audio format will be transmitted out of the HDMI connector from a Blu-ray or DVD player into the AVRs HDMI input when playing back SACDs.

You'll have an option somewhere in your players menu to setup the output format for SACD playback. If you set it to "DSD", you'll have the DSD signal streamed out of the HDMI output. If you you choose a "PCM" setting, your player will convert the DSD data to PCM and output that out of the HDMI output. If you have an "Auto" setting, your player will interrogate the the receiver to find out what formats it supports and if it supports DSD over HDMI, it will usually send DSD, if not it will send PCM.

Then if your AVR has an option to decode DSD directly inside its internal DAC, which has been the case for many years with modern DAC chips, the DAC will decode the native DSD signal. However, if you apply even the most basic of DSP features such as bass management, PEQ or digital room correction (ARC, Audyssey, Dirac, etc.), your receiver will convert the DSD signal into PCM before processing the signal and you will loose DSD signal integrity if you care about that.

 

[krabapple]

You actu

You actually get only 24bit 88.2khz from sacds not 176.4khz from certain players.

"only"

Dsd to pcm conversion depends too much on the filter used for removing ultrasonic noise of dsd while converting from dsd64 to pcm.

As if you could hear it. Conversion to 88k SR(or higher!)/24 bits would have to be *really bad* for you to be able to hear it. Like, *broken*.

You know the original intention for DSD was to be an industrial archiving format, meant to be converted to CD rate (or multiples thereof) PCM for consumer use, right?

This filter in these universal player is just about ok. Most sacds are sourced are pcm anyway ( some even from cd quality pcm ) so there is not much point in sacd/dsd to pcm conversion again through these players.

Well, there is, if you either don't need stupid big file sizes, or beaucoup ultrasonic hash (that in worst case could actually cause distortion at output)

Most hardware SACD players have a plain old lowpass filter at their analog output. At either 100 or 50kHz.

 

[krabapple]

I agree that DSD conversion in universal players is ok at best.

In what reputably audible way is it only 'ok at best'?

But one of my points is you can send DSD from a player, like my Oppo, as DSD and let the VP do the PCM conversion. With the ultrasonic noise filtered and at higher sampling rate than 24/88.

Your comment about SACD's not being pure DSD, in the vast majority of cases, is true. To be honest I don't believe anyone could hear any difference between PCM at 24/192 and DSD64 anyway. What I can say is SACD sounds much better in my system when I send DSD from my Oppo and use the VP to convert it to PCM at 24/176, than it did by letting the Oppo convert it to PCM at 24/88 and sending that to my GeerFAB Dbob.

And surely that's due to the different sample rates.

 

[aj625]

"only"






As if you could hear it. Conversion to 88k SR(or higher!)/24 bits would have to be *really bad* for you to be able to hear it. Like, *broken*.

You know the original intention for DSD was to be an industrial archiving format, meant to be converted to CD rate (or multiples thereof) PCM for consumer use, right?



Well, there is, if you either don't need stupid big file sizes, or beaucoup ultrasonic hash (that in worst case could actually cause distortion at output)

Most hardware SACD players have a plain old lowpass filter at their analog output. At either 100 or 50kHz.

Problem is that once you convert dsd to pcm you can't do anything afterwards to the damage done by inferior filtering.

 

[aj625]

Dsd64/sacd was originally meant to be analog low pass filtered. Little did they know that digital processing of pcm will evolve so much in future so as to make dsd64 inferior even to cd quality files.

 

[pLudio]

Because my Berkeley DAC won't accept DSD so I have to convert it to PCM. Ultrasonic noise is a problem with DSD conversion above 24/88, unless it's filtered. With the VanityPro's filters I'm getting 24/176 for the first time from DSD.

SACD DSD64 noise is a problem already at 20 kHz. With 24/176 you'll only pass more noise to your DAC than with 24/88.

 

[pLudio]

If I understand you correctly, you're asking about which audio format will be transmitted out of the HDMI connector from a Blu-ray or DVD player into the AVRs HDMI input when playing back SACDs.

You'll have an option somewhere in your players menu to setup the output format for SACD playback. If you set it to "DSD", you'll have the DSD signal streamed out of the HDMI output.

But it's not DoP.

 

[lloyd84]

So... you could use this to feed multiple high quality dacs attached to monoblock amps which would each drive a single channel of a home theater setup. Hmmm. You'd have to be well-off to do it but it would mean much higher quality audio than an all-in-one surround amp can provide.

 

[Paulkouhan]

Hi,

I am using the vanity103hd card in my oppo 103d player for years :

https://www.audiopraise.com/forum/read.php?11,450

It replaced the 8 channel analogue board to offer 4 digital 2 channels spdif outputs.

That allows me to use the dac I want for my home cinema set up.
So my oppo can be used for high end stereo or high end multi channel audio.
(I use a nanodigi for room eq and bi-amplification for the L R channels)

I think the purpose of the vanity pro box is to offer the same possibilities to any player.

I think that it is a versatile solution.

I may buy one the day I want to go 4K.
I would like it to be able to deal with dolby atmos (5.1.2)

 

[PaulZH]

I would like it to be able to deal with dolby atmos (5.1.2)

From their forum:

The computational power of the FPGA is not unlimited and neither are our resources

so, please don't wish for Atmos, DTS-HD decoders or similar.

 

[Kal Rubinson]

So... you could use this to feed multiple high quality dacs attached to monoblock amps which would each drive a single channel of a home theater setup.

If you select one of the multichannel versions of the VanityPro.

You'd have to be well-off to do it but it would mean much higher quality audio than an all-in-one surround amp can provide.

That's the idea!

 

[krabapple]

Problem is that once you convert dsd to pcm you can't do anything afterwards to the damage done by inferior filtering.

Please describe this 'damage'.

 

[krabapple]

Dsd64/sacd was originally meant to be analog low pass filtered. Little did they know that digital processing of pcm will evolve so much in future so as to make dsd64 inferior even to cd quality files.

Again, how so? In what particular ways, preferably audible?

( I am no champion of DSD. But that's not because it inherently sounds 'inferior'.)

 

[krabapple]

Because my Berkeley DAC won't accept DSD so I have to convert it to PCM. Ultrasonic noise is a problem with DSD conversion above 24/88, unless it's filtered. With the VanityPro's filters I'm getting 24/176 for the first time from DSD.

Your tone would be different if you have heard what I have. Which you haven't.

It's not clear you have, either. For all the usual reasons which I'm sure you're familiar with, as most ASR posters are. (right?)

 

[egradyh]

It's not clear you have, either. For all the usual reasons which I'm sure you're familiar with, as most ASR posters are. (right?)

It's clear to me. Since you're flying deaf and blind you are in no position to say one way or another.