Is there a difference between toslink and digital coax?

[SPOautos]

Trying to decide which way to feed music to a Yamaha wxc-50. I can go Toslink or digital coax. I would just test it but I have to buy a 15' cable in one or the other. Just thought I'd get a consensus on if one type is better than the other. I'll be playing high res flac as well as Tidal master. It's only for dedicated 2 channel listening.

 

[oohlou]

Yamaha wxc-50 right? I opened the manual and it doesn't look like it supports coax. So that makes the decision easy right?

Even if it did support both:
It would depend on the bit depth the two interfaces support. Given the same bi depth I think optical is preferred since it guarantees there is no ground loop.

 

[SPOautos]

Yamaha wxc-50 right? I opened the manual and it doesn't look like it supports coax. So that makes the decision easy right?

Even if it did support both:
It would depend on the bit depth the two interfaces support. Given the same bi depth I think optical is preferred since it guarantees there is no ground loop.

Hmmm, looks like your correct....I just saw the digital coax plug, but reading online it appears it's only a output not a input.

I think the digital coax has a higher bit depth compared to optical, but not sure that it means it sounds better.

Either way, looks like I'm stuck on optical unless I do the d/a converting with the computer and go to the wxc-50 with rca. Hmmm, I wonder which would be better the wxc-50 or the audio of the Asus x99 Dekuxe ii motherboard?

 

[Blumlein 88]

There really is no difference in bit depth. Both can do 24 bit. Often optical toslink won't work past 96 khz sample rates. That isn't inherent to the format as a few devices can do 192 khz over Toslink. But many bits of gear don't have good enough optical parts to do that cleanly.

So there is no difference up to 24/96. Optical does have the already mentioned benefit of preventing groundloops.

The manual to the WXC-50 says up to 192 khz for the optical input. The question is whether your source will or not. Also keep the optical cable as short as is reasonable.

 

[Jimbob54]

Trying to decide which way to feed music to a Yamaha wxc-50. I can go Toslink or digital coax. I would just test it but I have to buy a 15' cable in one or the other. Just thought I'd get a consensus on if one type is better than the other. I'll be playing high res flac as well as Tidal master. It's only for dedicated 2 channel listening.

Ummmm- what role is the wxc playing in your system then- what are your sources of music? Presume you are using the streaming function and then just asking about some locally stored files on your PC you want to also play? But your comment about possibly feeding via RCA from PC has me confused.

 

[SPOautos]

Ummmm- what role is the wxc playing in your system then- what are your sources of music? Presume you are using the streaming function and then just asking about some locally stored files on your PC you want to also play? But your comment about possibly feeding via RCA from PC has me confused.

I have been using it for streaming Tidal from my phone and my turntable goes through it as well. It provides a volume control. However, now that I finally have a server setup with my music I can also run Tidal through the computer....for instance setup Roon which incorporates Tidal. I could hook it up directly to my amp with rca and use my phone with the Roon app to manage whats playing and volume control. The only real issue would be my turntable but honestly, I rarely use it and could easily just swap the rca's at the amp and set the level control at the amp to get the volume where I want....Ive used the turntable once in the past few months.

All that said, it would depend on sound quality between optical out from computer to the wxc-50 to the amp vs rca from computer directly to the amp. Maybe I should make a post about my motherboard sound quality and see if anyone knows about it (Asus x99 Deluxe ii ). Its supposed to be a pretty decent audio section as far as onboard audio goes... but no idea how it compares to the wxc-50.

 

[Jimbob54]

I have been using it for streaming Tidal from my phone and my turntable goes through it as well. It provides a volume control. However, now that I finally have a server setup with my music I can also run Tidal through the computer....for instance setup Roon which incorporates Tidal. I could hook it up directly to my amp with rca and use my phone with the Roon app to manage whats playing and volume control. The only real issue would be my turntable but honestly, I rarely use it and could easily just swap the rca's at the amp and set the level control at the amp to get the volume where I want....Ive used the turntable once in the past few months.

I wondered if that might be the case. Shame the yamaha stuff isn't roon ready and I doubt ever will be.